It’s trapped inside ahand.
A big, callused,malehand.
What thehell?
Reflexively, I yank at the right strap still curled in my fist; at the same instant, the stranger attempting to steal my stuff gives a sharp tug from his side. The duffle jerks into the air as we pull in opposite directions, the bag suspended between us in the strangest game of tug-of-war I’ve ever participated in. No matter how hard I pull, he doesn’t relinquish so much as a single finger’sgrip.
“Hey!” I squawk, eyes flashing up to his face, fully prepared to unleash a string of less-than-polite accusations. “What the hell do you thinkyou’re—”
The words dissipate on my tongue mid-sentence, because the man attached to my bag, the one who owns that massive, callused hand currently wrapped so firmly around my duffle’s other strap, issimply…
Breath-stealing.
I feel like I’ve been sucker-punched as my eyes roam over his features. He’s not handsome — the word doesn’t do him justice. He’s far too rough around the edges, with stubble peppering that strong, square jaw and a thin scar bisecting one of those dark, slanted brows. An aristocratic nose sits squarely above a set of lush lips that, it must be noted, are currently pursed in an impatient scowl as he meets mygaze.
I suck in a much-neededbreath.
He’s glaring down at me from an impossible height, a wall of muscle in faded jeans and a black v-neck. In his late twenties or early thirties, he looks like a man accustomed to things I can barely fathom: fine meals and fast cars and gorgeous, glamorous women with loads of experience — sexual and otherwise. I feel like a little girl standing here beneath his gaze. Sloppy and naive and impossiblyyoung.
There’s a rhythmic ticking in his jaw that tells me his patience is about to expire. It takes all the willpower I possess not to drop my hand from the bag and simply give it to him, such is the effect of those intense eyes scorching intomine.
Honestly, I’ve never had a grown man glare at me before, besides the time I crashed Clint’s sit-atop lawnmower into the pond after one too many post-graduation wine coolers and incurred his father’s — much deserved — wrath. Call me crazy, but I just don’t get what most girls find so attractive about total assholes. I’m not submissive. I don’t have authority issues or daddy issues or whatever other issues usually make the fairer sex swoon over that gruff smolder adopted by blockbuster action heroes and angsty teen dystopian badboys.
Or… Ididn’t.
Until thismoment.
Because, while I’m perfectly aware I shouldnotfind myself thinking that this glaring stranger is the most magnetically attractive man I’ve ever laid eyeson…
Damn.
I repeat:damnnnnnn.
Swallowing harshly, I banish the thoughts to the back of my mind. Drooling over him won’t help me get my bagback.
“Sorry,” I prattle breathily after a pause that’s dragged on far too long. “I think there’s been amistake—”
“I should say so.” He cuts me off, a fissure of displeasure furrowing his forehead until the small white scar bisecting his left eyebrow stands out starkly against his tanned skin. His voice is sandpaper — full of grit. The stranger’s dark green eyes flicker to my toes and back in the space of a single, thudding heartbeat. I get the sense that despite the brevity of his assessment, he could describe every article of clothing on my body right down to the unfortunate coffee stain sitting just above my boob from a bout of turbulence on my last flight. Whatever he sees, it’s clearly not worth a second look. His eyes return to mine without lingering longer than an instant. “What do you think you’redoing?”
My spine straightens at the anger in his tone. “Excuseme?”
His eyes flash with impatience. “I’m going to need you to let go of mybag.”
“Yourbag?”
He nods sharply, patience dwindling. “Listen, I’m in a bit of a hurry, so unless you’re going to pull out a pamphlet and sell me some Girl Scoutcookies…”
“Did you just call me a Girl Scout?” I snap, feeling my temper rise to meethis.
His eyes never shift from my face. “If the sashfits.”
What adick!
“I think you’re having a senior moment, grandpa,because this ismine,” I hiss, tugging back. “This isn’tfunny.”
“I agree, it’s not funny at all.” His jaw ticks. “Letgo.”
“I don’t know what game you’re playing, but you can just back the helloff.”