I was supposed to be the one who left people aching.
I had spent years learning how to build walls tall enough to keep the world out and deep enough to bury what little softness I had left. People didn't get under my skin-they bounced off it. I had a reputation for being untouchable.
But he?
He didn't touch my skin. He touched my mind. And that was so much worse.
That night outside the library, I should've walked away. I should've tossed back a clever line, flipped my hair, and left him standing there with nothing but his ego.
But when he looked at me with those eyes-those slow-burning eyes like ink spilling in water-I didn't see a man.
I saw the undoing I never knew I was craving.
...
He didn't ask for my number.
He didn't even ask if I wanted to see him again.
He just leaned in closer, like he was testing the limits of my restraint, and said, "You'll come to me when you're ready."
I wanted to laugh in his face. Scoff. Tell him he didn't matter.
But my throat had locked up, and the only thing I could do was nod like some hypnotized girl in a romance I'd always pretended not to like.
When he walked away, the chill left in his place made me realize just how warm his presence had been.
And it pissed me off.
Because no man should have that kind of power.
...
I tried to go back to normal.
Classes. Coffee. Fake laughs with classmates who didn't really know me. It should've been easy-he wasn't even part of my world.
Except he was now.
In the way I paused before choosing my perfume. In the way my fingers hovered over dark lipsticks instead of nudes. In the way I started wearing heels, even when my feet screamed.
Because maybe-just maybe-he'd be watching.
And God, wasn't that pathetic?
But even knowing that didn't stop the ache from growing. The ache to see him again. To prove I could handle him. That I wasn't just some pretty girl who got shaken by a deep voice and the promise of destruction.
...
The next time I saw him, it wasn't planned.
I was sitting in a campus café, reading a book I wasn't really absorbing, when he slid into the seat across from me like he'd been invited.
He didn't say a word.
Just watched me.
Slowly. Intentionally. Like every glance was a stroke over my soul.
"You know," he said, after what felt like an eternity, "for someone who claims not to want trouble, you sure keep looking for it."
"I'm not looking for anything," I lied.
He smirked.
"Sweetheart," he murmured, fingers tapping the edge of my table like a slow heartbeat, "you're starving. And I? I'm the only thing on your menu."
I hated how he said it. I hated how right he was.
But most of all?
I hated that I was already begging in silence.
...