Fighter (A Liam Payne Fanfiction)

Chapter Three - One For The Road

From the bottom of your heart,

The relegation zone.

I saw this coming from the start,

The shake, rattle and roll.

- "One For The Road", Arctic Monkeys

....

"...And next thing I knew, Torres was out like a light in the first twenty seconds. Boom—on his ass."

She chuckled, sipping some more from her cocktail. I had been entertaining this beautiful, grunge vixen for the last couple of minutes by stories of my fighting exploits. I loved how her funny colored eyes were full of humor as she looked at me, drinking in every detail.

"Has anyone ever told you just how good you look in leather?" she suddenly asked me, running a single finger down my arm.

"Oh yeah?" I murmured, my eyes flickering down from her finger to her face. With a smirk, I reached over and took her tiny hand in mine. She glanced down at our joined hands, and looked up at me.

As our eyes connected, I felt surges of electricity jolt through my bloodstream, straight to my heart. Never in all my life had I wanted to lean in and kiss someone more than right now, at this moment.

Carefully, I ran the pad of my thumb over the smooth skin of her hand, lowering my gaze to those full, red-painted lips. Time froze. Nothing existed except me and her. She had slid under my skin and overtook every rational thought I had. Before I could stop myself, I leaned down, my lips inches from hers, and I was close enough that I could inhale her vanilla-and-smoke fragrance, which was the same from last night. Her mouth parted, and her breath drifted across my face. God, I wanted her. I wanted to kiss her more than absolutely anything. I wanted to feel those perfect lips mold to mine, and feel that sexy little tongue dance with my own. But I didn't want to move too fast. Would she push me away, or pull me in?

Before I could battle some more with my inner conflict, a disgusting cough popped our intimate bubble. "Your table is ready, sir," the waitress said, fighting a smile. It was more than obvious that she was as happy as a clam that she cockblocked me.

"Thanks," I said stiffly, and I kept my eyes on Isabella.

She had snapped out of the haze that we were both in, and she drew her lower lip between her teeth. "We should go," she breathed.

I gulped hard. The air surrounding us was thick and heavy like a mink coat. "Yeah, we should," I whispered back.

Once we'd be seated, the Tom Brady waitress silently brought us our menus and walked away. Thank god.

I carefully looked over her body language, which suddenly had changed. Her shoulders were tight, her breathing was slow, and her eyes were only on the menu in front of her. It seemed like she was trying to calm herself down. Tension was rolling off of her body in waves.

I slapped my menu together, and her gorgeous eyes flickered to mine. She opened her mouth to speak, but I started talking first. "Don't you do that," I said.

"Do what?"

"You know what, baby girl. You're shutting me out."

"I don't know what you're talking about," she replied, looking back at her menu.

"Yes, you do. You're cutting me out because I got too close just then. Isn't that right, beautiful?"

Her mouth opened and closed. "Liam..." She sighed deeply, running her hand through her messy, light hair.