My breath catches before I can stop it. He releases our hands first.
“Get some rest,” he says.
The words are calm and final. The line slides back into place exactly where he wants it.
I watch him turn away, my pulse still uneven. The kitchen is suddenly too quiet, and I’m aware of how deliberately he ended it.
ELEVEN
Ridge
Jean Lafitte:A cunning pirate and smuggler who operated in New Orleans in the early 1800s, known for his charm and strategic betrayals. During the War of 1812, he skillfully played both sides, pretending to ally with the British while secretly offering crucial intelligence to the Americans in exchange for a pardon.
I walk awaybecause I have to.
Not because the moment passed, but because it didn’t. I turn my back on her before my body overrides what little sense I have left. I know she’s still standing there. I can feel her eyes on me as I put distance between us.
I don’t go far.
The living area is dim, quiet, unchanged. I stop near the console and stare at it without touching anything, my hands flexing at my sides.
This is where I need to be, away from her, away from the line I already crossed last night and have no business crossing again.
This isn’t about want. It’s about control.
I draw a breath and force my shoulders to settle. Give her a minute. Let the heat drain out of the room. I can go back in once the temperature goes down, and end the night without making it worse.
“Ridge.”
That’s all she says. It pulls me harder than it should.
I don’t answer, and I don’t move right away. I stand there and let the word echo through me, steadying myself against what it stirs.
When I turn back, I already know restraint isn’t coming with me.
The kitchen smells like soap and heat. The counter is damp where she wiped it down, and she’s standing there with her hands braced on the edge, watching me like she’s been waiting to see if I would come back.
For a second, neither of us speaks.
Her sleeve brushes my wrist as she shifts. The contact is accidental, but it’s enough.
Whatever held last night gives way just as quickly now, despite my certainty then that it was nothing more than a release.
Coco’s breath stutters when I turn toward her. She notices everything. That’s part of the problem.
I don’t give myself time to think again.
I grab her before I talk myself out of it and spin her into the counter. The sound she makes when her back hits the edge is quiet and startled, like she is angry at herself for being caught off guard.
But she doesn’t resist. And her eyes give me the permission I need to keep going.
My hands lock around her hips. Pain flares through my right hand when I tighten my grip, the skin still too sensitive for pressure I don’t bother easing.
“Ridge,” she says, like a warning, or maybe an invitation.
I pull her body into mine and kiss her. Hard. No patience in it. No pretense.
She kisses me back just as fast, fingers sliding into the back of my head, gripping hard enough to pull my mouth closer. There is no hesitation in it. No testing. Like she made the decision half a second before I did and refuses to apologize for it.
