Page 38 of Dance of Defiance

I shiver, biting back the fucking sound as he leans toward my neck, his breath teasing over my earlobe as my eyes fall shut. His body grinds to mine, our hard, coiled muscles shifting against each other. His hips roll, pushing against me, andfuck me, I feel it.

His cock.

Rock hard, swollen, and jumping against my own.

“Sounds like you’re compensating for something,” he growls. “And from what I felt the other day…”

He groans as he rubs his erection against my dick, which is thickening at a mortifying, terrifying rate. I bite back another groan as my cock instantly swells to full arousal, electric sensations rippling and exploding through every synapse in my head as his bulge grinds against mine through our tuxedo pants.

“And what I’m feelingnow…”

I shiver when he fucking winks at me.

“Well, it’s not the usual thing guys compensate for, is it? So,” he purrs, leaning back into my neck to let the words tease over my skin. “NowI’m just a little curious what. It.Is?—”

“Youneedto get the hell away from me!” I spit coldly, my voice rising as I somehow find the willpower to shove violently at his chest. This time, either because I truly mean it or because I caught him off-guard, he stumbles a step back from me, the noose-like grip of his gaze uncoiling from around my throat before he fixes me with a look.

“Andyouneed to get your shit figured out and be honest with yourself,” he snaps.

I shove past him in a dazed blur, my footsteps staggering and uneven, my pulse racing wildly as I lurch for the door.

This time, he doesn’t stop me.

When I get to it, I pause for a second, my vision swimming. I draw in a shaky breath as I turn back to him. “I need to get back to my fiancée.”

Val smirks, folding his arms across his broad chest, a smug smirk spreading across his perfect lips as he leans against the bookshelves.

“Better make sure that hard-on goes down first.”

8

VAL

This.Fucking. Guy.

The three words repeat through my head over and over as I stalk Roman.

…Okay, that’s unnecessarily harsh. I’m notstalkingthe fucker. We’re hanging out, it’s just that we’re hanging out roughly twenty to thirty feet away from each other, and Roman doesn’tknowwe're hanging out.

That’s his problem, though.

I’m not entirely sure why I’ve been doing this off and on for the last few days. It started the day after that debacle of an “engagement” party, where Roman manhandled me in a way that got my bloodroaringand my dick begging for some fun.

…Which he promptly blue-balled me on.Suchan asshole.

After he stormed out of the library, I got my shit together, told my cock to sit down and be quiet, smoothed down my tux, and went to introduce myself to the blushing bride-to-be.

What can I say, there’s a devious little fucker inside me.

I wanted to feel a sense of smugness when I looked Dasha Lukashova in the eye and smiled politely during our conversation, knowing full well that I’d just felt her fiancé’s big cock twitching and throbbing against my own.

But whatever fucked-up sense of superiority I was hoping to exact from that exchange never materialized. Mainly because I actuallylikedtalking to her.

It turns out, as much of a stuck-up, no-fun, closeted prick-tease Roman is, his fake fiancée is apeach. She’s cool, intelligent, cultured, and—surprise—a huge fan of the ballet. So my plans for covertly face-rubbing quickly morphed into me offering to give her a tour of the Mercury Theatre, where the Zakharova rehearses and performs.

And I started taking my pent-up wrath out on Roman instead, in the form of stalking him.

Or, you know, whatever we're calling it.