Chapter 10 - Chapter Eight — Chandré

I glance up to see who is coming down the passage as I open the door to my cabin.

"Naz!" I practically screech, pressing both hands to my chest like I'm guarding my heart. Maybe I am, because that traitorous organ started a riot behind my ribcage the second Naz strode into view. I clutch the doorknob, hunting for something to anchor me. So much for my plan to play it cool and indifferent, but I thought I wouldn't see him until dinner. He's here before I've even made it inside my cabin, leaving me no time to prepare. To marshal my defences against this man.

But there is no defence for fine as fuck, not when it comes swaggering up the passage looking like a whole damn snack.

"Chandré," Naz says, his deep voice pouring over me like hot oil, raising my goosebumps and then singeing them. "I didn't know you were here already."

"I'm glad you came."

He looks down at me from his great height, a good head above me. The breadth of his shoulders blocks out everything behind him, and he is literally the only thing I can see. His scent—clean and woody and masculine and uniquely him—floods my senses, my nostrils flaring as I breathe him in. Everything about this man screams dominance and confidence, but when his dark eyes latch on to mine, I read a line of uncertainty in them. We haven't spoken since the after-party, though his wishes, his very clear intentions, are what brought me here.

"This is a pretty elaborate scheme to see me again." I gesture at the porthole in the narrow passage, flaunting its view of that jewel-blue channel. "You could have just asked me out."

"Pretty sure I did, and you turned me down."