After one feverish night with Tyler Evans, Rory is never supposed to see the man draped in enigmas and devilish charms again.
Six months later, she's deep into a summer fling with Chace. As their fling becomes a committed relationship, she's adamant...
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I wasn't thinking. My brain shut down the moment she uttered those words. We can fix this. Words that screamed she still didn't understand, still couldn't fathom the shit going down inside me. So I showed her.
Kissing Rory is blissful. It's more intoxicating than any sensation I've ever had coursing through my veins. Everything combusted the second our lips touched, and I can't hold on to her hard enough to contain the catastrophe. The world is sucking me down while the sky is lifting me to the heavens. I'm in complete agonizing paradise because it feels so right and wrong at the same time. Three seconds in, and I expect her to slap me or push me away.
She does neither.
Hope expands beneath my ribcage and clutches my heart when she opens her mouth just enough to invite me in. She kisses me back. Trembling fingertips touch my arms, so soft, so delicate and afraid. I reach across her full figure, savoring her hot skin still wet from the pool, down to her waist, and pull her body into mine. It's so right. Everything is just like that first night; the night we let nothing but carnal desires rip us apart as we tore into each other. There's more deep down inside us, kindling between us. I want to chip away her guard piece by piece. We can be so much more.
Rory digs her fingers into my arm and shoves me back. The fantasy shatters like glass and cuts deep into my skin. Shame consumes me, not because she stopped kissing me, but because the look in her eyes tells me exactly what I just did. I've ruined her. "Why would you do that?" she cries. Her eyes are wide and swimming in terror. She's shaking hard. She holds trembling fingers up to her mouth and stares at me with tears forming in her eyes. "W-why would you do that?"
"I-I'm so sorry. I don't know what I was thinking. I shouldn't have done that. I'm so sorry, Rory." I reach out for her but she angles away from me like my hand is on fire.
"Don't!"
My bones freeze. I fucked up. I've ruined everything. "Rory, please."
"Why would you kiss me?" she demands, her voice cracking with devastation. She hugs her body like I've violated her, and suddenly I'm afraid to ever touch her again. "Ch-Chace is coming back tomorrow. I-I was going to tell him that I love him." She looks up at me with so much remorse. "What am I going to do? H-he trusts me. I l-love him. I've never loved someone before, and now you messed with my fucking head!"
I blink in shock as I put together exactly what she's saying. I close the space she put between us, abruptly thrust into a sick euphoria. "You liked it."
She flinches like I just slapped her, and her eyes widen with guilt. "N-no."
"You liked it," I say again, breathless and free from my fears. I hold her arm and look down at her, making her arch her neck to meet my eyes. "You feel the same way," I breathe.
