[[[ LIV ]]]
This shitty club wasn't worth the time I'd wasted getting here. It hadn't even taken that long either- just sucked that much.
I'd promised my roommate I would come see her band play, even though her overbearing enthusiasm for togetherness was an incessantly frustrating wet towel on my sex drive. They'd opened and I could probably leave now without causing any tension but seeing her band hadn't truly ever been the motivation for this excursion.
I swirled the straw in my drink again, glancing down the length of the bar for a willing victim once more but only finding disappointment. I sighed, resigned to unlikely failure and settling in to wait for the show to end so I could go home and try to take the edge off this madness myself I had to do something about the mounting tension and aggression stirring in me. I could give in to the trouble that beckoned, and dance with the danger always tempting me. Trouble I was too happy to make if I couldn't find it.
Or I could find a willing body to share their bed with me. Either way, a divey music club that straddled the hip side of town and the questionable one seemed like just the answer I'd hoped for and was the only reason I'd agreed to come. To quiet the lust inside me. Violence or sex, I wanted my fill. It usually didn't matter to me if I spent my energy on a man or a woman as long as they were willing to worship my body the way I craved. But tonight I wanted something specific.
Tonight, I craved a careful balance of danger and sex. Tonight, I needed power and strength.
Tonight, I needed-
I needed the gorgeous man two tables away from the bar who had somehow escaped my notice until now. But now that I was noticing him, I couldn't stop. I couldn't figure out how I'd missed him before.
I zeroed in on him. My prey. But this man did not look like prey- he looked like sex.
His leather jacket looked soft and buttery from this distance, smooth and poured for a perfect fit over his broad shoulders and hugging biceps that seemed impossibly defined through the material. The profile of his face was silhouetted in the dim light and though I couldn't make out his features clearly, his prominent jawline and nose cut elegant shadows into the light around him and I wanted to chase them as they danced across his stubble and dark brow.
I got to my feet, throwing back my drink and my shoulders in one fluid motion, and moved down the bar toward him. He seemed absorbed in his own mind, something brooding and intense in the way he held his full mouth against the rim of his glass as he drank. I watched the slide of amber liquid until it disappeared past wet pink lips. I couldn't have torn my gaze from the rhythmic way he swallowed if the club was on fire. It wasn't, but I might be. The burn of him went straight through me like flames, settling in a roiling burn between my thighs that reignited my determination.
"This seat taken?" I asked him, allowing the fire inside me to show in my slow, appreciative assessment of his now-defined features as he met my gaze. Dark, brooding eyes with thick lashes that didn't miss the way I studied him. Lips so full my mouth practically watered. High cheekbones and a broad nose carved from honey skin and that jaw. The sharpness of it was only muted by a sprinkling of stubble along his chin. He took me in for a moment, curiosity and wariness fighting for dominance in his features for a moment before he shook his head once to indicate it wasn't. He gestured to the empty chair and I sat without further invitation.
"This band sucks," I offered bluntly, watching amusement spark in those dark eyes as he smiled vaguely.
"They do," his voice was deep and melodic, an accent I couldn't place adding to the flames inside me that turned into a raging wildfire when a wry smile quirked his full lips, "but the next one won't."
"Is that so?" I turned to face him fully, making no attempt to disguise the way my gaze travelled over his face and broad chest, pausing briefly on the hint of tattoos at the hem of his tank top. He nodded but didn't elaborate, just folded his hands together protectively around his mostly empty glass and watched me until my unbreakable confidence began to waver. His gaze didn't travel my face, or my mostly on display body. The leather leggings I'd chosen were practically painted on and the plain black tank top flowed over my chest like silk. Fitting, since it was silk. I called it my cat suit and it never failed me when I went on the prowl. A choker and black booties with silver studs and chains completed the look, my silvery blonde hair offering contrast to the moody outfit. I was dressed to kill and his laser focus on my face instead of that fact would maybe kill me instead. I waited a beat longer for him to speak before relenting to his silence, "I'm Liv."
"Colin."
His name was almost as sexy as he was. Though it appeared he wasn't an overly talkative dude since we lapsed into silence once more as we both sipped our drinks and listened to the shitty band while I thought about how to break the tension. His large hands dwarfed the glass between them, and I mentally mapped the thick veins that ran across them and up his muscular forearms until they disappeared beneath his pushed-up jacket sleeves. I noted more tattoos peeking there as well.
This man was a treasure map I wanted to memorize. I bit my lip as I imagined doing just that. Committing him to memory with my mouth, my touch.
"Do you wanna dance?" I blurted. I'm not usually much of a dancer but the drive to get my hands on this man ran so deep I didn't care. Besides, dancing is just fucking with music and clothes on right?
I hoped, at least.
He watched me steadily for a moment, his face still and dark eyes unreadable until I thought he was going to say no. Then he shrugged and got to his feet, smiling the first real smile I'd seen from him yet. We danced a few feet apart for the last couple of songs and when the shitty band finally left the stage, I offered to get us a drink. A flicker of surprise crossed his face and he nodded, leaning close to my ear to say, "I'll have whatever you're having."
I ordered us each a shot of top shelf scotch, guessing that was the amber liquid in his glass when I'd first approached him. I took a deep breath and nodded a thanks to the bartender, collecting my rampant lust and nerves before returning to Colin on the dance floor.
[[[ COLIN ]]]
I was pleasantly surprised and relieved when Liv offered to get us drinks. Rare was the woman who didn't wait around for me to make the move but it didn't seem that this one had the word wait in her vocabulary at all.
She'd approached my table with a fiery confidence nearly as irresistible as the ass that I watched sway with every step as she walked toward the bar. I'd come to this club alone, and planned to leave that way. But I saw the way she was watching me. Like I was something to be devoured, and she was starving.
Lust screamed from every pour and I was drunk on it from the moment she opened that pretty mouth of hers, her voice liquefying my thoughts and hardening my dick in an instant. I wasn't going home alone if she had anything to say about it and every cell in my body seemed to enthusiastically believe that she did.
"Here you go," her silky voice pulled me out of the thoughts I was drowning in and I turned to see her beside me, a glass of something dark in her outstretched hand.
Her delicate fingers were manicured with something sharp and black. In fact, most of her attire was sharp and black. It took a whole lot of restraint to keep my eyes focused on her face instead of the dangerous curves of her body in those painted on pants she wore and the deep v of her top that somehow managed to fit well but still shift enticingly over her form as she moved. Her outfit implied sex, but her vivid blue eyes practically screamed it. They weren't blue like oceans, or the sky or any of that bullshit. They were blue like that impossibly hot depth of flame that would burn you so thoroughly you'd be numb to the pain until it consumed you. I wanted to bathe in her fire. Everything about this woman brought out the beast in me and so far I'd kept my distance, reigning in the compulsion to grab her and pull her hips against mine. To drop the mask of collected gentleman and force her to feel what she was doing to me.
"Thanks," I told her, my voice dropping into a near growl I hoped she didn't notice. I took the glass and a tentative sip, brows raising in surprise at the taste of good scotch that hit my tongue, emboldening me in the best and worst ways as it slid down my throat. I swallowed, watching her watch me. It filled me some sick sense of pride and power at the way her pupils dilated and she sucked her full, glossy lip between her teeth.
I lowered my glass and she raised hers, downing the whole thing in one long gulp that had her throat working in a way that made my loose gray slacks feel suffocating.
Jesus.
She set the glass down on the nearest table gingerly as the next band- my band- started up on stage. It'd be a minute before they were looking for me. I only had a minute to do something and ensure she'd still be there when we came off stage in 30 minutes.
Baptism by fire, I decided. Liv's fire. I took a step toward her and I dropped the pretense of my broody and calm demeanor. I put my hand on her waist and paused, but I didn't have to wait long before her hands came to my shoulders and she came up on her tip toes, bringing her mouth closer to mine as my head angled down, moving of its own accord.
That first touch of our lips sent the whole world up in flames. My skin ignited, the hand at her waist gripping her firmly until our hips touched and I was certain she could feel me there. The other cupped the back of her head, fingers spread against her scalp and tightening as she opened her mouth and slid her tongue into mine. She nipped at my lip, and my head swirled with the wanting pleasure of it. I tightened my hand, tugging her hair at the root until she moaned into my mouth, pressing closer to me and fisting her hands against my chest inside my jacket.
"Colin, ya look busy. Are we interrupting something?" my band mates's voice over the PA doused the flames as quickly as they'd consumed me and I pulled away from Liv reluctantly, a sheepish cast to my triumphant gaze as I flicked it from her to the stage. He smiled wryly, dimples flashing and rolled his eyes with dramatic flair for the small crowd, "Well? We're waiting."
