face, glinting against the coal-black silk of his hair. “Took me all night to work up the nerve to ask you,” he added wryly, the corners of his dark eyes crinkling as he grinned. “Imagine how crushed I’d have been if you’d turned me down.”
She blinked, and his grin turned boyishly crooked, dazzling her with its beauty, making some forgotten part of her want to smile in response, though she fought against it. Elise knew he was teasing her, trying to put her at ease, and in another lifetime, words would have slipped from her lips like silk, either cutting or flirtatious in response, depending on her mood. But the woman with the ready comeback was gone.
Perhaps not an entirely bad thing, she reflected with an inward wince, seeing as how that woman had often been obsessively self-centered...and not very nice.
“Come on,” he murmured, gently taking her elbow and steering her toward the dance floor. He was being careful with her, tender in his touch and manner, and it made her want to snap at him, while at the same time she couldn’t help but be embarrassingly grateful.
Oh, yeah. You are so-o-o losing your mind.
Not surprising, she supposed, considering the fact he was so freaking hot her brain cells were melting by the second. She couldn’t even draw in a deep enough breath, the humidity rising around them like a sultry mist as the distant rumble of storms drew closer. Despite the chill of the breeze, the air lay heavy and damp against her skin, thick with lust and anticipation and the mouthwatering scent of Wyatt Pallaton. A provocative combination of musk and salt and the wild outdoors, he smelled unbelievably delicious, and she wanted to lean closer, drawing more of that heady scent into her lungs, while at the same time she wanted to do everything she could to escape it. Trapped between the opposing urges, she somehow managed to reach the dance floor without stumbling, aware of the curious glances being sent their way from the other guests, but unable to truly focus on anything beyond the feel of his hand on her arm, his long, strong fingers hot against her skin, while that decadent scent screwed with her head.
The second her feet touched the polished surface of the parquet floor, panic slammed into her with the stunning force of a bullet. “Wait!” she blurted, suddenly drawing back. He stopped and turned so that he stood facing her, but she didn’t dare look him in the eye, careful to keep her wild gaze focused on the snowy-white front of his shirt. He’d removed his jacket and tie earlier in the night and undone the shirt’s top button, revealing just a hint of his smooth, burnished chest. “I’m sorry,” she said thickly, staring at that bare glimpse of skin, “but I don’t think I can do this.”
“Just a dance, Elise. That’s all I’m asking for.” Then he was taking her into his arms, and she had to bite her lip to keep from moaning at the sudden chaotic rush of emotion. It was such a consuming, overwhelming sensation, being held by a man again, and her breath caught with a sharp, audible gasp as he pulled her against the hardness and heat of his muscular body, her head spinning as her senses went into some kind of cataclysmic meltdown.
Trying to remember how to breathe, she placed her hands on his broad shoulders, the soft cotton of his shirt warm beneath her palms, and took a quick glance up at his face to find him watching her, his expression fierce...intense...and yet, somehow impossibly gentle. “I’m dizzy,” she whispered, her pulse racing, frenzied and out of control.
“It’s okay. I’ve got you,” he told her, his beautiful mouth shaping the words, making them sound like something seductive and wicked as he spun her in a sudden turn that pulled a soft, startled burst of shaky laughter from her lips. “See, it’s not so hard to have a little fun, is it?”
She blinked, dazed, too much going on inside her body and mind to focus on any one thing. “I didn’t...I don’t dance,” she explained in a strangled whisper, when what she meant was that she didn’t let men get this close to her. Ever.
“I know,” he replied, and the slightly rough cadence of his words made her shiver with awareness, at the same time something thick and hot began to slip through her veins. She had the strangest suspicion that he was responding more to her unspoken thought than the one she’d voiced aloud, and an uneasy feeling swept through her as she wondered just how much he knew about her. About her past and the things that had happened to her.
He pulled her a shade closer, until his strong thighs were brushing against hers, her breasts pressed to the firm surface of his chest, and Elise could have sworn she could feel the powerful beating of his heart. Her breasts felt heavy, swollen, the rise of desire like a hothouse flower unfurling inside her body, and there was a part of her—a strange, primal, frightening part—that wanted to stretch her arms and back in a sinuous arch and melt against him, languid and soft and hungry. That wanted to hold her face up to a warm spring shower and feel it misting against her skin, wetting their clothes, until steam rose from the heat of their flesh. That wanted to rip that crisp white shirt from his lean, hard-muscled physique and press her open mouth to the pounding, urgent beat of his heart. Push her fingers through the thick strands of his silky hair and pull his mouth to hers, unleashing the primitive, predatory hunger she knew lurked inside him.
God, she just wanted. Wanted so badly she could have screamed.
“But you’re enjoying yourself,” he murmured, jarring her back to reality with the deep, rich, slightly gritty tone of his voice as they swayed to the music. “Aren’t you glad you didn’t tell me no?”
Surprising herself, she snuffled another soft laugh under her breath. “You’re very sure of yourself, Pallaton.”
“Call me Wyatt.”
She shifted her gaze, staring over his left shoulder, feeling as if his dark, onyx-colored eyes could see straight into her. “I thought everyone called you Pallaton or Pall?”
“They do.” From the edge of her vision, Elise watched the corner of his mouth lift in a devastatingly sexy, purely male smile. “But I want you to call me Wyatt.”
“I’m going to call you desperate if you don’t stop,” she warned him, hoping like hell that her face wasn’t actually as red as it felt.
“Stop what?” he asked, angling his head slightly to the side as he tried to recapture her gaze.
“All of this,” she said, fully aware that she sounded like an idiot. “Trying to dazzle me with your manliness and charm.”
“Oh, yeah? Is it working?” He kept his expression carefully blank, though she could see the glitter of humor in his dark gaze.
She rolled her eyes. “Like I’d tell you if it was.”
His head went back as a low, rich chuckle rumbled up from his chest, and her toes curled in her heeled sandals at the pure carnality of the sound. How did he do it, make a laugh sound like some kind of insidious new form of seduction?
Though she tried so hard to fight it, everything that he did made her feel drunk on lust, the hunger heavy in her body, like a weighty thing inside of her. The flash of his smile. The smoldering intensity in his dark eyes and the way they did that sexy crinkle thing at the corners when he grinned. She’d heard he was considered the tamest of the Runners, at times even stoic. The most easygoing of a volatile bunch. But being close to him, talking to him, Elise couldn’t help but wonder if the people who held that opinion of Wyatt Pallaton knew him at all. Were they blind? Because from where she was standing, there wasn’t a safe, easygoing thing about the man.
Desperate to regain control of herself and the situation, Elise asked a question that had been playing in the back of her mind for the past hour, slowly driving her crazy. “I saw you and Michaela on the dance floor earlier. Doesn’t it bother Brody when you dance with his wife?”
His hands shifted, one resting against the small of her back, while the other stroked its way up her spine until it reached the edge of her bodice, his thumb brushing against her bare skin in a slow, sensual caress. Her gaze shot immediately back to his, and she watched the groove form between his dark brows as he asked, “Why should it bother him?”
Suddenly, she wished she’d just kept her big mouth shut. Thanks to her friendship with Max Doucet, Michaela’s