The tension is too much to ignore, the pull between us is too strong to fight back.
The only thing that remains is that tiny sliver of control.
I swallow uneasily, my throat feeling thick. “We’re just friends,” I manage to say. The words sound empty. The words are a lie. “You’re supposed to go along with it.”
“And you’re supposed to be honest with me, Luciano,” she says, my name sounding both sour and sweet. I can’t help but stare at her mouth, those red lips, the pink tongue moving between them. “We’re supposed to be honest with each other.”
My eyes flutter closed and I take in a deep breath.
She’s killing me.
She has to know she’s killing me.
Her words tease me, tempt me, pull me under.
“Do you want to kiss me?” she asks.
Fuck. Me.
My eyes pop open, veins feeling like they’re on fire, making it hard to breathe, hard to think.
“Yes,” I murmur, unable to keep up the lie, unable to stop staring at her lips.
“Now? Or always?”
“Since the day I first met you,” I admit.
Because there’s no point hiding the truth now.
“Then why haven’t you?”
I bring my gaze up, her eyes burning into me.
Before I can stop myself, I’m reaching out and cupping my hand against her cheek, feeling her soft, cool skin against my palm. “Because you are not mine to kiss.”
Ruby girl.
I almost go for it. I almost lean in.
I fucking desire her like I’ve desired nothing else, like I’ve been craving this, her, my whole entire life and didn’t even know it until now.
Just one inch, one sweet inch, and I’ll know what she tastes like.
But I drop my hand from her face.
Her hands drop away from the chains.
I get to my feet and I stumble away from her, trying to take in a breath. My brain feels rattled, my heart is thundering in my chest.
You’re on thin ice, Luciano. A few more inches and you would have broken through it.
I walk a few feet away, keep my back to her, as if I can pretend she’s not there.
I should leave. I should take her back to the gala. I should do a lot of things.
But then I hear her behind me, the sound of her dress brushing against the dirt.
Don’t turn around.
But I do.
She’s right behind me, staring up at me and I’m transfixed, frozen in place. Fear and desire and lust and guilt cycle through me like a roulette wheel and I don’t know where it’s going to land.
I breathe in sharply through my nose, my fingers twitching at my sides, trying to quell the urges running through me, trying to use the last of my control.
“Luciano.”
She says my name, voice throaty and impassioned and promising me my wildest dreams. Her tongue slips out to wet her lips.
The ice breaks.
I grab her face in my hands, bringing her mouth to mine, crushing her in a hard kiss that will probably be my undoing.
Her lips are softer than I imagined, and they open against my lips, against the hunger that’s coursing through me, fueling that need for her that’s gone beyond desire and into madness. With each tease of her tongue, each hot, wet pass of our mouths in frenzied rhythm with each other, I lose myself a little more. My fingers press into her cheekbones, as if I’m afraid she’ll fall through my hands, and my dick is as hard as cement, threatening to ruin me right here in this city park.
She moans into my mouth, a sound that makes me want to do wicked, dirty things to her, her hands going to my collar and holding on, and I know that I’m so fucking close to completely giving in.
But I can’t do that.
Because she’s not mine to kiss.
She’s not mine at all.
Marco flashes through my lust-addled brain and it’s enough to make me pull back, to stop, to try and regain my breath, regain a sense of shame and humility.
“I can’t,” I say, choking on my words. I rest my forehead against hers, my eyes pinched shut. I need to get it together. I can’t be this person. I won’t be this person.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper to her, afraid to look at her. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have done that.”
“I wanted you to do that.”
“You shouldn’t have wanted that, Ruby. You shouldn’t want me.”
“Why not? You’re the one I’m supposed to be with it. I know it. I should be with you,” she tells me, her voice practically begging, her fingers curling around my collar.
“But you’re not.”
I straighten up and turn away. My dick is still hard, my heart still pounding, and she’s still staring at me with those gorgeous eyes that promise me the world.
Frustration rolls through me, and I put my hands in my hair, tugging at them in anguish, breathing in deep as I stare across the field at the swings. “He’s my brother. I can’t do this to him. I’ve already done too much damage.”
“I won’t…it’ll be okay. I won’t tell him.”
My brows raise. I look at her in surprise. “You’re not going to tell him?”
“That I kissed you? No. He doesn’t need to know that.”
“I kissed you.”
“I asked you to.”
“I don’t always do what I’m told,” I tell her.
“Neither do I. That’s why I’m always in trouble. But sometimes that trouble is worth it.”
“Well, it’s not worth it this time.”
My words come out harsher than I meant and I see her face fall. But I can’t take it back. To take it back would mean that what we did was okay, and it wasn’t.
I kissed my brother’s girlfriend.
I’m an asshole.
Ruby shakes her head. “This isn’t fair.”
“It’s not fair to anyone, don’t you see? No one is a winner here. Not me, not you, not Marco. And you and me…that’s just not going to happen. It can’t ever happen.”
She rubs her lips together, which makes me run the back of my hand over my mouth, wiping her crimson lipstick from my lips. I
