A PERFECT RENDEZVOUS

May I Have This Dance....

Zayn saw his shoulders stiffen imperceptibly when he came up behind him at the windows, and his unpredictable reactions to Zayn began to genuinely unnerve him. Rather than turning Harry into his arms and kissing him, which was what he would have done if he were like any other woman he'd known, he hit on a more subtle method of getting Harry where he wanted him to be. Shoving his hands into his pockets, he met Harry's gaze in the window, tipped his head toward the stereo, and said with teasing formality, "May I have the next dance, Mr. Mathison?"

He turned, his enchanting smile aglow with surprise, and Zayn's spirits soared crazily simply because he was pleased. He shoved his hands deeper into his pockets to keep from touching Harry and said with a wry grin, "The last time I asked a teacher to dance, I was more properly dressed for the occasion in a white shirt, maroon tie, and my favorite navy blue suit. She turned me down though."

"Really? Why?"

"She probably thought I was too short for her."

Harry smiled because he was easily 6'2" tall, and he thought Zayn was either joking or else the woman had been a giant. "Were you really shorter than she was?"

He nodded. "By about three feet. I, however, didn't regard that as a serious obstacle at the time because I had a wild crush on her."

Harry caught on then and his smile faded. "How old were you?"

"Seven."

Harry looked at him as if he knew the slight had hurt him, which, now that he thought about it, it had. "I would never have turned you down, Zayn."

The little catch in his voice and the soft look in his eyes were almost Zayn's undoing. Mesmerized by the feelings unfolding inside him, he pulled his hands out of his pockets and silently held his left palm out to Harry, his gaze locked to him. Harry laid his hand in Zayn's, and Zayn slid his arm around his narrow waist, drawing him close against him, while Streisand's incredible voice slid effortlessly into the first bars of "People."

A jolt shook Zayn when he felt Harry's legs and thighs coming into intimate contact with his own as he matched his steps with effortless grace, and when he laid his cheek lightly against his chest, Zayn's heart began to beat much too fast. He hadn't even kissed Harry yet, and desire was already pounding through every nerve ending in his body. To distract himself, he tried to think of an appropriate topic of conversation that would further his ultimate goal without immediately stimulating him more than he already was. Recalling that it had felt good to joke about the tire he'd slashed, he decided that it would benefit both of them if they could laugh about other events that hadn't been one bit funny at the time. Linking his fingers through Harry's, Zayn brought his hand against his chest and said lightly against his hair, "By the way, Mr. Mathison, about your unscheduled flight on that snowmobile today—"

He caught Zayn's wry tone immediately, tipped his head back, and affected an expression of such exaggerated, wide-eyed innocence that Zayn had to fight not to laugh. "Yes?" he said.

"Where the hell did you go when you shot over the edge of the mountain like a rocket and vanished?"

Harry's shoulders shook with laughter. "I landed in the embrace of a large pine tree."

"That was very clever planning," Zayn teased. "You stayed nice and dry and tricked me into acting like a demented salmon in that freezing stream."

"That part wasn't funny. What you did today was the bravest thing I've ever seen anyone do."

It wasn't the words he said that melted him, it was the way he was looking at Zayn—the admiration in his eyes, the awed wonder in his voice. After the humiliation of his trial and the dehumanizing effects of prison, it was heady merely to be looked at like a man, not an animal. But to have Harry look at him as if he were brave and fine and decent was a gift more precious to him than anything he'd ever been given. He wanted to crush Harry in his arms, to lose himself in his sweetness, to wrap him around him like a blanket and bury himself in him, he wanted to be the best lover he'd ever had and to make this night as memorable for Harry as it was going to be for him.