Page 24

It might have drenched too, so she must have worn just my tee shirt. Which didn’t help because her perky breasts with hardened nipples were poking through the fabric, enticing and torturing me in every delicious way.
But the look on Valeria’s face was of pure innocence and curiosity. Guilt coursed through me, and I hated myself for being such a man and thinking like that when all she wanted to know was how I looked.
Valeria giggled nervously, “Just close your eyes so that I don’t poke them.”
I followed her command and clenched my jaw when her fingers touched my hair.
So soft, Valeria thought. She wanted to run her fingers through it as she described his hair to him.
“It smells amazing! Is it dark brown like chocolate?” She asked.
I smiled. No one had commented on my hair before. “It is black. Obsidian. Just like my eyes.”
“I wonder what they look like.” Valeria said in the moment, not realizing that no one had ever paid attention to me like that before.
Valeria wanted to see my eyes. It made me giddy in a way I shouldn’t feel. They were just eyes, after all.
Her fingers traced my smooth forehead, the slashing brows and my hooded closed eyes.She lowered her fingers to my nose. Her soft voice describing the feel of my lashes, smoothness of my skin and my aquiline nose. She was smiling when her fingers grazed over the sides of my face, a tremble of shiver spiraling across her body. She explained my high cheekbones, my jaw covered in stubble, a five o’clock shadow, scratching teasingly across her palm.
I clenched the pencil so tightly that I was scared I might break it. I was looking at her, her eyes closed when she touched me so intimately, caressing me with such gentleness that I never wanted her to stop. Her hands cupped my face, her shaky voice whispering at the sharpness of my face.
I watched in horror when she was about to pull away and acted on pure instinct, holding her wrist.
“You missed something, Valeria.” My voice was heavy with arousal.
“I did?” Her voice was breathy.
I pulled her closer. “I can’t finish my sketch without one thing.”
We both knew what I was referring to.
Valeria swallowed the lump in her throat. “Are you okay with it?”
My response was to place her fingers on my lips. I watched her face with half-lidded eyes, her teeth sinking into the pink flesh of her bottom lip, wishing I was the one doing that. Thank God I was covering myself with the sketchbook, or she might have known that I was going hard with just a small touch of hers on my lips. That I might just combust if she kissed me.
The heavy air around us sizzled with sparks. It felt raw. Intimate. Vulnerable.
Valeria shyly trailed her hands from my lips to cup my jaw. My heart rate doubled over as I heard her say,
“Can I… Can I kiss you, Khalid?”