All of Me: A Confessions of the Heart Stand-Alone Novel

by Jackson, A. L.

  I’d put down money she was married to one of these pompous douches who forked out a thousand dollars a plate just so he could be seen.

  It wasn’t like any of these assholes had any actual interest in feeding some impoverished, ratty kid.

  Knew the reality of that firsthand.

  Like she could feel the weight of my stare, she glanced my way. She froze when she saw me staring back, tripped up, too, both of us getting swept up in an instant of attraction.

  Her eyes flashed.

  A bright, bright blue.

  So distinct that her penetrating gaze almost sent me reeling back.

  They shined like crystallized, teal marble. A thousand shades that twisted and spun into something endless. So deep that, if I were to stare too long, I’d tumble right in.

  Lust billowed in the space between us. Hot and intense.

  That instant attraction had become a bluster in the air. Every single muscle in my damn body went hard just from that single glance.

  It was what I craved. Something raw and intense and unbridled. Part passion, part rage.

  For a few blissful moments, fully letting go.

  Mindless sex.

  Bodies giving.

  No consequence.

  I could feel it. The fever that radiated from her just as intensely as it radiated from me.

  Crashing in the middle of us.

  Compounding and amplifying and coming alive.

  No doubt, the girl was a ticking bomb ready to blow.

  Straightening my shoulders, I tried to pretend like I wasn’t affected as I watched those crystalline eyes rake over me, fire and ice, and I had to wonder if she was imagining raking her nails down my back instead.

  That lasted all of a second before she jerked her attention away and fumbled for a gulp of her drink.

  All coy and shy as she put me off, inciting that need inside me to reach out and make her mine.

  Grabbing my glass, I sauntered her way, hand stuffed into my tux pocket as I slipped into the stool next to her.

  She stiffened, awareness floating from her like a hot breeze.

  I fully swiveled her direction, sitting sideways with one elbow resting on the bar and the other on the back of the stool as I leaned back and blatantly took her in.

  The girl was so gorgeous she somehow managed to make my insides quake.

  I was having a bitch of a time stopping myself from leaning in and pressing my nose to her neck, right at that delicious sweet spot at the back of her ear. From sliding the tips of my fingers up the silky flesh exposed by that dress, taken over by the overpowering urge to get lost in those long, long legs.

  “Having fun?” I asked, voice rough, grating with all the visions of what I wanted to do to her.

  Her head barely shook. “I’d rather be left alone, if you don’t mind.”

  “Hmm . . . looks to me like you could use some company.”

  She released an incredulous sound, and she shifted to look my direction, a flash of that icy fire in her eyes.

  God, she was pretty.

  The kind of pretty that struck you somewhere deep.

  I knew well enough that beauty like that was only surface.

  “Just don’t,” she hissed.

  My brow lifted in amusement. “Don’t what?”

  “Oh, please, you think I can’t mimic some variation of exactly what you were gettin’ ready to say? I’m not naïve. Believe me, I’ve heard it all before.”

  Humor ridged my mouth at the same time as it was watering with the sound of her voice.

  Southern and sweet and somehow bitter to the bone.

  Hard and mad was exactly my thing.

  “And what’s that?”

  A scowl knitted up her forehead. “‘What’s your sign?’ Or was it going to be something along the line of ‘what is a girl like you doing in a place like this’? Or maybe you were getting ready to play it off that you knew me from somewhere. That one’s my favorite. Whatever it was gonna be, no, you can’t have my number.”

  A rough chuckle rumbled around in my chest, and I moved so I could lean in closer, my head angled so I was about six inches away from her.

  Which was apparently too damned close.

  Because the energy coming from her hit me like a punch to the face.

  Full force.

  Fierce and furious.

  Didn’t help that she smelled delicious.

  Like a plump, juicy plum.

  The same color as those damned lips.

  Fuck me, if I didn’t want to take a bite.

  “I wasn’t actually going to waste my time on a number. I’m more of an ‘in the moment kind of guy’. I figured you and I could get out of here and find something a little more . . . interesting to do. You look as bored as I am.” My voice lowered, a caress at her ear. “I promise you won’t regret it.”

  A shiver lifted across her skin, so alive I could feel it, before outrage rushed in to take its place.

  She reared back, blinking through her offense.

  “Wow.”

  That was all she said.

  But I could hear a slew of other insults rambling around in her mind.

  I leaned in closer, knowing I was crossing a line considering I was in a place filled with my colleagues. But this girl somehow managed to make me forget all of that.

  I couldn’t rationalize anything but going after what I wanted.

  Right then.

  In that moment.

  A release.

  A blissful oblivion.

  A blackout.

  And I wanted it with her.

  I glanced down at her left hand, expecting to see a huge rock sitting on her ring finger. My dick gave a little fist pump when I found it bare.

  “So, what do you say?” I asked, voice casual though I felt anything but.

  This girl managed to make me feel off-kilter. Thrown from my game.

  Her brow lifted and her tone dipped in disbelief. “You expect me to just . . . walk out of here with you? Just like that? Just you and me in some dark corner? No numbers required because we won’t be seeing each other again? No regrets?”

  The last she spat.

  “That’s exactly what I was thinking. Besides,” I murmured, “I know exactly what a girl like you is doing in a place like this. Just like the rest of us . . . you’re here because you have to be. Because it makes you or whoever you’re with look good. You don’t have to pretend with me that you give a shit.”

  Disgust rolled from her. “Who the hell are you?”

  “Doesn’t matter.”

  Huffing, she pushed to standing. “You’re right. It doesn’t matter who you are because you’re the last person I’d ever want to know.”

  Glass clinked as she shakily set her flute onto the bar, and she let her gaze swing back to me, her head angled to the side as she picked up the small clutch that had been sitting on the bar in front of her. “And for the record? You don’t know the first thing about me, and I’m pretty sure I would regret even a single second I spent with you.”

  Without giving me a chance to respond, she moved to slip out of the space between us. When she did, the top of her thigh brushed across my knee.

  I jerked, and she stumbled, a sharp gust of air sucked into her lungs.

  I was doing the same. Air locked in the tight well of my chest. Heavy and dense.

  It felt like a torch had just whipped across my skin and climbed right into my veins.

  My ears rang, and my heart started drumming an erratic, harsh beat.

  I held my breath, not sure what the fuck that feeling was.

  Hating it and wanting to hold it in the palm of my hands at the same time. Knowing it would scorch me if I did.

  What the hell?

  I shook my head to break the stupor. That was right when her spine went rigid again, and she gathered herself as she started to walk away. All leg, her slinky dress hugging those lush curves, the fabric dipping down to expose the small of her back. So sexy I could hard
ly fucking breathe.

  She moved across the room and disappeared into the crowd without looking back.

  My stomach fisted.

  “Shit,” I muttered, gulping down the rest of my drink, trying to chase the unsettled feeling away.

  This absurd urge to chase after her.

  I didn’t chase women.

  They weren’t interested in my proposition, they could go on their way.

  No harm.

  No foul.

  But that sensation wouldn’t abate.

  Shit.

  What was wrong with me?

  But it didn’t matter how hard I tried to convince myself that going after her would be a mistake, I was downing my scotch and slamming the empty onto the bar before my feet were carrying me across the floor.

  Two

  Grace

  What in the world had just happened?

  It felt as if I’d stepped right into a riot.

  Unrest and tumult.

  The man a disorder I could feel coming from a hundred miles away.

  Gorgeous and powerful and oh so wrong.

  I could feel those potent, strange-colored eyes searing into me from behind, as if he could remain sitting right there and they could still chase me down. Pin me. See everything hidden inside.

  I did my best to keep my head held high and to keep my feet from slipping out from under me. I rushed through the room filled with round-tables covered in fine linens and china and crystal where dinner had been served that I hadn’t been present for.

  I was the damned fool who’d sneaked in after.

  Uninvited.

  Unwelcome.

  I made it through the tables to the other side of the room where a band was set up on the makeshift stage, playing a slow R & B cover from the seventies. Below it, couples had moved onto the dancefloor.

  I started to cut across it, my heels sliding across the slick floor as I rushed for the massive ballroom doors at the opposite side.

  The promise of retreat was a mere forty feet away.

  God, I never should have come here.

  I’d been sitting at that stupid bar licking my wounds, trying to hold back the tears and the anger and the sorrow, all the while praying that Kenneth Millstrom might have a change of heart and come up to me.

  Tell me he’d represent me.

  That I had a fighting chance rather than him laughing at me and saying, “I’m sorry, but you have to know that’s just not going to happen, sweetheart. I’d be a fool to take you on as a client. You’re wasting your time.”

  Sweetheart.

  What a douche.

  I still couldn’t tell whether he’d been being condescending or sympathetic. Either way, it didn’t matter. Those words still had the same effect.

  They’d crushed me.

  Then, not thirty minutes later, I was being propositioned by that asshole.

  That asshole who had my chest heaving for air as I searched for sanity.

  No question, that man had the power to strip me of both.

  How could I even allow a man to affect me? Even if it were only for a second?

  Oh, but it wasn’t only for a second. Because I felt it again. An overwhelming surge of heat that washed over me from behind.

  Something dark, almost sinister, an open invitation to step into his expensive brand of sin.

  I thought to propel myself faster, hike up my skirt and run, but instead I was whipping my head over my shoulder, unable to stop myself from seeking out those eyes, slowing like one of those stupid girls who stepped right into an ambush she was just too dumb to see.

  Tripped up and trapped.

  My heart raced, already certain of what I would find.

  Oh, was I right.

  That gorgeous man was making his way through the crowd. Couples who were dancing spun out of his way, as if he had the power to command a storm. To part the waters with the wicked gleam of those eyes. Or maybe it was just with the ruthlessness that oozed with every step that he took.

  As if he were on the hunt.

  The second he caught sight of me, his sexy mouth twisted up in an arrogant grin.

  There I was, in for the fight of my life, and I was allowing myself to get all hot and bothered by some gorgeous stranger who was clearly after one thing.

  A shiver rolled down my spine, and I kept backing away as he came closer.

  Good lord, gorgeous was right.

  Impossible, really.

  So beautiful, I’d momentarily gone stupid when I’d glanced that way and saw him standing at the opposite end of the bar a few minutes ago. So obscenely sexy I’d thought I had to be hallucinating.

  My mind conjuring a fantasy to make getting through the night a little less brutal.

  He angled through the chaos of couples that swirled and spun and swayed.

  Tux fitting that perfect body like he’d been sewn into it, shoulders wide and waist narrow, taller than any man had the right to be.

  He stared at me from across the hazy glow of lights, making me fumble, the glittering light catching his eyes that were the color of cracked cinnamon and speckled with the sun.

  Still wearing that sexy-as-sin grin, he roughed a hand through his brown hair that was cut short and styled impeccably.

  Every line of his masculine face was chiseled and sharp, the guy carved of stone, a perfectly trimmed five o’clock shadow defining his strong jaw. I’d have said he was made of marble, all smooth and shiny and glossy, except there was something rough beneath that polished exterior.

  Something raw and unbridled.

  Dangerous in a way that made my stomach quake.

  But after he’d opened that deliciously decadent mouth, I’d realized he was no fantasy.

  He was nothing but a bad dream.

  A delusion.

  That pretty exterior nothing but an illusion of all the nastiness hidden underneath.

  Problem was, I was held by that fantasy. Captured and entranced as he strode in my direction. I needed to up and run, and instead, I was standing in the middle of the dancefloor like a lamb that wanted to get eaten.

  I’d finally just about come to my senses when he was suddenly right there, a tower of darkness that cast a shadow over me, so damned tall I had to tilt my head back to fully take him in.

  But it wasn’t really me who was doing the taking.

  He was devouring me with that potent gaze, exactly like I’d imagined.

  “Dance with me.” It was a rough command.

  A lure.

  That energy moved.

  A stir at my feet.

  I tried not to get trapped by it, by the feeling of it crawling up my legs and spreading over my body. Chaining me to the spot.

  I swallowed down the attraction. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  He came closer. Stealing the air and making me shiver.

  His mouth was so close to my ear that I couldn’t tell if it was his breath or his lips that were sending tingles rushing as they brushed across my skin. “I think it’s a brilliant idea.”

  “That’s because you don’t have anything to lose.”

  “Don’t I?”

  If I wasn’t watching him so closely, I might have missed the way he grimaced, the way something struck him deep.

  It only lasted for a second before that smirk slipped into something seductive.

  “Besides, what could one dance hurt?”

  “Oh, I’m sure it could hurt plenty.”

  I knew it in the way I’d started to move around him, attracted and repelled, as if this man was the gravity in the room. We were suddenly in a slow dance. Not even touching, and still, I could feel him everywhere.

  As if those big hands were roaming over my body. Making me scream and shiver and quake.

  And my body was already making the foolish decision for me, drawn toward him, compelled by the rhythm of the music as everything pitched into a mesmerized sway.

  He leaned in, his mouth back at my ear. “You’re worried about be
ing hurt, when the only thing I’m thinking about is how good I could make you feel. I’d make you lose your mind, beautiful.”

  “I don’t doubt that.”

  Not for a second.

  “Everyone deserves a moment to forget,” he murmured, as if he already saw all the things bleeding inside me, and then I really was shivering because he looped an arm around my waist and pulled me close.

  The two of us were instantly at one with the cadence of the slow, provocative beat. “Let me be the one to do it.”

  I inhaled a trembling breath when I realized I was in his arms.

  The man was so big. Tall and powerful in a way that should make me afraid, muscles hard and bursting with strength, but somehow, I was wanting to completely melt into the strength of his hold.

  “I don’t even know you,” I whispered.

  “Believe me, you don’t really want to. That’s what makes this a brilliant idea. A win-win. Tell me you don’t feel it.”

  I was pretty sure he was no longer talking about a simple dance.

  “I feel it. What I’m concerned about is the aftermath.” The admission was a slip of sound, swept up in the sway of our bodies as he led me around the floor like a pro.

  A pro at stealing hearts. I was sure he left them scattered all over the floor, stomped on them with the sole of his expensive shoes after he’d held them in the palms of his hands.

  Tossed away so carelessly after he’d had his fill.

  His mouth barely grazed along my jaw. The hint of a kiss.

  Need tumbled through me in a way I’d never before experienced.

  Spikes of heat.

  A flood of desire.

  I wondered if I’d ever truly been seduced by a man. If this was what it was like.

  Spellbound and needy and hot.

  So caught up in a moment that I didn’t take the time to think through the consequences. In the moment, the cost didn’t matter.

  Careless.

  That was what it was.

  “I’d make sure it was worth it.” Apparently, the man was the messenger of seduction with the way he was whispering promises at my skin. “I’d make you come again and again until the only thing you knew was the pleasure only I can give you. The feel of my hands and my cock and my skin and our bodies giving in. It’ll leave you with a memory you’ll never forget.”