Heat flooded her cheeks like molten copper, spreading down her neck in waves that made her skin prickle with awareness.
Her fingers tightened around her phone until her knuckles turned white, the device's edges biting into her palm. She worried the screen might spider-web under the crushing pressure of her grip.
The device trembled in her hands, not from fear, but from something far more dangerous—a hunger she refused to name.
Damn him. Damn him for walking around like that, for making her forget her own name, for threatening everything she'd built with his mere existence.
Damn him for the way droplets of water traced lazy paths down the valleys of his chest, for the casual arrogance that seemed to emanate from every pore.
She bit down on her lower lip hard, using the sharp pain to anchor herself to reality.
