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My hand left my knee, and I shocked myself when it landed on his thigh.
“I’ve literally been hiding my heart and covering my eyes so something like this couldn’t transpire. And then you came along, and to put it bluntly, you charmed the pants off me, and everything I’d been attempting to avert all went to hell.”
My fingers began to tingle, and I pulled them back, squeezing them into a fist.
“Here’s the thing, Brady. You’re the first man to ever make me feel anything. And in the year since I dated, you’re the first man to make me want to give my body to someone. You broke through a barrier that I never intended to lower.”
How could I describe this? How could I make him comprehend the gravity of what I was saying without opening a wound and exposing him to the current I’d been drowning in?
“That probably sounds a little off the wall, doesn’t it? Here’s a woman who’s been uninterested in men for an unreasonable amount of time, and I’m still in a place where I can’t handle anything and?—”
“You’re making sense.” His stare was softening. “Keep going.”
I looked toward the lobby, viewing the faces that had recently walked in, the ones heading for the elevators, the new additions to the bar.
Even though the anxiousness was building in my stomach, I continued, “When I look at you, I see someone—ah!” My hand went to my shoulder as the pain shot through my muscle, my chest tightening into a ball as the wind was practically knocked out of me.
What just happened?
Brady immediately stood and reached behind me. “Are you fucking kidding me? Don’t you see her sitting here?” he snapped to whoever he was gripping. “Are you okay?” he asked me.
I nodded.
“Lily, are you sure?”
“Yes,” I replied.
My brain slowly started to piece together the last few seconds—the ache, the movement, Brady’s reaction—and I figured out that someone had slid in between my chair and the one behind mine. There wasn’t enough room, which had earned me an arm—or a sharp, pointed elbow—to the shoulder to give them more space.
But before I could take a breath, I peeked behind me to see who the culprit was. When I saw it was a man I didn’t recognize, I gasped in some air.
“Dude,” the guy huffed, “I’ve been waiting forever for a drink and?—”
“I don’t care how long you’ve been waiting. That doesn’t make it all right to squeeze into a spot where there’s no room and hurt someone in the process,” Brady barked at him. “Apologize to the lady.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re not even looking at her.” Brady’s eyes were rabid. “Say it to her face.”
The space in the back of me was suddenly vacant, the body that had been wedged in there was gone, and he came to my front. Brady’s hand was still clamped on the man’s arm, his expression telling me he was being forced to do something he didn’t want.
“I’m sorry,” he groaned.
I was still rubbing my shoulder. “It’s okay.”
“It’s not okay,” Brady said. “But get the hell out of here.”
The guy walked away, but Brady remained standing, his eyes glued on the man until he must have been pleased with his distance, and that was when he finally sat.
He massaged the back of my hand. “Are you sure you’re all right?”
That was a loaded question.
Because physically, yes, I was fine.
But mentally, I was processing the intricate layers of Brady Spade.
A man who hardly knew anything about me.
