I had no idea how long we danced like that for before he finally started to inch his mouth closer to mine, all I knew was that however long it was, it wasn’t long enough. I wanted to live in that moment forever. Holding my breath in anticipation of feeling his soft lips against mine again, I closed the distance between us and then, I was lost.

When he moaned in the back of his throat, my heart seemed to do a little flip in my chest. His lips parted against mine and then his hot tongue slipped into my mouth, tangling with mine in a tantalising kiss that left me breathless and giddy. With his mouth on mine, I forgot everything else around us and what this kiss was probably for. In that moment, we could have been anywhere, we could have been standing in the middle of a stampede of wild horses, yet I wouldn’t care, so long as he didn’t stop kissing me. His kisses were addictive. My excitement was growing inside me, building like a raging inferno as I pressed my body against his, needing to be closer, to feel more of him, to be devoured and possessed by him.

But he broke the kiss and put his forehead to mine. A needy whimper left my lips as he breathed heavily and clutched me closer to him. Tilting my head, I captured his lips again, tangling my hands into the back of his hair, needing just a little more of his undivided attention. An involuntary moan escaped my lips as he kissed me back, sucking my bottom lip into his mouth and biting it gently.

Again he pulled away, shaking his head this time. “Enough now.” His voice was husky and thick with lust as he swallowed and those sultry, heavily-lidded eyes met mine.

I blinked a couple of times and nodded in agreement, even though every nerve in my body was screaming for the opposite. I laid my head on his shoulder as he continued to dance, swaying to the slow beat of the song that the DJ was blasting out. His ragged breathing slowly returned to normal as I tried desperately to push the lustful thoughts away so that I could calm my jittery body.

As the song slowly filtered into another, his pace changed seamlessly to compensate. I smiled and looked up at him. “Are you good at everything?” I asked.

“No, why do you say that?”

I waved my hand at him as an explanation. “You’re a really good dancer. I’m yet to find one thing you can’t do.”

He laughed and smiled at me. I tilted my face, rubbing my nose up the edge of his jaw, breathing him in as his hands stroked my back softly. “I would say the same for you, but the only thing I know you’re not good at is letting people in,” he said in my ear.

I pulled back to look at him. “Hey, I can let people in; I let you in, didn’t I?” I was a little annoyed at his comment.

He shook his head. “No. You won’t let me in; you barely even want to be my friend because you think I’m going to leave you. You close yourself off from everyone so that you don’t have to feel anything again. You like to be numb,” he said matter-of-factly.

I stared at him, dumbfounded. How the hell does this boy know so much about me? Oh my God, does my file have my therapy tapes in there or something? Has that bitch of a therapist breached my confidentiality?

“Have you been listening to my therapy tapes?” I snapped angrily, pushing myself out of his arms.

He laughed and caught my hands, pulling me closer to him again. “No, Anna. You’re actually pretty easy to figure out most of the time,” he replied, squeezing my hands gently. My body relaxed, and I rolled my eyes at his comment. “Now shut up and dance with me before the bar closes.” He pulled me closer to him again and I laughed, smiling because somehow, he always seemed to make me feel better.

Chapter Sixteen

The sun beams down on me as I absentmindedly flip through the pages of a magazine. The strong scent of jasmine drifts up from the bushes that I’d not long planted, a few feet away from the swing chair I’m slouched on. I am just about to take a sip of my coffee when a slam of a door and a girlish giggle come from the house. A smile breaks out on my face as I look up, seeing a beautiful, little girl running towards me. I notice how tall she seems and how the smile on her face melts my heart. Her long, black hair is still damp and flows out behind her as she runs to me.

“Momma!”

I put my cup down just in time for her to jump onto my lap, laughing excitedly. “Hey! Did you have a good time? Did you jump in on your own?” I ask, excited to hear about it.

She nods enthusiastically. “Yeah, I jumped in loads of times, and I splashed Daddy right in the face,” she chirps, laughing wickedly.

I grin. “You did? Good girl! Where is Daddy anyway?”

She shrugs, twirling a lock of my hair around her finger. “He’s putting our swimming stuff in the laundry room.”

“Hey, Baby Girl.” I look up and my heart speeds at the sight of him walking across the garden to me. He is so handsome that my mouth waters.

As he gets to me, he bends and plants a soft kiss on the corner of my mouth before using the pad of his thumb to brush a smudge of dirt from my cheek.

“Hi,” I breathe. It’s almost a sigh of contentment because my whole world is now around me.

“Missed you,” he whispers, before stealing my coffee cup from the side and downing the contents as he plops himself into the seat next to me and casually slings his arm around my shoulder.

I jerked awake, gasping, but for once, smiling as I roused from my dream. Ashton sat up quickly from his makeshift bed on the floor. “You okay? Nightmare?” Concern coloured his sleepy voice.

I opened and closed my mouth a couple of times, grateful that he hadn’t turned on the light because my face was sure to be beet red. I had no idea what to say. I’ve just had my first nice dream in three years… And it involved me having his child? Something is seriously wrong with me!

Horrified, I lay back down. “No, not a nightmare. It’s fine.” A quick check of the clock told me it was almost ten in the morning. We’d not gotten back to the apartment until after one this morning, so I was still tired.

He didn’t leave it though. Instead, he moved, climbing onto the bed and resting his arm across my stomach. “It wasn’t a nightmare? What’s up then?”

My embarrassment grew because the object of my desire in my dream was now too close to me as he looked down at me through the semi-darkness. “I was just dreaming. It wasn’t a bad one. Actually, it was the first nice dream I’ve had since… since…” I frowned, not wanting to say his name again.

“You had a nice dream? That’s great! What was it about?” He sounded ridiculously happy about it.

I winced, squirming under his scrutiny. You, wasn’t exactly something I could answer. “Um…” I chewed on my lip, and he flopped down next to me, lying on his side and shoving his arm under the pillow as his other arm tightened around me, pulling me closer to his warm body. “I, er, had a little daughter. She was beautiful. It was just nice.”

A dazzling smile crossed his lips as I spoke. “You did? Did she look just like you? If she did, then she’d have to be the most beautiful, little girl in the world.”

My heart seemed to clench in my chest at his adorable words. The answer was no though, she hadn’t looked like me, she’d looked like him! “She kinda did,” I answered. The little girl did, in fact, have brown eyes like mine. Needing to make an escape from this awkward conversation before he probed further, I pushed myself up out of bed. “I’m going to make some breakfast. I’m thinking bacon and eggs. Sound good?” I didn’t even wait for an answer before I practically ran from the bedroom, needing a few minutes away from him and the knowledge that I’d had a seriously inappropriate dream about him.

A little while after we’d eaten, I decided that I’d like to kill some time in the gym. According to the pamphlet about ASU that I’d read, there was a well-stocked gym on campus, so I was eager to check it out. As we pulled up outside and climbed out, another car pulled up next to us.

I groaned and threw my hands up in exasperation. “I can go on my own, you know!” I snapped, glaring first at Ashton, and then at my two far guards that had obviously followed us here.

Peter shrugged. “I actually just came to use the gym, I’m off duty. Please direct your glare at these two,” he joked, waving a hand at Ashton and Dean.

I had to smile at that as I rolled my eyes and stalked into the building, not waiting for them. “You guys think I’m some pathetic wuss that can’t defend herself. I could kick all of your asses,” I muttered, shaking my head. I had no idea why I even needed a far guard; Ashton was surely more than enough to stop people from grabbing my butt or pushing me over into a puddle, which was all that would ever likely happen to me.

A scoffing noise came from Peter’s direction, so I raised one eyebrow in question. “You think you could kick my ass?” he asked sarcastically, pulling his shoulders back and smirking at me as he opened the door to the gym and nodded for me to go first.

“Yes,” I answered flatly. He was probably about six foot tall and easily heavier than Ashton because he packed in more muscle, but I was pretty sure I could take him.

When I stepped into the gym, I sighed happily. It was indeed as well-stocked as the pamphlet had promised. And another benefit it had was that it was empty. Being Sunday lunchtime, most students were probably still in bed, sleeping off the night before.

Peter scoffed again, following me into the gym and rolling his eyes, before nodding towards the padded mat area off to one side. “Want to try?”

A grin spread across my face as I nodded slowly. Heck yeah, I want to embarrass you! “Sure.”

Ashton shook his head quickly, holding his hands up in protest. “That’s not really a good idea, Peter.”

I frowned angrily, clenching my teeth together. He thinks I’m going to get hurt? Lousy pretend boyfriend! He’s supposed to support me!

Peter grinned, linking his fingers together, stretching out his arms and cracking his knuckles at the same time. “I won’t hurt her, don’t worry.”

Ashton snorted. “I wasn’t worried about her. You’re supposed to be on duty tonight, and I don’t think having a broken nose will go down well with the whole blending in thing,” Ashton teased, chuckling. My anger evaporated immediately as I understood his hesitancy, and it wasn’t because he was worried I’d get hurt.