Chapter 64 Zadyn
ZADYN
This is a bad decision.
A very bad decision.
These thoughts have to stop. These fantasies have to stop.
But I’m not imagining it when she pulls back, her mouth dangerously close to mine. Her thick lashes cast shadows down her tear-streaked face, and—
Gods damn it. She’s staring at my lips.
I freeze, worried that the slightest movement will frighten her off, like a deer in headlights. But that’s all it would take. One tiny, minuscule shift in our positions to have my lips against hers.
It would be easy.
It would also be incredibly stupid.
I promised myself that if I was ever going to do this, the timing would be right. That she would be ready for this—for me.
The timing of this could not be worse. She is grieving Derek, healing from Kylian—she is shattered.
But the shift in the air, in her scent, the sudden tension so palpable I can almost taste it in the small space between us, is undeniable. Our foreheads touch, and my eyes drift closed, drunk on her mere proximity.
“Tell me what you want.” The lazy words fall from my mouth without any real thought as to the damning consequences.
She bites down on her lower lip, sucking it between her teeth.
Seven hells.
“I want you.”
I rein in a shudder, feeling her voice breeze over me. But I need more. I need her to say it.
“Be more specific.”
Those hypnotic eyes flicker up to mine as she annihilates my resolve with just two simple words.
“Kiss me.”
There will be no coming back from this if I do. Because there is no world in which kissing her now does not change everything.
My mind shouts in warning. I should deny her momentary lapse in judgment.
Chalk it up to being bereft and in need of distraction.
But despite my better judgment, despite reason and sanity and honor, I find myself leaning in like a slow-motion car wreck and placing a ghost of a kiss over her waiting lips.
It’s a test. Barely even scratching the surface. I pull back, almost afraid to meet her eyes. But when I do, all I see is hunger. Rare, raw, and desperate.
I wait one more second and then—
Oh, fuck it.
I braid my hands through that thick head of hair and tilt it back. The sweetest sound of surprise leaves her mouth as it parts for me, and I cover it with my own.
The first taste of her has me groaning. I take control of the kiss, no longer able to hold back, feeling her body melt into my touch—forming to me like we were made for each other.
Because we were.
I lay her down, tucking her beneath me as my fantasies burst to life. She kisses me back, her fingers clutching my collar, curling in my hair, tugging me closer like she needs this as badly as I do. I let my mouth wander lower, over her neck and chest, tracing each perfect curve with my hands.
This is all I ever want to do. Make sure no part of her goes untouched, unloved.
Her hold grows rough as she cranes her neck off the ground, her lips working around mine as if to consume me. Every little noise she makes sends a surge of blood straight down my body until I’m straining against my waistband, begging to be buried inside her.
Her scent teases me, invades every part of me, making it impossible to breathe around her—like she’s all that exists.
She becomes the air itself.
“I want you so bad,” she murmurs against my skin.
You have no fucking idea, I want to say.
But then I remember.
I remember that she isn’t mine. That her heart is still broken from Jace. And what I’m doing, how I’m taking advantage of that break, is detestable.
The guilt rips my focus from her warmth, from her sweet little hands slipping beneath my shirt. I try, but I can’t ignore it—the funnel of anger and frustration overshadowing my desire.
It takes all my willpower to tear my lips away and push off of her. But I do.
“Zadyn?”
“I can’t do this.”
She sits up beside me, laying a hand on my shoulder. “Did I do something wrong?” Her voice nearly trembles, and my heart clenches.
She thinks it’s her. Oh, Serena.
“No.” I swallow. “I can’t do this when I know you still love him.”
“No. I’ve let go of the idea of us. It’s over.” She tries to smooth my hair, but I drag my head away, worried that one touch from her and my resolve will crumble. Hurt skids across her beautiful face.
“You’ve let go of the idea—but not him. I don’t know if you ever will.”
“I will. I have,” she says more forcefully. “Zadyn, please. I want this. I want you.”
“Yes, but I don’t want you. I love you.”
Her jaw goes slack, and I watch the shock register on her face. But I can’t stop the words from spilling out.
“I love you. I love you. I always have. I’ve watched you fall in love and get your heart broken by people that couldn’t even come close to being worthy of you if they had a hundred lifetimes to get it right.
And even though that hurt, I could endure it.
But what I can’t endure is being a substitute for the person you really want. The person you really love.”
Silence falls as we stare at each other, chests rising and falling out of sync. I watch her finally face the truth she already knew deep down.
“Zadyn,” she whispers, a dip appearing between her brows. “You know I love you.”
“That’s not the kind of love I’m talking about and you know it.”
“I didn’t know you felt that strongly.”
“Yes, you did, Serena. You just didn’t want to face it so you didn’t have to feel the guilt of not returning my feelings.” I can’t keep the ice from my tone, the disgust at my own foolish hope, at my desperate actions, my inability to resist her.
“That is not true!” she protests, her voice rising. “I never thought you were in love with me. If I had known—”
“If you had known then what?” I meet her intense gaze.
Even in her confusion and frustration she looks like a goddess. Lips swollen, cheeks flushed, a halo of fire coming from the flames behind her. I close my eyes and pinch the bridge of my nose, just to stop her angelic image from distracting me.
“It wouldn’t have changed anything. You would have done everything the same. And come on. You never thought that my reaction to you at solstice or to you and Jace had anything to do with how I felt about you?”
Her voice is so fragile. “But you were with Cece. And then Ilayna.”
Cece? She has no idea, does she? No idea that the only reason I was with Cece was to try to escape the constant thoughts of her. To distract myself so I wouldn’t do anything stupid. Anything like this.
I fight back a cruel laugh. “I asked you to give me a reason not to be with her. I practically begged you like a fool. I would have sat like a dog at your side if you’d asked me to. I would have waited until you came around, until you—”
Until you decided to take pity on me or release me from this torment once and for all.
“They were nothing to me. All they did was ease the pain that was always there, just bubbling beneath the surface.”
“Zadyn,” she says, her voice soft as night.
I watch as she slides onto her knees and peels her sopping shirt over her head.
I turn away, but she pulls at my face until there is nowhere else to look but at those eyes.
“Zadyn, look at me. Look at me.”
I can’t help it. I look. Tears blur my vision as I pry her hands from my face.
“Please don’t torture me like this. Don’t offer me your body when I can’t have your heart.”
Unable to stand another second, I get to my feet and leave the room.*
SPRING brEAK, PANAMA CITY 2016
A lamppost flickers overhead, twitching on and off in the quiet night.
I’m standing on a dock, leaning over the railing as the gentle waves of the inlet ebb and flow. A light, salt-kissed breeze skates over my bare arms and legs. I’m wearing clothes that don’t belonged to me. I’m wearing skin that doesn’t belong to me either.
Serena brushes past like a whirling dervish, cross-faded off three-month-old weed and frozen margaritas.
“Doesn’t this look like Mamma Mia to you?” she sings, arms outstretched as she drunkenly twirls around.
“Yeah, if Mamma Mia were set on a dive-y boardwalk in north Florida instead of Greece.”
“You don’t think this looks like that scene when they’re on the dock? Wait, there’s a bunch of scenes when they’re on the dock, but still—this definitely looks like it.”
She teeters on her feet as we near the end of the dock, and starts belting out the chorus of her favorite song, triggering a string of dog barks and slamming windows.
“Okay, Meryl.” I steady her. “Watch your step there. I’m not calling 911 if you fall in.”
“But I want to go in! The water looks like glass.” Her voice is filled with wonder, and I can’t help but smile. She turns to me, her expression intensely serious. “We have one item left on our list. And that is skinny dipping.”
Ah yes, the list we compiled on the never-ending bus ride from Manhattan to Panama City to make our spring break unforgettable. It was packed with silly, idiotic tasks like bull-riding and shotgunning beers and…skinny-dipping.
Serena thinks I’m wild. Free. The life of every party.
The truth is, I was never wild by nature.
She makes me wild. It’s the combination of us—fire and gasoline—that makes sparks. That could burn down cities if left unattended.
I watch her from a few feet back, staring out at the water, the moonlight turning her skin pearlescent. She turns to me, and I hope I have enough time to wipe that look off my face. The look of hopeless desire. The gaze of a man in hapless, stupid love.
But Serena doesn’t see a man when she looks at me. She sees a woman.
She has no idea that behind the exterior of her friend, Annie, a vivacious female with dirty blonde hair and a reckless smile, a woman I curated, there lies a stranger.
“This was your big idea.” She fixes me with a sharp stare, her hands glued to her hips. “You first.”
I laugh, shaking my head, and start to strip. I have nothing to be shy about. It’s not like she can see the real me—not with this glamour.
Stark naked under the moonlight, I run and leap off the abandoned dock, howling at the moon before landing inside the chilly water. As I come up for air, Serena lands with a loud splash. She bursts through the surface panting, an invigorated smile on her face.
“Holy shit, why is it so cold?!” Her laugh echoes down the dock.
“Coming from the girl who likes her baths boiling,” I tease, splashing her. She splashes me back.
I try not to stare. Try not to make it obvious the effort it takes not to let my gaze linger on her naked shoulders, the strip of skin above her breasts as she bobs up and down in the gentle waves. I try to forget that she’s only a foot away from me in nothing but her own skin.
But, fuck, it’s impossible.
I don’t know when it started or when it got this bad, but it’s become a cavity inside of me.
A dull pain stretching into my gums, my blood, my roots.
Constantly hurting. A need throughout my entire body not only to protect her and keep her safe, but to touch her. To hold her. To constantly be near her.
She swims closer, parting the water as she paddles up to me.
Please don’t come any closer. I’m already struggling to keep my hands to myself.
“I can’t believe those guys earlier,” she says.
“So rude,” I agree, thankful for the distraction.
They tried to pick her up at the bar. She thought it was me they wanted, but it was glaringly obvious. She doesn’t see herself as others do. She’s heartbreaking.
Serena drifts even closer, her pink lips dipping beneath the water like a silent invitation. And every part of me is screaming, Do it. Kiss her.
That nagging voice is so loud, I worry she can hear it. I shove it down, smothering it with finality.
Then the realization hits.
I can’t keep this up. I can’t keep pretending to be her friend. I’ve gotten too close.
Two weeks ago at this abhorrent college party full of frat boys and bottle-blonde sorority girls, we lost a game of flip cup and had to kiss.
It was brief. And to her, it was just a harmless kiss between two friends being egged on by a bunch of jocks.
But her lips had scalded mine in a way I’ll never forget.
She branded me with her name that night. And she never even knew it. And when I pulled back, careful not to seem too eager, there was this look in her eyes that was impossible to interpret. I had wondered if she felt something more in that moment. I didn’t want to confuse her any further.
But this? This is too much. It’s wrong. She has no idea, but I do.
I have to pull back. I’ve seen too much, shared too much, and now—
I shouldn’t be feeling this way. I can’t be feeling this way.
Annie has to go. It will hurt her, I know, but this can’t continue. It’s not good for either of us.
After graduation, I’m drawing the line. I’ll make some excuse, and she and Annie will drift apart like friends often do. Eventually she’ll move on and forget about me, and everything will be the way it should be.
I can keep watch from a safe distance until it’s time to bring her home.
Or maybe I’ll stay just a little longer—just until I’m sure she doesn’t need me.
It’s for the best. At least, that’s the lie I sell myself.
* Cue: back to friends by sombr