Page 6 of City of Liars

Theo sat for a moment, deliberating. And then he put his fingers to the keys and began to play, the notes rising into the space between us. Another classic: Simon and Garfunkel’s The Sound of Silence, a song I’d always loved.

He ducked his head, his hair falling into his eyes as his voice filled the room, singing about communing with darkness and walking alone. He sang as if the song had personal meaning, his voice lingering on each syllable. Mesmerized, I drifted toward him as he sang about loneliness and prophets’ words scrawled on the walls of subways and tenements. I’d thought he was sexy before, but this was different—like he was giving me a glimpse into his soul.

His fingers stilled and his eyes met mine, the expression in them open and raw. He opened his mouth to speak, and before I could overthink it, I leaned down and stopped whatever he’d been about to say with a kiss. He tasted intoxicating, like whiskey and spearmint gum.

Theo froze. And then he reached for me, cupping my face in his palms. His skin was hot against mine, almost feverish. I wound my fingers in his hair and he moaned, an eager sound that elicited the same from me. My pulse picked up, pounding until I was sure he could feel it.

I jerked back from him, trying to pull myself together. It didn’t help: He looked sexier than ever, his black hair tousled and his eyes half-lidded. That brow of his arched again in a question.

Atomic only had a single window, and we were nowhere in sight of it. Still, I couldn’t help feeling like an exhibitionist. “Maybe we shouldn’t… Aren’t you worried someone’s going to come in?” I said, in a belated attempt at prudence.

He grinned at me—not the shy smile from earlier, but a cocky smirk that didn’t make him any less alluring. “Nope. I own the bar. And Jonas locked the door when he left.”

“You...what? You own the⁠—”

“Atomic is mine,” he clarified. “And we’re closed. No one is coming in unless you and I want them to. And right now, all I want is to kiss you again. May I?”

I met his hazel eyes and saw nothing in their depths but sincerity and undeniable desire. After everything, I deserved to have a man look at me that way. I deserved this.

My doubts dissolved. “When you put it like that—yes,” I whispered.

“Good,” he whispered back, and then he tugged me down to him.

I gasped, and his tongue slid into my mouth, a slow, sensuous licking that had me craving more. He rose from the piano bench, tilting my head back to deepen the kiss, one hand settling on my hip with a possessive grip that sent heat curling through my belly.

I shifted, restless, and he nipped my lower lip in reprimand, then soothed the sting with his fingertip. I nipped him back, a challenge, and his eyes met mine, their hazel shade gone midnight-dark. His hand tightened on my hip, pulling me closer, and I shivered at the weight of him, hard, against me. Fire seared through my veins, chasing away logic and any remaining second thoughts.

I wasn’t the kind of woman who made out with random strangers in a deserted bar. I hadn’t been that person before my disastrous marriage and afterward, every potential date had come with a pro-and-con list. I wasn’t careless, or impulsive, or reckless.

And yet, I wanted Theo. I wanted to stop thinking, to start feeling, to do something just for me. He didn’t know who I was, about my family, my daughter, my divorce, my career. He just wanted me, and it was liberating. Freeing.

“Liv?” he said, his voice low. “Okay?”

That honey-over-gravel tone of his sent another shiver through me. “More than okay,” I told him, meaning it. “Freaking great.”

Relief flashed through his eyes as he brushed his lips over mine in acknowledgment. This kiss was different, almost tender. And yet there it was again: that incendiary chemistry, heightening with each stroke of his tongue and glide of his fingertips across my skin.

I’d always thought the idea of a kiss making you weak in the knees was a Disney cliché, but my legs shook, threatening to dump me onto the floor. He caught me, his laughter a low murmur that echoed in the empty room. Then he was walking me backward, his hands buried in my hair, his mouth on mine. We hit something solid, which jangled in protest. His piano.

Theo lifted me, laying me down on top of it as if I were made of spun glass. His body slid over mine, his lips ghosting down my neck to my collarbone. Beneath us, the keys played a discordant complaint.

His finger caught the strap of my dress, pulling it off my shoulder. He trailed a line of kisses down my arm, leaving a tingling sensation behind, and I hitched a leg over his hip. The taste of whiskey swam through my head, but instead of swallowing the world in a haze, each detail clarified—the cold wood of the piano, the warmth of Theo’s body.

His fingers twined in my hair, yanking the bobby pins loose so they cascaded in a hail to the floor. His words were heated whispers against my skin. “So beautiful...just let me…”

I fought the urge to pinch myself. How had I gone from the nightmarish dinner with Mustache Man to a seduction straight out of a romance novel? This was someone else’s life, not mine. I couldn’t even remember the last time I’d felt this way: a pure physical embodiment of mutual desire, not Chloe’s mom or therapist par excellence or Gray’s beleaguered ex-spouse.

“God.” He ran his hands over me, tracing my shape, then tugged at the other strap of my dress, a question. “Please,” he said, his fingers stilling.

The heck with worrying how this might look or how I would feel about it tomorrow. Emboldened by Shiraz and secondhand whiskey, I undid the strap and let it fall.

Theo gave a low rumble of appreciation, and I arched against him, eager. I didn’t recognize the woman I was in this moment, confident and unafraid to ask for what she needed. Even if she—if this—was gone in the morning, I wanted to savor every second of it.

“I want you,” I told him, a sentence I’d never said aloud before. If I were living in a romance novel for the night, I might as well lean into the fantasy.

I expected it to sound ridiculous. But the growl he made, the hunger with which his mouth took mine, told me Theo didn’t find it ridiculous at all. His hands went to his jeans, which fell to the side in a clatter of keys and phone and belt buckle, and then he was stretched full-length on top of me, heavy and warm.

He met my eyes, asking for permission, and I nodded, my heart pounding with anticipation. Then he was fumbling in his wallet for a condom, hazel eyes darker still with desire, and I was guiding him over me, into me, and he was filling me, moving slow and then faster, a delicious, addictive friction.