Page 12 of Riding the Line (Willow Ridge #2)
Crushing it , he mouths to me. He then ticks the air like he’s crossing off the item on my bucket list, before quickly returning his attention to the guys. Joy flushes through me, my cheeks heating.
Cheers and chatter ripple through the skating crowd as Hunter’s song blares through the speakers, but not as loudly as Wyatt’s groan and Rory’s subsequent cackle.
It’s one of his livelier songs, guitar strings plucking quickly and adding a choppy beat to skate to.
Strobe lights flicker around us, filling the rink with a cacophony of colour that pulses to the beat of the music.
Rory starts shaking her hips, and Fliss grabs my arm, twirling me around with her.
An awfully high-pitched squeal leaves my lips as I’m too aware that if we disconnect I will most definitely go barrelling down to the floor.
The lyrics and chords of the song blend with the rushing beat of my heart.
But it’s okay, because Fliss drags us over to Rory, who then immediately takes my hands so we can spin around together too.
She’s belting out the lyrics, and I give myself permission to just forget about how scary this all is and revel in it.
Let the music and the laughter of my friends carry me away for however long we dance for—
But then Rory’s letting go of my hands, and I’m hurtling straight towards the wall.
Where Duke is leaning, readying to push off to join Wyatt and Wolfman who have started skating ahead.
My frantic scream isn’t a quick enough warning for him to move out of the way.
The last thing I see is the wild whites of Duke’s eyes before my body slams into him, breath whooshing sharply out of my lungs.
Where I expected us both to tumble to the ground, I’m instead spun around in Duke’s firm grip and pressed against the barrier.
My hair falls over my face as my back hits the barrier, then something solid and warm wedges between my thighs – the only thing stopping me from dropping to the floor.
I swallow when I realise it’s Duke’s thigh.
His thick thigh, where corded muscles strain against the dark denim, carrying all my weight.
My rapid heart rate drops lower in my body, the heat radiating from Duke’s thigh and settling deep within my core.
One strained, tattooed arm slams on the edge of the barrier beside me while the other snakes around my waist, caging me in and forcing my head up to meet Duke’s frenzied gaze.
I also suddenly realise that it’s not just Duke’s thigh keeping me up, but the way I’m fighting for purchase by fisting his T-shirt.
His cypress scent invades my senses, churning up memories of being pressed against his chest and cradled in his arms all those years ago.
I need to get out of this situation. Any confidence I’d built this evening immediately flushed away.
But when I shift to try to gain balance on my skates again, all it does is rub Duke’s thigh between my legs, the friction of his solid muscles against me shooting a lick of heat up my spine.
A whispered gasp leaves my lips before I can stop it.
Duke’s eyes flash, shooting down once to where I’m straddling his thigh – his pupils instantly blown out – then back up to me. I swear he gulps.
One of us needs to move.
‘I’m sorry—’ I start.
Duke wriggles his arm away. ‘No, I should—’
And then, just as we both push against each other at the same time, our skates gain a mind of their own and decide to shoot off in different directions.
I’m not sure who pulls who down, but our hands are suddenly latching onto the other again frantically as we flip and hurtle towards the ground. At one point I even see a hot-pink skate above me.
We’re a tangle of limbs and skates and hair before we smack against the ground, me flopping diagonally across Duke, with one of my legs hooked around his.
Pain vibrates up through my arms as they take the brunt of my fall, stopping my head from walloping against the floor.
Laughter echoes in the distance. My breath whooshes out of me as the room finally stops spinning, and just as I try to remove myself from where Duke and I are ravelled together, his hands clutch my waist, fingers digging in tight with a groan.
A rumbling, guttural groan that sounds oddly … sexual .
Along with the way his large hands are splayed across my waist, the heat of his strong fingers imprinting into the slice of bare skin between my top and shorts, the groan has my cheeks heating even more.
And when I go to clamber off him again, his fingers grip me tight, ensuring I cannot escape the press of his hard body below mine.
It’s then that I turn to him and realise he’s wincing, face creased and strained with agony.
‘Are you okay?’ I ask.
A strangled noise comes out first, but then he says, ‘Your leg. You’re squashing … everything .’
My eyes shoot down to—
‘Oh. Oh .’
As carefully as I can, I roll myself off him, deliberately moving my leg down and away from his likely bruised junk.
The long, sharp huff of a sigh he releases once we’re detached practically screams I am so done with this , and I silently berate myself for ever thinking anything good could come out of Duke Bennett helping me with my bucket list.