“You went on a date the other night.” He put the Audi in first gear before letting out the clutch and pulling up the emergency brake.
“Well, that wasn’t a date date,” I fumbled, feeling guilty about Mr. Wrong Number. “And we weren’t—”
“I know.” He looked over at me, and I saw his jaws clench slightly. “But I didn’t like it.”
My heart kicked up as his eyes pulled me in. He’d been jealous? Over me? I tucked my hair behind my ears and said, “I’d never even met—”
“I didn’t like it.” The smell of his cologne found its way to my nose and filled me with hot memories of his skin as he looked into my eyes.
“Well.” I cleared my throat, shaken by whatever the hell was happening, and said, “Let’s agree to be exclusive until we’re done with this, then.”
His lips curved into a smile, but it didn’t hit his eyes. “You always have to add the ‘until it’s over,’ don’t you?”
“I do.”
“Fine.” He turned off the car and opened his door. “Little shit.”
That made me laugh again, and as we stepped into the elevator, I grabbed his hand and slid my fingers between his. That made him look down at me in surprise, and his face was so sweet I kind of thought I was going to melt.
The second the elevator doors closed, Colin’s mouth was on mine and he slammed my body against the wall with his. Not hard enough to hurt me, but deliberate enough to make me instantly weak in the knees. His big hands held my face, his fingers partially in my hair as his mouth did its thing.
Sweet holy heaven, I was defenseless.
His hard body pressed against me and I dug my hands into his hair, needing as I breathed him, tasted him, felt him in every nerve ending in my body.
“Mm . . . button.” I pulled my mouth free but that just made him bite my neck, which made me moan, “God, isn’t there an elevator stop button, Col?”
He lifted his head long enough to say, “You want to stop the elevator?”
I looked into his eyes, and he looked disoriented and disheveled and absolutely delicious.
I just nodded.
Which made his nostrils flare and his eyes ignite.
And then the damned elevator dinged.
I jumped out of his arms and ran a hand over my hair as the doors opened and yes, we were still just in the garage. A man in hospital scrubs smiled at us as he got in and pushed the button to my floor.
Awesome. Apparently we were neighbors.
I looked down at the floor as the elevator went up. If I looked at Colin I’d either laugh, shrivel up in embarrassment, or just jump on him, witness be damned. Not that I particularly cared what my doctor neighbor thought of me, but my terrible clearly-about-to-have-sex-in-the-elevator neighborly first impression was a symptom of a bigger problem.
I couldn’t say no to Colin anymore.
No matter what I said about us, all he had to do was touch me or kiss me or flirt in that deep, sexy tone, and I would follow him into a fathomless ocean and I literally couldn’t swim. （Ask my mother—she was still pissed that she’d paid for five years of childhood swimming lessons where I’d refused to go in the deep end. That was her legendary beef with me.）
But it wasn’t just that Colin had the upper hand in this whole fling, it was that I had no hand.
Not even a strong pinkie finger.
I glanced up and he was leaning against the wall, just staring at me with a look so scaldingly hot that my muscles all turned to jelly. I swallowed before returning my gaze back to the floor.
This just wouldn’t do.
I looked at the illuminated elevator numbers out of the corner of my eye—two more floors.
And as we rode up those last two floors, I came up with a plan of protection.
See, the problem, in my opinion, was that all of it was too much at once.
If it were just sex, I could handle it because it was purely physical.
If it were just a date, I could handle it because it was purely fun.
If I kept them separate, I thought I could somehow manage to keep feelings from growing too big and overtaking everything else. I was already in way deeper than I should be, but with a little tweaking, maybe I would be okay.
Colin
We stepped out of the elevator behind the guy, and I wondered if he’d been able to feel how badly I wanted to wring his fucking neck. Technically he’d done nothing wrong, but Liv had just told me to stop the elevator.
She’d wanted to have sex with me in the elevator, and I’d damn near dropped to my knees when the power of her nod landed a killer punch to my midsection.