Blazed (5 page)

"You've been doing some research?"

"Well, you know. A guy you meet in a bar strolls into your workplace and bluntly tells you that he's picking you up when you finish without really asking if it's okay. It pays for a girl to be armed with information. 'Knowledge is power'."

"I suppose you're right. How very prudent of you."

"Ah well..." Scratching the back of my neck, I lifted one shoulder in an awkward shrug. "I kind of had it forced on me the minute you left. I'm really more a fan of blissful ignorance. But for curiosity's sake, uh... Why?"

His gaze flickered over me then settled back on the road ahead. "Why don't I hang out with women or why you?"

"Yes." 

He sighed, almost amused at my response and shook his head. "I made you set yourself on fire. I suppose this is the least I can do."

"That's all it takes? Stop the presses, I need to let the entire female population of Great Britain know it’s that easy." 

WE drove in silence for the next ten minutes, my unease at travelling in the gremlin car fading with each mile. My gaze stayed fixed out of the window, watching the stop-start rhythm of the sea of cars around us. Despite living there for a little over four years, I didn't know
London well enough to take it's chaos for granted like the other suits and stiffs roaming the streets between dinner appointments. It still amazed me that anyone could live comfortably in the middle of all the noise. 

I'd not once perused the crowded arenas of
Piccadilly Circus or Trafalgar Square, so I was daunted enough by being so close to the action 
before
 Blaze pulled into a small private car park and retrieved another nightmare mode of transportation from the boot of his 'car'.

"Rollerskates?" I snapped, crossing my arms defiantly as he pulled off his shoes to slip on a pair of red and white skates of his own. "This
 had better be your bad sense of humour at play."

"Nope. It's rush hour, this is faster."

"You're fucking crazy, man." He shot me a sterling grin and pulled my door open, swiftly crouching to pull my feet from the foot-well. I was horrified when I realised that he was genuinely serious. "Oh god, I'm going to die today. Without a doubt, this is my last day on Earth."

"I've got your back." He looked up at me and winked, pulling my shoes off and replacing them with the
 ludicrously clowny skates. "I had to guess at your size, so I went for a five." I tried not to focus on the fact he'd guessed right. He was turning out to be weird enough without the words 'foot fetishist' flashing over his head in neon lights. "You ever been on a pair of these bad boys before?"

"Sure, when I was about nine." And I'd felt like an idiot then.

"Great! No tutorial necessary then." Grabbing me by the waist, he hauled me to my feet and tossed my bag down on the seat behind me. It seemed like I was totally at his mercy in the middle of a relatively alien place, separated from familiar company and any way of contacting them. On rollerskates. Why wasn't I feeling a little more apprehensive than I should have been? 

"For interests sake," I murmured, testing the stability of the wheels underneath me, "you know how to keep under the press radar, right?" My question had less to do with his lone wolf reputation and more the fear of being identified as a Tudor.

"Why, are you camera shy?"

"If I say I'm camera shy, do you promise not to ask questions?" His eyes narrowed with suspicion but he nodded, agreeing to play along. "I'm camera shy."

"Righto. Ready?" 
No.
 

"As I'll ever be."

WITH one of his hands wrapped around my wrist, Blaze pulled me along behind him at unnerving speed, weaving between the pedestrians that filled the pathways. Occasionally, he glanced back at me to laugh at the hand I had firmly clapped over my eyes and called back insults based around me being cowardly. Watching him move so confidently and fluidly, there was really no way to avoid being envious of how comfortable he was in his own body
— completely refined and controlled in a hectic environment like it stemmed off from him and had been constructed specifically for his enjoyment. He was more 'London' than Jonathan and the thrill of being literally dragged along for the ride distracted me from the fact that we were being an absolute nuisance.

"I thought you said we had a route," I yelled after shouting an apology to the fifth person finding themselves on my collision course. Blaze spun around and ground to a halt in front of me, cheeks flushed and pupils wide with adrenaline.

"We do, I just wanted to see how many times I could take you around in a circle before you noticed." 

Stepping back to look at the surroundings, I realised that I was looking at Nelson's Column for the third time. "Oh! Ass."

Grinning, he grabbed my hand and pulled me in front of him, pushing me forward at a much slower and safer pace than before. His fingers innocuously thread between mine like it was the most normal thing he could have done, and somehow that encouraged me to move my legs. I might have thought it was because I wanted to escape if I couldn't feel the goofy smile plastered to my face. 

Everything in my life at that moment felt askew, turned upside down on it's head and showing no signs of righting itself. There was no way that we would actually avoid the media when Blaze, of all people was circling the capital on rollerskates with some ragtag brunette beside him, but that was okay. The time for bitter retrospect and mourning my mistakes would be later. It was impossible to think logically when he had such a
 stupefying effect on anyone who looked at him. As soon as we parted ways, I was sure I'd be instantly plunged into a deep regret for being so foolhardy, but when he looked so urbane and free, it was hard not to get a little carried away in the moment.

And then I remembered an old
cliché I'd heard so often before but never really put value to; 'Be careful what you wish for'. If I really thought about it, Blaze might just fit the description of the tall, dark and handsome stranger I'd wanted to mess up my life, and maybe I'd dreamed of him so hard he just sprang into existence. Hardcore 
Buffy The Vampire Slayer
 fans might call him my 'key'— a complete fabrication of something else moulded into human form, creating false memories of his fame and popularity for everyone else but me. Admittedly, I probably wasn't subconsciously protecting me from a psycho goddess, but my being there with him seemed just as unlikely. 

But why the hell was I complaining? I'd wished him, so if he was going to send me down in a blaze of embarrassment and public humiliation, it was my own damned fault.

OUR ROUTE LED us to
Hyde Park, where skating seemed to be far less bizarre. Girls in daisy dukes and tank tops spun around skillfully with their bandana wearing boyfriends to the music pounding from portable CD players, swirling around us like we were no real obstacle. Masses of people called Blaze's name when they saw us, proving to me just how notorious the man was, and their curious frowns at our linked hands were a confirmation that 
this 
was not his usual means of association. Like I had any doubt. I shook my grip free and folded my hands securely under my arms, painfully aware that I didn't fit in wearing tattered grey slacks and a style-less work shirt.

Apparently sensing my insecurity, Blaze pointed at my shirt and shook his head authoritatively. "Off."

"Excuse me?"

"Okay, not off as such. Undo the bottom buttons and tie it up like a bolero."
 Sparing a quick glance down, I rolled a foot away from him and turned my back on him. Revealing my midriff in public was possibly a bigger anxiety trigger than if he'd asked me to strip naked. At least all eyes would have been fixed on my chest that way. The way my body looked was a secret shame. "Come on, Emmeline. You'll burn up like that. I know that's your specialist area, but—"

I spun back around to him, hands on my hips. Would he ever let that go? "It's Emmy, not Emmeline, and I'm not doing shit to this outfit. Let me sweat or take me home."
 

"Interesting set of options," he murmured, trying not to laugh at the fact that I'd been unwittingly suggestive and had the blush to show that I knew it, "but seriously, whatever your beef is with your body, nobody cares what you look like here. Check it." He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder at a seriously overweight man wearing less clothes than decent. "You could be seriously disfigured and nobody would care with this guy hogging the vista." I froze, numbed by his unintentional perceptiveness.
 

He arched a brow at my expressionless face and took advantage of my stillness. "Okay, I'll just sort you out myself."

Before I had any time to object, he had the bottoms of my shirt tied off low enough to not reveal flesh and my sleeves rolled up. Surprised by his swiftness and embarrassed by the fight I'd put up over nothing, I stared at him, struggling to muster the smile he'd so easily caused before. If he sensed my inner turmoil about being so dangerously close to being exposed, he didn't give it away when he turned me back around and began to pluck the bobby pins from the French knot styled into my hair. 

"So how long is this mane of yours?"
 

"Very. That's why it was tied up." He must have ignored the blatant vehemence in my voice too because he kept on pulling at the pins until there was nothing to stop it tumbling free. His fingers sifted through the strands of raven from root to the tips that ended at my waist.

"
Jesus.
" Something in his tone made my stomach flip. It was carnal and raw— something that had no place being directed at me. I'd been object of enough men 
and
 women's affections to hear lust in a voice, but Christ, this was so primitive that I half expected his teeth to sink into me. "Why the hell don't you wear it down all the time?"

"It gets in the way," I whispered, scared to turn around and see if his face matched his silky growl, "you'd find out how much if you backed up enough for me to stop feeling like your prey." Immediately, he stepped back out of my personal space, but I could still feel his intensity permeating off him in waves. I was sure my brain was starting to bleed from how severely sexual he was, and I decided in that minute that, as popular and gorgeous as he was, I wouldn't grant him the privilege of being treated any differently from any other man who was drawn to me. If one night in my bed was what he was looking for, he'd get it without this charade.

"There are easier ways to score a lay than with disingenuous flattery and outlandish dates, you know." My fists clenched at my sides as he closed in on me, grabbing me by the hips to pull me right up against him. His hands so close to my bare skin made me sway— I wanted them lower, tensing and flexing, nails biting into my skin as I rode him... My head tipped back to catch a first time glimpse of the twining flecks of copper coursing through his irises. "Wow." 
Ugh, dammit...

"Cute," he laughed, "but I've got you pegged, Emmeline. You'd be surprised how much you give away without even knowing it, and trust me, I'm no enabler. If you think I brought you here as part of some juvenile mating ritual, you're wrong."

"So why 
did
 you bring me here?" 

He frowned, slowly releasing me. "I don't know. I didn't even think about it. But I'm not an idiot
— I know that if I took you home and screwed you now, I'd never see you again."

"So?"
 

Scowling, he ducked down and planted a quick kiss right on my lips. I jerked back in surprise, baffled by the passionless advance. "No. I'm not nearly done terrorising you."

HIS rejection didn't hurt as much as it should have, unlike my palms and knees after repeated impact with the concrete. An hour in the baking June
 evening sun proved that I wasn't half as graceful as he was and not nearly as reflexive. Every time I fell, he darted over to me to save me but ended up on the floor with me. While he laughed, I sulked, feeling like an uncoordinated no-hoper.

"We're not doing that again," I huffed, rolling my eyes at being carried around like a sleepy child. There was no denying that being that close to him was a treat for all the senses
— he smelled divinely of shower gel, sweat and himself— but the blood soaking through the fabric of my slacks made me feel more idiotic than the rollerskates did. Pain didn't bother me, but it seemed to bother Blaze, who insisted on carrying me back to his silver bug car en route a pharmacy so he could clean me up when I winced uncontrollably with every step.

"Agreed," he nodded, "I should have guessed that you were too accident prone for something my seven year old nephew does quite capably."

"Don't mock me. I know people." Throwing his head back to laugh, Blaze set me down on the bonnet of his car and lifted my trouser legs to survey the damage. His laugh was almost as silken and seductive as his voice, a good distraction. "Is it bad?"

"You'll live. Though judging from the state of these kneecaps, you're no stranger to falling over."

"Occupational hazard. I'm a professional wino." He ripped the packet of an antiseptic wipe open and seemed to look up for signs of life when I didn't flinch.