Masked Attraction

Chapter 19: Flavor

"May I interrupt?" I promptly turn around to the sound of a voice I would know anywhere. I lay eyes on Sebastien standing there on the threshold between us. He smiles at my friends and then fixates his attention on me. I nod my head to him and turn around telling the rest of them I will be back shortly.

Sebastien gives me a wicked grin and holds out his hand to me. "Want to dance?"

I fervently shake my head no, but Bash escorts me out onto the dance floor not taking no for an answer. He pulls me into his arms and grabs one of my hands and puts the other one gently on my waist. I feel myself silently panicking from being in the center of the room with people watching because wherever Bash goes, people pay attention. He starts swaying us back and forth not self-conscious at all that we are one of the only ones dancing to the slow song.

"So, I wanted to apologize. I may have overreacted." This distracts me from going into a tizzy of being in a room full of people.

"May have?" I say quirking an eyebrow.

"Alright fine. You never let me have one." He chuckles under his breath and then looks down at me his eyes softening. "I overreacted. I am overly impulsive and protective at times. I am sorry. I just don't want to see you get hurt. I live with these guys. They are not the kind of guys I want you around, but I don't have the right to boss you around. I'm sorry Emma."

"It's okay Sebastien. I forgive you," I say sincerely meaning it.

"I guess I am also not used to you going out with guys," he says looking off into the distance thinking thoroughly about something.

"I went out with Jason last year," I remind him.

His attention pulls back to me, "That guy? Please, he was as dull as a dud. No flavor whatsoever."

"Flavor?" I question him.

"Yeah, he was like going out with a piece of paper. No personality at all," he clarifies.

"You have some seriously weird phrases you know that." I giggle at him.

"What can I say, I have flavor," he jests. "You look really pretty by the way," he notes. I beam up at him feeling way more beautiful when he says it rather than Zeke.

"Thank you, so do you Bash," I answer back, doing a quick once-over at him in his well-fitted suit. His all-black attire is completely captivating on him clinging to his trim build and enhancing all the muscles underneath it.

He chuckles and I feel my face flame up unsure if he caught me ogling him. "Thanks Emma, I love being called pretty." I laugh now realizing what I said. "So how is your date anyway? Cuz if he pulls a move on you I swear I will break his wrists."

"Bash!" I exclaim.

"Sorry, sorry," he responds back to me, clearly not sorry at all. I shake my head at his response and reach up lacing my arms around his neck mimicking a couple next to us. He responds by placing both of his hands on my tiny waist completely encircling them. I notice a few other people starting to dance around us, but I no longer feel as flustered as when we started.

"He's alright. I tried talking to him but I don't even think he knows where his classes are let alone what he is taking."

"Yeah, he is definitely not someone to be casually discussing school with," Bash informs me.

"I mean he doesn't need to be a brainiac, but we are in college so it would be nice if I could talk to a guy about my classes and lectures. I feel like I can never discuss those types of things with a guy without being written off as a nerd or boring."

He examines me, "Alright I'm a guy, tell me about your classes."

"What?" I ask bewildered.

"Tell me what you would have told him. Practice and I'll tell you what I think of it," he declares certainly.

"I already know that you don't care about that stuff," I evidently say dismissing the subject.

He insists. "Emma I like talking to you so I'll like whatever you say and a guy into you will think the same thing. Just tell me what you were planning on talking about, I want to hear it."

"Alright, okay," I cave to him. "I um, so far am really liking my epidemiology class," I start to say getting enlivened just talking about. "It is so exciting! I want to take more classes on it. Like next week, we are going to discuss exploratory data analysis and also the relationships between epidemiology and biostatistics in the prevention of diseases," I feel myself eagerly blabbering on and look over at his reaction his blue eyes staring at me a little blankly. "See I am totally boring you. I suck at making interesting conversation," I huff.

"No, you're not Emma. I like to hear you being all smart and passionate about your work. Even if I don't know what you're talking about, it doesn't mean I don't want to hear about it. It was good so stop worrying about how you're coming off. You never have to hold back for any guy. Just be your perfect self, because any guy who finds you boring is idiotic," he enounces indisputably.

I let out a breath feeling my insides pacifying and try and hold back a blush. He always manages to calm me and stir up my feelings in a frenzy. Trying to push aside any incoming emotions I ask, "What about you? What has been going on with you?" I ask and I vaguely hear the song changing but neither of us seems to care.

"You know, the usual. Getting into some trouble here and there, but nothing too much," he winks at me and I laugh. "Being co-president is a little more work than I thought. I never actually wanted to do it in the first place, but when all the brothers nominated me I was like well why not. Turns out, it's a shit ton of work but I'm mostly liking it, feeling I have something important and that I am pretty good at it."

I watch a blonde head and red dress approach out of the corner of my eye.

"Hi, Emma! Can I steal Bashy from you?" I hear Britt say and I look over at her almost forgetting we are in a room with other people.

"Oh, yes of course," I back away from Bash feeling slightly colder.

"I'll catch up with you later, Emma," Bash tells me and follows Britt who has snatched his arm.

"Mhmm," I say back. I overhear him telling her that they have a poker game going on downstairs that they should crash and annihilate and she nods giggling as he brings her downstairs.

I awkwardly stand there for a few moments before slowly walking back to where my friends were before.