“You still should have told me,” my roomie argued. “We need pictures of this kind of thing, and I know you didn’t take a single one.”
His lips twitched into the barest trace of a smile. “Wrong. I got a picture.” He lifted his phone, showing her his lock screen. It was a selfie of him and his adorable little girl dressed in her tiny, glittery pink leotard and her hair in the bun I’d put it in myself before class started.
Lyla snatched the phone from him, her eyes sparkling as she traced her index finger over Josie’s brow. “She’s so beautiful.”
“Yes, she is,” I thought I heard Howler mutter, his eyes hungrily eating up the sight of Lyla while she wasn’t aware.
Knowing I was witnessing something profoundly personal, I looked away and straight into a pair of intense, dark eyes across the room. I blinked, cutting off contact, but when I opened them again, he was still looking at me, and I couldn’t pull my gaze away this time.
Holy gods.
If he weren’t looking straight at me at that moment, I would have fanned myself. He was standing all alone, a good three feet between him and any other person surrounding him, even though I would have bet money every woman in the room was just as unable to look away from him as I was.
He stood at least six foot three, dressed in only a pair of workout shorts and nothing else, not even a pair of shoes, and his hard eight-pack was on full display for the entire warehouse to see. There was a scar on the upper part of the left side of his chest, but I couldn’t make out what had caused it from the distance that separated us.
Forcing my eyes off his amazing body, I focused on his face instead, but that didn’t alleviate my overheating problem in the least. His thick hair was a mixture of chestnut and mahogany that had a slight curl to it and was long enough that it hung to his shoulders. He had a full, well-trimmed beard, and my fingertips itched to run through it.
As I was taking my time to take in all of him, he was doing the same to me, and I could feel his gaze caressing every inch his eyes skimmed over like a physical touch. My body reacted like he was only inches in front of me, instead of the yards and yards that separated us. My heart rate picked up, and my breathing becoming shallower as his predatory eyes landed on my chest.
I was wearing jeans I’d picked up in Paris over the summer and a top of Lyla’s she said would make everyone drool over me if I wore it. It was a halter top, and I wasn’t wearing a bra. My breasts were small enough I didn’t have to wear one, but right then, I wished I were, because my nipples were rock hard and on display for this guy to see just how much he affected me.
And all he was doing was looking at me. Damn. But what would it feel like to have him actually touch me?
As if he was thinking the same thing, he sucked his bottom lip into his mouth. I felt my sex flood with need that had me pressing my thighs together in an attempt to ease the sudden throb.
“Where is Jo-Jo now?” Lyla asked, handing the phone back and thankfully pulling me out from under the spell of the beast-like man across the room.
“I got a babysitter for the night. Judge informed me I couldn’t miss tonight. I would have asked you to watch her, but you turned off your phone.” He grasped one of her belt loops and turned her around. Pulling her phone from her back pocket, he turned her phone on then handed it back to her. “Keep it on.”
“Don’t boss me around,” she snapped at him, turning it off again and returning it to her back pocket. “You don’t get to toss out commands and expect me to comply, Howler. We’re not together. Remember?”
He clenched his jaw, but he remained mute, glaring off into the distance instead of meeting her gaze. “I have to go. Stay out of trouble tonight, Lyla.” As if finally remembering me, he turned his eyes on me. “Nice meeting you…”
“Mia,” I reminded him with a grin. “It was nice to meet you too, Howler.”
“Josie really likes you. She couldn’t stop talking about you and how much she already loves dancing, all the way home.” He grimaced. “Guess I’ll let her come back next week.”
“I hope so. She’s so sweet, and I really enjoyed having her in class.”
“Guess we’ll see what happens, then.” Tipping his head to me, he shot Lyla a last heated look and walked off.
As soon as he was out of sight, Lyla grabbed my barely touched drink and swallowed it in one gulp. “Fuck, I’m going to need stronger stuff than vodka if I’m going to have to deal with him tonight.”
The bar was behind us, so with one last glance in the direction of my Beast, I tucked my arm through my friend’s and we went to get more drinks.
Chapter 3
Mia
“Oh gods,” I groaned as the two men in the metal cage pounded away on each other.
Lyla only laughed and screamed just as loud as everyone else in the warehouse.
I didn’t have an issue with professional fighting. After Lyla told me where we were going, I’d been excited to watch. When we took our places in a roped-off area near the cage and the first guy came out, I’d still been anticipating the fight.
Then my Beast came out, with people screaming his name, obviously the fan favorite of the event for the evening, and I’d lost the excitement.
Beast was going to be fighting. Letting someone pound on him while he pounded back. The thought alone of him bleeding, broken, hurting made my stomach turn, and I’d been nauseated ever since.
“Don’t cover your eyes,” Lyla yelled over the roar of the crowd so I could hear her. “He keeps looking to see if you’re looking. You’re going to distract Beast.”
I’d found that out when he came out too. “The Beast” was his name. It was fitting and explained all the Belle shirts I’d seen at least ten chicks wearing.
Dropping my hands, I focused on the cage again, and sure enough, his dark eyes were looking my way even as he was hitting his opponent in the kidneys. Blood sprayed from the other guy’s mouth. I thought his name was Chopper, but I honestly couldn’t remember much about the fighter once Beast stepped out of the locker rooms in the back.
Lyla had told me this was going to be bloody, but I didn’t realize how right she would be. Or that I would care so much.
There was a cut above Beast’s left brow, and it was bleeding uncontrollably, making his entire face red with it. Even his beard was soaked, blood mixed with sweat dripping from the ends of his facial hair.
His head snapped back when he took a punch to the face and I couldn’t help crying out, but I didn’t cover my face again. Beast’s nostrils flared, and he uppercut Chopper.
The other fighter dropped back, falling to the mat like a ton of bricks, and the place went wild while the ref began counting to ten.
I held my breath, but Beast walked over to the cage, grinning at me through the fencing. Wait, was that a dimple under his beard? The temperature in the room skyrocketed a good twenty degrees at that realization. I gulped and he winked, making the ache between my legs double. At least five feet separated me from the cage, but it might as well have been only inches the way he was looking at me, like he was going to devour me the second he touched me.
Dear gods, I needed some fresh air. No one had ever affected me like that before. Up until right then, I wasn’t even sure I had much of a libido because sex had never really been on my list of priorities. That didn’t mean I hadn’t done it before, but the one time I had, I’d messed up everything.