Chapter 5

The air in the back room of The Rusty Anchor was thick, heavy with the scent of stale beer, spilled whiskey, and the musk of a hundred bodies pressing against the walls outside. It was a private booth, carved out from the main chaos by a heavy, velvet-draped divider that offered just enough privacy for us, but not enough to silence the roar of the Harley Davidson convention raging just feet away. I could feel the bass of the music vibrating through the leather seat beneath my thighs, a rhythmic thrumming that matched the frantic beating of my heart. He was still standing over me, his presence overwhelming, a tower of muscle and leather. The way he looked at me had shifted from possessive to predatory in the span of the last ten minutes. His eyes, dark and intense, dropped to my lips, then down to my throat, tracing the path of my pulse as it jumped wildly against the collar of my silk blouse. I was wearing a short, black dress that had been perfect for the occasion, designed to turn heads, but now, in the dim light of the booth, it felt like a challenge. "Take it off,