Chapter Nineteen
THE RIDE BACK was quiet, but not in a bad way, not heavy like earlier at the clubhouse, just full, like everything that had passed between us was still sitting there between us, settling into something I didn’t quite know what to do with yet, and I didn’t try to fill the silence or explain it away, just let it exist while the road stretched out in front of us and the night wrapped around everything else.
When Gatsby pulled up in front of my place and the engine cut, the quiet shifted again, thicker now, and for a second neither of us moved, my hand still resting loosely in my lap, my thoughts tangled somewhere between everything I hadn’t said and everything I couldn’t.
“Walk you up?” he asked.
“I’d like that.”
The night felt calmer alone with him, and I stayed close to him as we walked up to my door, not because I needed to but because I wanted to, because something about being near him made everything feel… right.
I turned when we reached the door, my hand brushing his like I wasn’t ready for the moment to end, like if I let it go too quickly everything bad would come rushing back in to take its place.
“Tonight was nice,” I said, my voice softer now, more honest than it had been all night.
“It was,” he said, and the way he looked at me made something in my chest tighten in a way that had nothing to do with fear.
There was a pause then, not awkward, not forced, just something that lingered between us like it was waiting to be decided, and before I could think better of it, before I could talk myself out of it, I stepped closer.
I didn’t plan it.
Didn’t give myself time.
I just did it.
His hand came up to my jaw, firmer this time, his grip settling in with quiet certainty as his thumb pressed just enough to tilt my face back, not forcing it but guiding it, like he already knew I’d follow, like he didn’t need to ask.
And the way his touch lingered there for half a second longer than necessary, the slow drag of his thumb against my skin, sent something hot and immediate through me, something that made my breath catch before I could steady it.
He noticed.
I felt it in the slight shift of his fingers, the way his grip tightened just enough to hold me in place as he closed the distance without breaking eye contact, not rushed, not hesitant—just deliberate.
When his mouth met mine, it wasn’t soft.
It was heat and pressure and intent all at once, and the small sound that slipped out of me, barely there, more breath than anything, seemed to change something in him, because his hold adjusted instantly, pulling me a fraction closer as the kiss deepened, like he’d been waiting for that, like he knew exactly what to do with it.
Every reaction I gave him, he answered.
The hitch in my breath, the way I leaned in instead of away, the way my fingers curled under his shirt and held there, he felt all of it, responded to all of it, the kiss shifting in small, precise ways that made it impossible to ignore how aware he was, how in control of the pace he stayed even as it edged closer to something rougher.
Not uncontrolled.
But close enough that I could feel the tension of it, the restraint sitting just under the surface in the way his thumb pressed a little firmer at my jaw, in the way he didn’t let the space between us open again once it closed.
And it pulled me in faster because of it.
The air between us turned thick, electric, charged with something that made my lungs forget how to work.
His mouth never broke from mine, but the kiss shifted, deepened, became less about coaxing and more about claiming.
His hand slid from my jaw, fingers trailing down the side of my neck, leaving a trail of fire in their wake, and when his palm flattened against my collarbone, I felt the heat of his skin like a brand.
I gasped against his lips, and he swallowed the sound, using the moment to tilt my head back further, to press harder, to take more. The arm around my waist cinched tight, pulling me flush against him.
My grip tightened without me realizing, my body already responding, already matching him even as he set the rhythm, even as he kept control of it, and I felt that line blur completely, the one I’d been holding onto all night, the one that said I should stop, should think, should… but I didn’t.
Couldn’t.
Because the way he held me there, the way he moved like he understood exactly what he was doing to me, made it too easy to let go of all of that, too easy to just feel it instead.
Just him, close, steady, magnetic in a way that didn’t leave space for anything else.
And for those stretched, breathless seconds, I let myself get pulled under it completely, let him read every reaction, let him answer it, let him take it exactly where he wanted it to go.
Let myself forgot Drago. Forgot Kane. Forgot everything I’d agreed to.
It was just him.
Just this.
Just something that felt right and so perfect.
He pulled back slowly, his forehead brushing mine, and I kept my eyes on his because I didn’t trust myself to look away, didn’t trust what might come back if I did.
“Can you feel it?” he asked again, quieter now, and I didn’t need to ask what he meant.
I nodded. “Yeah.”
He studied me for a second longer, like he wasn’t convinced, and I held his gaze, willing him to let it go, to not ask anything else, to not see what I was trying so hard to keep buried.
Finally, he did. “I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said, stepping back.
“Tomorrow,” I echoed.
I turned to the door, unlocking it with hands that felt steadier than they should have, stepping inside and closing it behind me, listening to the soft click as it shut, sealing the night, and him, on the other side.
For a moment, I just stood there, breathing, letting the feel of him linger against my skin, letting it settle into something I could hold onto, something real enough to quiet everything else still circling in my head.
And then something shifted.
At first it was so slight I almost missed it, just a thin, unfamiliar edge slipping into the quiet, like the air had changed without warning, like the space around me had tightened in a way I couldn’t see but could suddenly feel pressing in all the same.
I didn’t move. Didn’t even breathe right. Because the silence, what had felt calm just seconds ago, wasn’t calm anymore. It was too complete. Too still. The kind of stillness that doesn’t just sit there, but listens.
My fingers curled slightly at my sides as my chest tightened, my body catching up before my thoughts did, instinct kicking in somewhere deep and quiet, telling me something was off even if I couldn’t say what, even if everything looked exactly the same, the door closed, the room untouched, nothing out of place, but it didn’t feel the same.
The longer I stood there, the more that earlier warmth, the lingering trace of him, of the night, of everything that had felt right, started to thin at the edges, replaced by something colder.
Something watching.
Something waiting.
And I had the sudden, unmistakable sense that I wasn’t alone anymore. “Hello?” I called softly.
No answer.
I stepped further inside, setting my purse down slowly, my eyes adjusting to the dim light, and then I saw him.
Kane.
Sitting on my couch like he belonged there, one arm stretched along the back, his ankle resting over his knee, completely at ease in a space that wasn’t his, like he’d been waiting long enough to get comfortable.
My breath caught so hard it hurt, my body locking before my mind could catch up, every thought scattering at once until all I could hear was the sound of my own heartbeat, loud and uneven in my ears.
“What—” I tried, but the word broke halfway out.
He smiled, slow and patient, like this moment had already played out in his head and ended exactly the way he wanted it to. “Took you long enough,” he said, his voice calm, almost angry. “I was startin’ to think you weren’t comin’ inside tonight.”
My fingers curled into empty air at my sides, my skin going cold even as my pulse raced. “How did you get in here?” I asked, my voice thinner than I wanted it to be.
He shrugged, like it didn’t matter. “Wasn’t that hard,” he said. “You should really think about better locks.”
My stomach dropped. Not because of the words, but because of how easily he said them. Like this had never been a question of if.
Every instinct in my body screamed to run, to turn around, to get out of the house, but my feet stayed planted where they were, my back still too close to the door, like if I moved too fast, it would set something off.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, my voice steadier than I felt, even as my pulse pounded hard enough to make my hands shake.
Kane didn’t answer right away, he just watched me like he was taking his time with it, like time itself belonged to him and he had all the damn time in the world to waste.
Then he leaned back slightly, stretching his arm along the back of the couch again, settling in like this was just another night, like he hadn’t just walked into my life uninvited and made himself comfortable.
“Relax,” he said, the word almost amused. “If I wanted to hurt you, I wouldn’t be sittin’ here talkin’.”
“You shouldn’t be here,” I said, forcing the words out even as my body shifted without thinking, just a step to the side like that would make a difference, like there was anywhere in this room I could move that wouldn’t still have him in it, watching, waiting, already too comfortable in a space that wasn’t his. “You need to leave.”
He didn’t answer right away, didn’t move, didn’t even blink, just sat there studying me like I’d said something worth considering instead of something we both knew didn’t matter, and the silence stretched long enough that I felt it start to press in, heavy and deliberate, like he was letting it do the work for him.