Page 75 of Securing the Pucking Rebound

My temperature soars, but just before our lips collide, panic slams into me, and I press my palms against his chest, forcing him back.

“I don’t do hookups,” I blurt, dragging my eyes from his and staring straight ahead at his chest, which, I discover, is moving as erratically as mine.

My breath catches when his fingers tuck under my chin, forcing me to look up at him again.

“I don’t want to hook up with you, Sienna.”

God. The way he says my name…I swear, I could melt into a puddle at his feet. His southern accent is always there, but when he’s…I swallow thickly. When he’s turned on, it gets thicker. Sexier.

I shutter my eyes, remembering someone else with a southern accent who stole my heart once.

Apparently, I have a type.

It takes a hot second, but once my reaction to his voice subsides and his words settle in, I deflate and attempt to slip from my spot pinned between his unmoving, hard body and the unforgiving elevator wall behind me.

“No,” he growls, his hand dropping to my waist again, holding me in place.

“Calvin,” I whimper desperately—although I’m not sure if I’m desperate for him to release me or to hold me tighter.

“I’m not interested in one night of sex, only to be cast aside as soon as we’re done. I’m not a one-night stand kind of girl; I’m a dating girl.”

“Sienna, I⁠—”

We both startle when the doors open and voices spill into the elevator. Calvin takes a step back, but it looks like it takes every ounce of his self-control to do so.

Coldness washes over me, and my fingers twitch at my sides with my need to reach out and drag him back to me.

No, this is for the best.

“Sorry, this elevator is taken,” Calvin grunts before jabbing his finger into the close door button, quickly followed by my floor.

He glances at me from under his lashes, but to my surprise, he doesn’t step back in front of me. Instead, he moves to my side.

I try to suck in the air I need, but it’s laced with his scent, and everything comes crashing down when his knuckles brush against mine and there’s nothing accidental about it.

Fire burns up my arm from the innocent contact, and I turn to look at him to find him already staring down at me.

His lips twitch into the smallest smile before he drags his bottom lip between his teeth. The move is almost my undoing. Thankfully, the elevator comes to a stop and the doors open, forcing us to break eye contact—unless we want to spend the rest of the night in the enclosed space.

I mean, I could think of worse things.

Nope. Keep your head, Sienna. Think with your brain, not your vagina.

I surge forward, prepared to outrun him if necessary, but despite his injury, he keeps pace right behind me, and when I come to a stop at my door, realizing that he has my purse, and therefore, my key, I find that he’s right on my heels.

“Thank you for tonight,” I say, hoping my tone doesn’t sound all breathy and needy. “It was fun. Maybe we should do it again sometime.” I kick myself the second the words spill free. Doing this again is a bad, bad idea. The best thing I can do is keep as much distance between us as possible.

“Is that your way of asking me for a second date, darlin’?”

“What?” I gasp. “No, this wasn’t even a date. We⁠—”

He prowls closer again and reaches up to tuck a lock of hair behind my ear.

“It was a date,” he states. “Can I let you in on a little secret?”

No.

“It was my first ever date.”