Series: Cobalt Empire Series by Krista Ritchie
Total pages in book: 220
Estimated words: 215301 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1077(@200wpm)___ 861(@250wpm)___ 718(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 215301 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1077(@200wpm)___ 861(@250wpm)___ 718(@300wpm)
I ache to move with him on and off the dance floor. The crowd jumps and grinds, getting more animated. The remixes are flaming my lungs. From “Be My Lover” by La Bouche to “Can’t Get You Out of My Head” by Kylie Minogue. These songs—the universe is seriously fucking playing with me.
Not funny.
I should’ve invited Eliot and Luna. Less temptation tonight, but I just thought Phoenix and I are so close to the goal line. Do not need to introduce a powder keg yet. Let’s wait.
I take a bigger swig of rum to cool off. Hair sticks to the sweat building on my forehead, and I slide my fingers through the damp strands, brushing them back.
Phoenix turns to me and cups a hand around my ear. I rotate more toward him. His warm breath shoots electricity through me, and the hard muscles of his chest press against mine. “Do you feel that bass?”
I’m mostly focused on his hand against my ear, but I nod.
“It feels like it’s traveling through my body,” Phoenix says, energized. “I want that feeling for seven.”
Seven. The seventh song. His love of music fists my heart. “I want that too!” I yell over the DJ. His shadowed smile dizzies me more than the hypnotic thumping around us.
Bodies suddenly crowd closer as more people pack the dance floor, and instead of being pushed apart, Phoenix shifts behind me. I can feel him dancing with the hive-like masses, and I stay in the beat with him.
I start losing myself to the moment, to the crimson strobe lights sweeping us, to the brush of his chest against my back, and to the tantalizing closeness of his hands against my hands.
He rests an arm on my shoulder, giving me the best view of the tattoo on his bicep. Inked in an old Roman script are two words: play on.
I’d asked him one night during a writing session what it meant. We were sitting next to one another on the same side of a booth, my laptop flipped open in front of us and headphones around both our necks.
“It’s a quote,” he said. “From Shakespeare.”
“Yeah, right. You’re just saying that because—”
“Because it’s the truth,” Phoenix said, cutting me off. He knocked his knee against mine, and his eyes fastened on me. “But please tell me why I chose it, since you were there with me three years ago in Boston.”
I stifled a grin. “Fair. But you do know my family loves Shakespeare, right? It’s basically a Wiki fact.”
“I basically don’t care,” he told me, but he held out his bicep for me anyway. He let me graze my thumb against the tattoo. “You know the quote then?”
I nodded. “Twelfth Night. ‘If music be the food of love, play on.’”
His lips gradually rose into a smile. One that lingered and felt intimate in its existence near me. That smile slowly embedded itself inside my head.
Here, on the dance floor, the memory gives me a sudden idea for our album name. Before I can even consider sharing my epiphany, people begin shoving closer to the DJ, and Phoenix’s arm on my shoulder crawls down my chest. He draws me against him, my back melding against his chest and abdomen. Thank fuck he can’t see the flush scorch my face. My eyes are on the DJ.
I wonder if Phoenix’s eyes are on me.
I don’t twist around to see. I just feel him take bumps against his back as dancers crowd forward. He stays rooted in place, not letting me fall into the mini-skirt-clad girls in front of me.
When people settle into their spots, I try to drown in the music and not him, but he’s dancing right up against me and I’m dancing right up against him. Feeling him hold me from behind has my mind in a fucking blender.
I should stop thinking.
I should just enjoy this, right?
I’m scared. I think I’m terrified of what happens if I give myself to someone who holds the keys to my dreams.
His strong hands slide down to my waist, and I drop my gaze and distinguish the ink on his fingers that curl around my sweltering, thrumming body. Right hand: L.I.V.E …and then the left hand: H.E.R.E.
Live.
Here.
My lips try to part; a strange, aching breath jettisons out of me. I’m so fucking grateful it’s too loud to hear whatever noise just left my body. I am losing it, especially as I picture his hand between my shoulder blades. As I picture him pushing me down so he can take me from behind—I need to face him.
I can’t let my imagination run away from me. Not while I’m literally with him. So I spin around while I sip my rum and Fizz. Still dancing—we’re still dancing together, only now his eyes are caressing.
Mine are roaming. I love how he’s staring at me. Like he understands exactly who I am, like he could even love me for all the parts other people would prefer to throw away. Riling, demanding, obsessive, dramatic Tom Carraway.