Chapter 9
SUMMER
The yacht docks, and Kairo helps me off.
His hand is on my lower back again, and I let him guide me up the stone path because my legs still aren't working properly.
The night air is warm and heavy, and the jungle sounds press in from every side.
I can feel his cum drying on my inner thighs with Nico's saliva, and I want to scrub myself raw.
We walk in silence. The villa glows through the trees ahead of us, all that glass lit up against the dark jungle. The path curves along the cliff edge, and I can hear the ocean below, crashing against the rocks, steady and indifferent.
I stop walking.
I can’t do this.
Kairo takes two more steps before he realizes and turns back. "Summer."
I walk toward the edge. The wind whips the sheer black dress around my legs, the drop is straight down.
One step.
One decision that finally belongs to me.
“Summer.” His voice changes instantly. “Stop.”
I put my hands on the railing and lean forward, the rocks below look sharp, and the water looks hungry.
“I can’t do this anymore,” I whisper.
“Summer … step back, right now.” There’s real panic in his voice.
“What’s the point?” My voice cracks. “You own me. My father sold me. My own body betrays me every time you touch me. I can’t run. I can’t fight. I can’t even hate you properly anymore. So, what’s the fucking point?”
I swing one leg over the railing.
He lunges with a raw, broken sound I’ve never heard from him. His arms slam around my waist like iron, yanking me backward so violently we both lose balance. I fight like a wild animal, thrashing, clawing, screaming, kicking.
“Let me go!” I scream, elbowing him in the ribs. “Let me fucking go!”
“No!” he roars, dragging me away from the edge. We crash to the ground as dirt and rocks scrape my skin. I’m on top of him for half a second before he rolls us, pinning me beneath his full weight. His hands shake as they grab my wrists, slamming them into the dirt above my head.
“Don’t!” His voice cracks completely. “Don’t you ever fucking do that again!”
I’m sobbing so hard I can barely breathe, still fighting underneath him, legs kicking wildly. “You don’t get to do this! You don’t get to break me and then act like you care when I want it to end!”
“Summer,” he says my name softly.
I shake my head. “Don’t,” I warn him. “You humiliated me, you fucked me in front of another man, you treat me like property. Why the fuck do you care if I jump?! It would be less hassle if I were dead.”
His hands are shaking as they cup my face, and his forehead presses against mine. I can feel his heart slamming against my chest like it’s trying to break free.
“Because if you go over that edge,” he says, voice raw and shattered, “I’m going right behind you.”
I go still beneath him.
He’s breathing hard, almost panting, and emotion wells in his eyes.
I don’t like that, it’s confusing. “You hate me,” I tell him.
“I don’t hate you, Summer,” he whispers, broken. “I’ve never hated you. Not for one fucking second.”
I stare at him, chest heaving, tears streaming down my temples into the dirt.
“Then what am I to you?” I sob. “What the fuck am I to you, Kairo?”
He doesn’t answer with words, instead, he crashes his mouth against mine.
The kiss is desperate, messy, and frantic, like he’s trying to pour every unsaid thing into me.
His hands cup my face almost too tightly, thumbs brushing away tears as his lips move against mine with raw hunger.
There’s no control in it, no calculated dominance.
Just pure, broken need. His tongue pushes past my lips, tasting salt from my tears and the ocean air, and I kiss him back just as desperately, sobbing into his mouth while my fingers fist in his shirt.
He kisses me like he’s terrified I’ll disappear.
Like if he stops, I might still try to jump.
When he finally pulls back, we’re both breathing hard, foreheads pressed together, and his eyes are wild.
“You’re everything,” he rasps, voice hoarse and shaking. “You’re the only thing that’s ever mattered. And I’m so fucking scared of losing you that I don’t know how to be gentle.”
I don’t know what to say to that. We stay on the ground, dirty, broken, while the ocean roars below us and the jungle whispers around us.
Eventually, he stands and pulls me up with him.
My legs won't hold, so he picks me up, one arm under my knees, the other around my back, and carries me the rest of the way.
I don't fight. My arms go around his neck, my face presses into his shoulder, and I can feel his heart still hammering, still too fast, still scared.
He carries me through the glass doors, through the villa, up the stairs, and down the corridor.
He doesn't take me to the bed, instead he carries me to the bathroom and sets me on the edge of the tub. He turns on the faucet and starts filling the tub, testing the temperature with his hand until it’s perfect.
He then pours gel into the water that foams and fills the room with a eucalyptus scent.
As the tub fills and the steam rises, he turns back to me and pulls the sheer dress over my head, carefully, like I'll shatter if he moves too fast. He takes off the heels one at a time and sets them by the door.
"Get in," he says softly.
I lower myself into the water, and the heat wraps around me as I close my eyes.
For one second, everything stops, the fear, the anger, the humiliation, the confusion.
There’s just heat and silence and steam.
I hear him undressing, the rustle of linen, the clink of his belt, clothes hitting the floor.
He steps into the bath behind me and lowers himself in, his legs bracketing mine, his chest warm against my back.
Neither of us speak for a while as the water laps against the porcelain. His heartbeat is against my shoulder blade, it's slower now, but still not steady.
"Why did you do that?" I ask quietly. "With Nico."
Silence.
Of course, he’s not going to answer. He thinks he doesn’t owe me anything.
"Because I was jealous," he murmurs.
Oh! I wasn’t expecting him to say anything.
"Of a waiter?"
"Of you touching and looking at him. That you might want someone who isn't me."
I’m confused. If he was so jealous, why the hell did he let him touch me?
"Then why make him do what he did to me?”
He lets out a long breath. “I needed to stake my claim over you. Eating my cum from your cunt kind of proved that.”
My brows pull together. “I don’t get it. He still got to touch me, lick my most intimate place though.”
“Did you come?” he asks.
“From him? No.”
“Then he was just doing a service. I will not tolerate the disrespect of another man trying to take what is mine.”
His words and actions confuse me. "Why?" I turn my head slightly. "You don't know me, Kairo. We only really met the day of the wedding, but I’ve known of you.”
He's quiet for a long time before he answers me. "That's not true," he says.
I turn further. "What do you mean?"
"I've seen you before, Summer. Many times before."
My stomach tightens. "When?" I think I would have remembered, the man is hot.
"Your father's Christmas party, four years ago. You wore a green dress and stood by the window for most of the night because you didn't know anyone, and your father didn't bother to introduce you. You drank two glasses of wine and left before midnight."
He’s right. I remember the green dress and staring out the window, counting down the hours till I could leave. I remember feeling utterly invisible because no one wanted anything to do with me. The guys my age were more interested in other girls, not me, but I don’t remember seeing him.
"You were there?"
"Yes, I spent the entire night watching you," he confesses.
“You did? Why did you not talk to me then?”
“I … I didn’t think you would be interested.”
I turn around and look at him, the man who looks like a Greek god. “I would have been,” I answer him softly.
He runs his thumb across my cheek. “But you’re not now?”
I don’t know how to answer that, so I don’t. "Where else?"
He doesn’t push that question. "You came in to drop off paperwork to him at his office. You had a coffee from that place on Fifth with the blue awning. You were wearing a white shirt, jeans, and you smiled at the receptionist on your way out."
My skin prickles under the hot water. "How do you remember all of that?"
"Because I was paying attention." His hand moves under the water and rests on my hip. "Because I've been paying attention for a long time."
"How long have you been paying attention?"
He doesn't answer.
"Kairo," I push.
"Long enough to know that you deserve better than what I've given you." His thumb traces a slow circle on my hip bone. "And long enough to know I'm not capable of letting you go."
"You scare me," I tell him.
This makes him frown, and I think he might be slightly offended. "I know," he says sadly, and I don’t like how that makes me feel.
"But you confuse me more than any person I've ever met."
This earns him a slight smile. "I know that too."
“I don’t understand how you feel about me.
I thought you hated me, but … you said you don’t.
You made a stranger eat your cum from me, but then you saved me from the cliff.
You’ve made me sit on a dildo during dinner, but then I’ve noticed in the library you have all my favorite books, and the clothes in the closet are my size and style and … ”