‘All right. Take the video into Village Pictures,’ I say. ‘I want you to. Just let me run it past my agent first, but I think she’ll be all for it.’
The faintest trace of a smile touches Kye’s lips, and that alone is enough to drain the strength from my knees.
‘Stop doing that,’ I say softly, my gaze slipping to his mouth.
‘Stop doing what?’
‘Smiling.’
Surprise flashes in his eyes, warming them up. ‘I didn’t smile.’
‘Good. Some of us are trying to think straight around here. A distraction like that doesn’t help.’
A light laugh sneaks out of him, and now there’s no hope of avoiding it. He holds his hand over his mouth. ‘I thought you liked it when I smiled. What was it you said?You should do that more often.’
I catch my face in my palms.
‘You have the most beautiful smile I’ve ever seen,’ Kye continues. ‘It’s actually ridiculous how stunning it is.’
I groan. ‘Please stop.’
‘Don’t waste it.’
I free my face from my hands and feel the blush searing my cheeks as I gaze up at him. Only when he’s alone with me have I seen him smile like this—dimples showing, eyes shining, tongue playing a little with his teeth. Never when Austin’s there, too.
‘And I meant it,’ I say softly.
A tender look seeps into Kye’s eyes, and I wish I could erase the hesitation, the self-imposed torture, that lives in his face, but I can’t. The same way I can’t extinguish the uncertainty, the fear, that’s made a home in my chest.
‘I don’t want to be owned, Evie,’ Kye suddenly utters, and something about his voice—the aching desperation that underpins it—knocks all the air out of my lungs.
Stepping right up to him, I reach for the arm hanging by his side and slowly, cautiously, weave my fingers through his. His grasp curls tightly into mine, and I bring our joined hands to my mouth.
Taking my time, I kiss each one of his knuckles. His eyes grow heavy as he fixes them steadily on my mouth.
Now that I’m touching him, I can’t seem to stop.
I let go of his hand and lightly track my fingers up his stomach over his white shirt, feeling him shiver against me. A sigh rolls out of his throat as I trace my fingers higher and higher, brushing the length of his silk tie and hesitating only when I reach the loosened knot resting against his neck.
‘Why is everything about you so irresistible?’ I murmur, my gaze lingering on the patch of bare skin above his tie, then drifting down to the contours of his shirt where it sits against his muscles.
His cheeks flush and his pupils darken as I begin untying the knot.
‘Do you want me to stop?’ I ask.
Kye shakes his head. When I ask myself the same question, my answer is a resoundingno. I don’t want to stop. As if it were a song, I want to tune in and listen to the rhythms of my body, which, right now, is thrumming a tune of quiet desperation.
I return to my task with shaky fingers, loosening Kye’s tie until it hangs lower around his neck. I give the thinner strap a tug, and the silk comes undone and drops into my hand.
‘You know, I’ve been thinking,’ I say with a tremble. ‘And I think I’ve realised what might be the issue here. I feel like you think a littletoomuch about certain things.’ I stretch the tie between my hands and lift the fabric to Kye’s eyes. ‘So … maybe if you can’t see me, you can forget who I am and all the reasons you think we shouldn’t be doing this.’
With a burst of the confidence that Kye seems to draw out of me, I carefully fasten the tie around his head, covering his eyes and ruffling up his hair. He makes no move to stop me.
‘I could never forget you,’ he says, and I almost kiss him then, but I hold back.
His perfectly fitted shirt looks like it was made for a body like his, and I can’t resist cupping the firm ridges of his shoulders and running my palms down his arms. What’s even more tempting is how his lips are parted—they’re just wide enough for me to see his tongue sitting at the front of his mouth, like he’s hungry for something.
He sighs as I press the pad of my thumb to his pouty bottom lip, gently guiding it open until I can’t resist anymore. I replace my thumb with my mouth, covering his lips with my own. He groans as our tongues catch, heat licking up my spine. Every bone in my body disintegrates as he wraps his arms around my lower back and hauls me tighter against him, our mouths crushing together like we can’t get close enough.
