Ink& Desire

Steamy Night

Anaya tried to get back to work. She really did. But the glow of the screen felt blinding, and the silence of the house was now filled with the muffled sounds of him moving in the next room. The creak of the floorboards. The soft thud of a suitcase. The click of a light switch.

The lines on her tablet began to blur. She found herself drawing the way the water had pooled in the hollow of his collarbone. She felt a strange, heavy heat settling in her limbs, a magnetic pull toward the wall separating them. It was as if the boundary between her creation and her reality had dissolved in the rain.

She stood up to stretch, her eyes catching a movement in the full-length mirror across the room.

In the reflection, her bedroom door was wide open.

A shadow moved. Before she could even turn around, a pair of strong, damp arms wrapped around her waist, pulling her back against a solid, warm chest. The scent of sandalwood overwhelmed her. She felt the rough texture of a damp shirt against her back and the heat of a body that felt far too solid to be a figment of her imagination.

"Aarav?" she whispered, her voice breaking.

He didn't answer with words. He leaned down, his breath hot against the sensitive skin of her ear. She felt the graze of his teeth—a slow, predatory nibble against the curve of her neck that sent a jolt of pure electricity straight to her core. Anaya’s head fell back against his shoulder, a low, involuntary moan escaping her as his hands tightened their grip on her hips, pulling her flush against him.

The world tilted. The heat was unbearable, the sensation of his skin against hers so vivid she could swear she felt individual droplets of water still clinging to his hair. It was more real than anything she’d ever felt.

The Awakening

Anaya gasped, her eyes snapping open.

She was slumped over her desk, her cheek pressed against the cool glass of her tablet. The room was silent, save for the steady, peaceful patter of rain against the window. No one was holding her waist. The door was locked, exactly as she had left it.

Her heart was doing a marathon, and the phantom sensation of teeth against her neck lingered like a burn. She touched her throat, almost expecting to find a mark.

She sat up, rubbing her face, her breath coming in shallow hitches. It had been a dream. A crazy, vivid, "I’ve-been-drawing-this-guy-too-long" dream fueled by a massive caffeine crash and an overactive imagination.

She looked down at her screen. There was Aarav, frozen in digital ink, his eyes dark and mysterious. She looked at the door, then back at her work, feeling a little embarrassed.

"Just a dream," she whispered to the empty room, trying to laugh it off.

But as she reached for her water glass, her hand brushed against the "Notifications" tab on her laptop. A single email sat at the top of her inbox, timestamped ten minutes ago:

Airbnb: New Confirmed Reservation! Your guest, Aarav, is arriving tonight.

Anaya’s blood ran cold. Slowly, she turned her head toward the front door just as the sound of a car engine died out in her driveway, followed by the heavy thud of a car door slamming shut in the rain.