23. Sienna
Chapter 23
Sienna
I find a stopping point before my eyes start to cross and I’m left with blurred vision from staring at this screen for too long.
No wonder Levi always wears bluelight glasses when he works.
I rub my eyes to give them some relief before I reach forward and shut the laptop on his desk.
The crew wrapped up hours ago and just yesterday I finished fixing up the bike Theo drowned.
It’s now sitting proudly next to the special custom that’s always at the front of the shop. The one nobody is allowed to touch.
I find Levi in the back lot behind the shop, crouched next to his brother’s truck, hands stained with grease, jaw clenched so tight it looks like it hurts.
He’s trying to fix something—something he could’ve left for tomorrow, I’m sure.
But Levi doesn’t leave things undone. Not when it means someone else might have to carry the load.
“You haven’t stopped all day,” I say quietly.
He doesn’t look up.
“Lot of shit that needs doing,” he grits out.
“There’s always going to be shit that needs doing.”
“I can handle it.”
That’s his answer for everything. Like handling it is a badge of honor. Like breaking down is a luxury reserved for other people.
I step closer.
“You’re not a machine, Levi.”
He scoffs under his breath, wipes his hands on a rag, and finally stands. “I’m fine.”
“You’re not. ” My voice cracks. “You’re exhausted. You’re angry. You’re carrying everyone on your shoulders like the world’s gonna fall apart if you stop for five minutes. But what about you ?”
He stares at me like I’ve slapped him.
“Who’s carrying you ?”
He swallows hard but doesn’t speak.
“Brody leans on you. Theo and Carter depend on you. Evie still calls you when her life falls apart. You’re the anchor at SKC. And now Josie… God, Levi, you're stepping in and being everything for that little girl and no one asked if you were okay doing that.”
“And I get it. I do. You think if you stay busy, you won’t drown. But you’re already drowning and you don’t even see it.”
Silence hangs between us, thick and brutal.
I take a shaky breath, softer now. “You’re not weak if you let someone help. You don’t have to do this alone.”
He finally meets my eyes, and the weight in his gaze nearly buckles me.
“You don’t know what I’ve done,” he whispers. “What I’ve seen. What I’ve lost, Sienna.”
“I don’t have to. I see you. Not the tough guy act you feel the need to always put on. You. And I’m still here.”
His breath hitches. Just barely. But I feel it.
“You’re allowed to want something for yourself, Levi. Even if it’s selfish.”
I get closer to him.
“Even if it’s me.”
For one second—just one—his guard slips. I see the storm behind his eyes. The ache. The need. The fear. And I know he wants to pull me in.
But he doesn’t.
He just says, low and ragged, “You make it real hard to keep doing the right thing, Angel.”
There’s that nickname he called me at the lighthouse. The one he didn’t think I noticed.
Is that how he sees me?
Right now he’s looking at me like I just handed him a lifeline wrapped in barbed wire.
But then, he moves. Fast.
One step, then another, and I don’t breathe until his hand is fisted in my shirt and his mouth crashes against mine.
No hesitation. No asking.
Just need.
Weeks of tension detonate with one kiss. It’s not careful. It’s not controlled. It’s him finally saying fuck it the only way he knows how… by devouring me.
His hands are on my waist, gripping tight, pulling me into him like he doesn’t know where he ends and I begin.
My fingers find the back of his neck, tugging at his hair, anchoring myself to something solid before I completely lose it.
He growls against my lips, low and guttural, like he’s been starved and I’m the only thing on the menu.
“I tried,” he rasps between kisses, forehead pressed to mine. “Tried to be good. Tried to stay away.”
“You didn’t try hard enough,” I whisper, breathless.
A humorless laugh escapes him.
“No. I didn’t. Because every time I see you, I forget how to fucking breathe.”
His hands slide down, gripping the backs of my thighs.
In one smooth move, he lifts me, pinning me against the side of the truck. Metal bites into my spine. His body cages mine in, big and hot and desperate.
“This isn’t fair,” he mutters, brushing his mouth along my jaw, my neck. “You looking at me like that. Saying shit like that. You seeing me when I’ve spent years making damn sure no one does.”
“Maybe it’s time you stop hiding,” I whisper, letting my fingers trail down his chest, over his racing heartbeat.
He groans. Full-bodied and tormented.
And then he kisses me again.
Harder.
Like he’s trying to erase the distance between who he is and who he thinks he’s allowed to be.
His kiss deepens, rough and hungry, like he’s trying to memorize the taste of me, or maybe forget every reason why he shouldn’t.
I don’t want soft. I want real .
And Levi Steele is nothing if not real.
His hands roam like he’s trying to convince himself I’m here. That I’m his. That he can finally have the one thing he’s forbidden himself from wanting. One hand fists in my hair, tilting my head so his mouth can blaze a trail down my throat, across my collarbone.
“Tell me to stop,” he rasps, breath hot against my skin.
“I won’t.” I’m already unbuttoning his shirt, hands shaking but sure. “Not tonight.”
That’s all he needs.
My legs wrap around his waist, and he carries me back into the shop, into his office, out of sight but not out of danger.
Because this? This is dangerous.
But I don’t care. I don’t care if this is wrong. I don’t care if people will frown upon it. I can’t even bring myself to care about how his best friend, my dad, might feel about it.
We’re two consenting adults. The world be damned.
He pushes everything off his desk, including the laptop I was just working on.
“Levi,” I squeal as he replaces it with me.
“I’ll get you a new one,” he promises, his mouth back on mine, claiming and wild.
It feels like he’s been holding back a storm for years and I’m the only one stupid enough to walk into it without an umbrella.
Clothes vanish in a blur. Mine first. My top pulled over my head. His fingers skim the edge of my jeans. The roughness of his hands makes me gasp when they find skin.
“You have no idea what you do to me, Sienna,” he hisses my name out like it pains him, dragging his mouth down my chest, his beard scraping, his tongue soft where everything else is hardened. “No idea how many nights I’ve thought about this. About you. ”
The look in his eyes says it all.
My legs wrap tight around his waist, his hands digging into the backs of my thighs. The metal of the desk is cool at my back, but I’m already burning.
His mouth finds mine again, messy and hungry. There’s no finesse now. Just lips and teeth and heat. Like he’s trying to consume me, undo every second we’ve spent pretending we weren’t going to do this.
I tug at his shirt. Buttons snap. And he tears it off like he can’t get rid of it fast enough.
“God, you’re beautiful,” he mutters, voice rough as gravel, dragging his mouth down my neck. “I have been starving for you, Sienna.”
I gasp when his tongue flicks over the hollow of my throat. His hands are everywhere. They grip my waist and brush under the lace of my bra before pushing it up with an impatient groan.
“You’ve been haunting me,” he says against my skin. “I can’t escape you. Not even in my dreams.”
I gasp as he sucks one of my nipples into his mouth, and I cry out.
It’s needy, raw, and shameless. My hips grind against him, the friction between us so intense it makes my whole body tighten.
“I can’t wait anymore,” he growls. “I need you.”
“Me too.”
His hands are at my jeans, tugging them down with urgent, uncoordinated movements until I’m bare beneath him.
He hesitates a moment.
“I’m on birth control,” I tell him. “And I’m clean.”
“I’m clean too.”
“Then stop waiting,” I pant. “And take me, Levi.”
He undoes his belt, unlooping it through his jeans in one quick motion.
And fuck, it’s sexy.
I’m breathing ragged when he presses his forehead to mine as he frees himself. His erection looks thick and heavy in his hands. My body responds immediately.
He drags the tip of his cock along the slick heat between my thighs.
“Fuck,” he mutters. “You’re soaked.”
“For you,” I breathe as he continues to torture me. “Always you.”
He lines it up at my entrance, inching only a little bit, before he pulls back out. It’s driving me crazy. I need him to fill me. So when he pushes into me again, I wrap my arms around his neck and pull him closer, deeper.
I want to feel him… need to feel him.
He groans low in his throat as he sinks all the way in, his hips pressing tight against my body.
“Jesus, Sienna,” he whispers. “You feel like heaven.”
I moan his name, arching into him, and then he moves —hips snapping forward in sharp, deep thrusts that make me see stars.
It’s filthy. Fast. Every inch of us grinding together, skin to skin, gasps and growls and broken moans filling the empty garage.
He fucks me like he’s trying to mark me. Each thrust bruising and perfect. Each stroke pushing me closer and closer to the edge.
He grabs my thigh, hikes it higher around his waist. His mouth is on my chest, my shoulder, my jaw, biting and kissing and claiming.
And I want it. All of it.
I want to be the thing that breaks him open and puts him back together.
“I can’t stop,” he pants against my lips.
“Don’t,” I gasp. “Don’t stop.”
He doesn’t.
He pounds into me until my body is trembling, my nails digging into his back, my cries bouncing off the concrete walls all around us.
“Levi— fuck —I’m close—”
“I’ve got you,” he growls, hand sliding between us, thumb pressing against my clit in rough, perfect circles. It sends me even higher, faster.
“Let go for me, Angel.”
I shatter at his command.
My whole body tightens, pleasure crashing over me like a tidal wave. I moan his name, desperate and undone, clinging to him like he’s the only thing keeping me from floating away.
He follows me over the edge with a deep, broken groan, burying his face into my neck. His release is hot as he spills into me, still holding me until we collapse against each other, a mess of tangled limbs. Our bodies vibrating from the intensity of what just happened.
He looks down at me and tucks my hair behind my ear, pressing a kiss to my temple in a quiet gesture that says you’re mine.
I trace a scar on his shoulder, still breathless, my body humming.
The quiet that follows isn’t awkward.
It’s heavy. Full. Final.
Because we both know it now, without question.
Nothing’s going back to the way it was.
Not after this.
Not after us.