Tempting Sydney

by Corbett, Angela

  “Seriously, Brynn. How do you find this stuff out?”

  “It’s out there,” she said, waving her hand in the air, “in the wind.”

  I rolled my eyes, grabbing my keys from the table next to the door. I decided I needed to spend more time listening to the wind. Maybe it would have some intel on Jax.

  Thirty minutes later, we were at the entrance to an old silver mine high above the city. Every October, they opened it up as a haunted house attraction. Tonight—according to the huge black banner hanging over the entrance—all ticket sales went toward a fundraiser benefiting a foundation that raised awareness to stop reckless driving.

  I love Halloween, ghosts, and scary stories, but I’m not a big fan of haunted houses. They’re all shock factor and fake scares. Give me a real haunted house with an actual ghost any day. But I reminded myself that I was trying to broaden my horizons and get out of my comfort zone. Plus, it was for a good cause.

  We started walking toward the entrance, but detoured away as Brynn pulled me in the direction of two guys. She’d told me on the way up the mountain that we were meeting them there. I’d gone along with it because I figured she was probably right—I did need to get out of the house. But I could care less about the date, or the boy she’d set me up with. Brynn, who had far more experience in the man department than me, swooped in next to a tall, blonde surfer type, and grabbed his bicep with gusto. “Damn, Chet! What do you bench, five-hundred pounds?”

  That was one of the more ridiculous things I’d ever heard come out of Brynn’s mouth—and I’d heard some whoppers. “If so, you should check him for fangs,” I said, “because five-hundred pounds is vampire territory.”

  “I wouldn’t mind a vampire.” She looked up at Chet, batting her eyes. “Wanna bite me?”

  I rolled my eyes and turned to the guy standing next to them. He was wearing a coat, but his shoulders were wide and he seemed sturdy enough to climb if I needed to get away from an evil clown. His light brown eyes were soft. I smiled, trying to be a good sport about the date. “Hey, I’m Sydney.”

  He smiled back, his cheeks dimpling in an endearing way. I wasn’t going to marry the guy, but if I had to go through a scary haunted house, he wasn’t a bad person to partner up with. He was attractive, I’d give him that. Brynn had done a good job. “Drew. Nice to meet you. And I’m not a vampire.”

  I frowned inwardly, and tried to keep the expression off my face. Huh. Drew. I hadn’t had great experiences with Drews in the past. I had a theory that any guy named Drew was destined to be a raging, egotistical asshole. I hoped this one proved me wrong. I smiled and said, “Good to know. I’m glad I won’t have to worry about being turned tonight.”

  Chet and Drew had already bought our tickets, which was nice of them. Brynn and Chet stopped groping each other long enough to direct us inside the mine entrance. Drew and I followed them into the elevator that took us three hundred feet down into the ground.

  The first obstacle we came to was a watery pit covered by a few 2x4s we had to navigate across in the dark. It was like walking a plank, only each plank was about as wide as my shoes, and precariously placed. The smoke rising from the water made it difficult to see anything, let alone the boards. I could already tell this haunted attraction would not be my favorite experience, and I longed for the case study on tort law that I was working on at home, instead.

  Unsteady on the skinny boards, I almost fell, but felt a firm hand grab my waist and stabilize me at just the right moment before I would have tumbled. I looked back and saw Drew’s dimples. “Thanks!”

  “Any time,” he said, his hand lingering on my waist. Whether it was for support, or an excuse to touch me, I wasn’t sure. I’d take the support, though.

  We stepped off the wood walkway and into a tunnel. We had to crouch down and crawl through it. The tunnel was pitch black, and I was constantly on guard for something to jump out from the sides, or in front of me. The confined space wasn’t helping my claustrophobia, either. Without light to guide me, there were more than a couple of times I thought I was going to get stuck. I felt a hand on my ass. I figured it was probably Drew, but couldn’t fault him for it since he was trying to feel his way through the darkness, too. I was surprised I hadn’t accidentally fondled someone myself.

  I finally reached the end of the tunnel and pushed through a heavy black curtain into a room pulsing with a bright strobe light. I had no memory of my birth, but figured it probably felt a lot like this, and was just as disorienting. No wonder babies are so pissed when they’re born. I was a little pissed off myself.

  I found Brynn and grabbed her arm. “This is ridiculous,” I hissed into her ear. “I’d rather be doing homework.”

  She rolled her eyes, still hanging onto Chet. “You’d always rather be doing homework.”

  “And his name is Drew! You know how I feel about Drews!”

  “Stop overreacting. You’re on one date with him, not having his babies. Plus, you’re obsessed with a Jax. Jaxes are way higher than Drews on the douchebag name meter.”

  I scowled at the reminder. After he’d followed us to the club and rescued us, Brynn had become even more convinced that Jax was my soul mate.

  Drew came up behind me, standing a head taller than me, and pressing into my back. “Hey, you made it!”

  I turned from Brynn, trying not to let my pissy mood show and gave Drew a forced smile. “There were times I questioned if I would, but the tunnel eventually birthed me.”

  Loud music started blaring and we were all pushed into a room full of mirrors, multi-colored lights flashing in quick patterns meant to be disorienting. The strobe light had been tame compared to this. I kept pushing around the mirrors, trying to find my way through the maze. I finally realized it was useless and they’d provide an exit when they were ready for our group to move on. I decided to stop fighting my predicament, and stood, waiting. I grabbed Drew by the arm so we wouldn’t get separated. He smiled wide. “Don’t worry, I won’t let anything get you.”

  Great. My knight in shining armor.

  After a few minutes, we were herded into another room. This one had macabre scenes that made photos I’d seen of the plague look like cupcakes and rainbows. It wasn’t scary—it was absolutely disturbing. Each scene was dark until we passed by it, then the scene would flash and come to life. A girl smashing a guy’s head with an ax; a red-eyed monster threatening to attack; a man tied to a rack, arms and legs being pulled apart in four different directions as he screamed in pain. The final scene was a terrified woman sprawled out on what looked to be cobblestone streets. The guy above her was laughing maniacally as he held a knife over her, eyes wild. The screeching music was a horrifying companion to the scene. Just as the guy looked like he was about to do something even worse, like rip off her clothes, the scene went completely black, and the music cut out. I took a deep breath, relieved that part was over, and waited to be herded to the next room of horrors. My eyes tried to adjust to the inky blackness surrounding me, but there was no light at all; I couldn’t even make out shapes.

  That’s when I was pulled a few feet away. A strong arm around my waist.

  I was glad Drew was so committed to our buddy system, but his grip was a little tight. We stood there, the sound of heavy breathing the only noise in the room. I felt a large hand cup my cheek tenderly—the gesture somewhat familiar. Hot breath hit my face like a warm, beachy breeze. My chest heaved in response. The combination of total darkness and an unfamiliar area where anything could happen had my heart racing, but not with fear—something else. I could feel him in front of me, strong, stable. I liked the feeling more than I wanted to admit. My contemplation was interrupted by soft, silky full lips pressing against mine. He pushed lightly against me, coaxing my mouth open. Our tongues twisted together and the kiss deepened before he suddenly broke away.

  His lips, hands, everything—gone.

  A blood curdling scream pierced the air and the lights kicked back on, highlighting the woman now dea
d and bleeding in the scene. The man smiled, his lips curled in a way that seemed to radiate insanity. The actors in this haunted house were pretty damn impressive.

  And I was totally disoriented. I looked around the room; Drew was a few paces away. It didn’t look like he’d just kissed his blind date. But his name was Drew and he was probably an epic asshole, so I couldn’t be sure if he was the type to kiss and pace. But jeez, that was an amazing kiss!

  I licked my lips, tasting a fruity strawberry flavor. It reminded me of something, but I couldn’t put my finger on what.

  I moved closer to Drew, silently studying his face for any sign that he’d just pulled a ninja kiss. He gave nothing away. A door opened and I followed Brynn and Chet, with Drew bringing up the rear. We went through a few more scenes, but my mind was preoccupied as I tried to figure out what had actually happened in that dark room. We rode the elevator back to the top and I managed to nod and give appropriate—albeit short, responses—where I needed to as we were herded through a maze of hay bales, at the end of the attraction.

  We were penned in by a chain link fence, and were trying to figure our way out when the obligatory Jason with his chainsaw, minus the chain, was suddenly in the cage with us. He paused to look each one of us in the eye, tilting his head like the psychopath he was. When he got to me, he stopped and stared longer than he had with everyone else. I was uncomfortable with being the subject of his fixation.

  Brynn grabbed onto Chet. I had mixed feelings about grabbing the possible stealth kisser Drew, and managed not to until Jason came rushing for us. I screamed and tried to pull Drew with me to the other side of the fence, but he stood there, frozen in place. Great. The guy who was supposed to be protecting me was a pansy. And I wasn’t sticking around to get attacked with him, even if the attack wasn’t real.

  I ran to the other side of the fence, leaving Drew by himself. Jason had the chainsaw right above Drew’s head. At first Drew tried to keep it cool, but as the chainsaw lowered more and more, Drew’s fight or flight response kicked in and he eventually ran away, too. Now Brynn, Chet, and Drew were all by the exit and I was alone, on the other side of the enclosure. And really, really pissed. I wasn’t going to be terrorized by a fictional character wielding a fake weapon while my date, best friend, and her alleged big dick scampered away. Some protector Drew had been. He had one job and didn’t do it.

  Annoyed, I narrowed my eyes and I started to march past Jason. He stalked toward me, pushing me back toward the fence—the last place I wanted to be trapped. Fake chainsaw and fake Jason notwithstanding, the actor still played the part well, and it was hard to be ballsy when I was being detained by a nightmare.

  He stood back, holding the chainsaw in front of me, blocking my path. Every time I tried to move, he blocked me again. Finally, I’d had enough. “This is ridiculous,” I said, pushing past him. He grabbed my arm and I swiveled my head in his direction, looking first at my arm, then at him. I’d had friends work as actors in haunted houses. The number one rule was not to touch the attendees. I shifted my eyes up to meet his. They were indiscernible dots through the mask. “Let me go,” I hissed.

  The voice that answered was muffled through the mask, but held a familiar, deep tone. The words he spoke were unmistakable, “Not a chance, sweetheart.”

  I had one question plaguing me. The same question that had been running through my head all weekend.

  Had Jackson West kissed me in a dark, haunted mine? And if he had, was it creepy, or romantic? I couldn’t decide.

  I went over the facts—again. The strawberry flavor left on my lips after the kiss had reminded me distinctly of the strawberry candy Jax had popped in his mouth when he fixed the overflow on She-Ra. But a lot of things smelled and tasted like strawberries—including the actual berries—and a lot of people ate strawberries, too. Based on that, I didn’t feel like there was a big enough connection.

  Jason’s voice had sounded a lot like Jax’s, but he was wearing a mask, and the voice was hard to distinguish. And the “sweetheart” tacked onto the end of the conversation was a word he’d used in place of my name before. Sweetheart was a pretty common term of endearment, however, so between that and the muffled voice, I had enough uncertainty to drive me nuts with curiosity about whether or not it had actually been Jax. My gut didn’t have any questions, though. My gut told me Jackson West had full-on kissed me—and it had been fantastic. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that revelation. Admitting it even to myself was scary.

  I’d gone over and over the night in my head all weekend. Number one, Jax as an actor in a haunted house seemed…odd. I just didn’t cast him as the acting type. Football, wrestling, hell, even baseball, I could see, but drama as an extracurricular? It seemed completely out of character. But maybe I didn’t know him well enough to make that judgment. And if he was that good at drama, no wonder he thought highly of himself in bed. He probably knew quite a bit about role-playing. I got lost in thoughts of that, and the scenes from my fantasies that he could probably act out like a true thespian, before I shook myself out of it and went on to my next point.

  Number two, if Jax had pulled something like that off, he’d have owned up to it by now…at least, I thought he would have. Then again, the last time I saw him was at my house the morning after he’d rearranged Karl’s testicles a week ago, so maybe he was waiting until our next meeting to deliver his “I kissed you and you didn’t know it” speech.

  Of all the possible kiss explanations, Jax as the kiss ninja made the most sense. It would explain the fact that Drew didn’t seem at all phased by what had happened during the haunted adventure, and—despite his name—was nothing but a gentleman the rest of the night. We’d stopped for hot chocolate after the mine and Drew even bought my drink. Though if he’d stolen a kiss in the dark and still wasn’t owning up to it, hot chocolate was the least he could do.

  After calling me sweetheart, “Jason” had terrorized me a bit more before letting me leave with Brynn and the boys. If Jax really had kissed me, he’d broken the rules by touching me—twice: once during the kiss, and again as Jason. A thrill of excitement fluttered through me. Maybe he did like me? I was also a little pissed because why kiss me in the dark, instead of kissing me in a normal lighted area where we could both be privy to the lip lock, and the lead up? You only get one first kiss with a man; it’s really not something you want screwed up. If we’d had a magical moment, at least one of us was unaware of the identity of the other magic maker. That seemed grossly unfair, and gave him the upper hand. I didn’t like that. I preferred to be in control of situations.

  “I just wish I knew if it was him,” I said to Brynn. We were doing yoga in the living room, trying to decompress from the weekend. Which meant I was trying to relax, and Brynn was trying to shake a hangover from her second date with Chet on Saturday night.

  “Well, it wasn’t Drew,” she said. “I asked.”

  “You asked?” My mouth hung open as I switched into Warrior Two pose. “I can’t believe you asked!”

  She lifted a shoulder, concentrating on her balance. “Drew was there when I got up this morning, so I took advantage of the situation.”

  “Yeah, I noticed you didn’t come home last night. So, are you and Chet an item now, or what?”

  She rolled her eyes as she changed positions. “When am I ever an item with anyone, Syd? You know I’m just having fun.”

  “You had fun with Chet two nights in a row. That’s unusual for you.”

  “Chet’s man parts are unusual. They warranted further investigation…you know, for my research.”

  I laughed and shook my head. “You’re using research as an excuse for a lot lately. I take it the info you got from ‘the wind’ was correct, then?”

  Her lips stretched into a smile. “It was. And Chet might be my new go-to booty call. I’m sure Drew would like to be yours. He seemed interested, and was pretty deflated when I told him someone else had ninja kissed you on his date.”

  “Ninja kiss”
was even funnier when someone said it out loud, and it wasn’t just in my head. “I can’t believe you told him that, either. But it is pretty funny. His date got stolen right under his nose and he had no clue.”

  She laughed. “Did you even get Drew’s number?”

  “No. He was a nice guy, and hot—so good job on that—I’m just not really interested.”

  “Yeah…that’s because you’re interested in a guy who pretends to be a chainsaw wielding psycho killer, and probably stalks the bowels of the earth searching for his next conquest—like an evil dragon. Congratulations on falling for Smaug. How many girls do you think Blue Eyes kissed in the dark Friday night besides you?”

  I frowned. “I hadn’t thought about that.” I didn’t want to think about it now, either. Surely, he had girls interested in him. With his face and biteable ass, he probably got hit on hourly. The question was whether he followed through on any of the invitations. I didn’t get the vibe that he did. He was so guarded, and I knew it wouldn’t be easy to get him to open up—for anyone. I could tell he had plenty of experience with women, but he wasn’t some frat boy just trying to get laid. He was older, and seemed to be past that stage of his life. I got the feeling he didn’t do much without first knowing the potential reactions and consequences from every party involved—kind of like me.

  “I thought you liked Jax,” I said to Brynn. “You suddenly seem to think he’s evil.”

  Brynn shook her head. “No, not evil. I just don’t know what his game is. He’s hard to read.”

  Brynn stood and we both finished with Mountain, and then sank down into Child’s pose. My breath was even and calm. The yoga had helped me think. I sat up, brushing hair away from my face.

  “You need to confront Jax about his ninja skills,” Brynn said, her arms still flat in front of her, face pressed into her mat.

  “I know. I’ll talk to him about it the next time I see him.”