There was a moment where we were silent, but it wasn't awkward.
It was… everything. And then she stood, smoothing her hoodie, tucking her hair behind her ear like it hadn’t just wrecked me to have her sitting there—seeing too much, saying too little. “I should go,” she said quietly. “I just wanted to check on you.”
I nodded, but something in me rebelled at the idea of her walking out. Again. Like that wasn’t the thing that always happened. Like people didn’t always leave once they got a peek under the surface.
I stood too, a step forward before I could stop myself. Too close. Close enough to feel the heat radiating off her. “You shouldn’t have come.”
She didn’t flinch. Just looked up at me with those eyes that knew more than they should. “I wanted to.”
My jaw clenched. My hands itched with restraint. “You shouldn’t look like that.”
“Like what?” she asked, barely a whisper.
I swallowed hard. “Like something I want. Like something I could lose myself in.”
For a second, the world held its breath. Her gaze searched mine, and whatever she found there made her step in instead of away.
“Then lose yourself,” she said.
I didn’t think. I didn’t plan. I just reached for her like a man who’d been dying of thirst and finally saw water.
Our mouths collided.
It wasn’t soft. It wasn’t careful. It was everything I’d been holding back—weeks of tension, months of isolation, years of learning not to need anyone just to survive. It was rage and hunger and loneliness crashing into one another, channeled into the heat between us.
She didn’t pull back.
She kissed me like she’d been waiting for it too, like she understood the ache in my chest even when I didn’t know how to name it. Her hands slid up my chest, curling into my shirt, pulling me closer like she wanted to drown in it right along with me.
I backed her toward the wall, my hands finding her waist, anchoring myself to the only steady thing in the room.
The noise outside—phones buzzing, media fallout, all the chaos—faded into static.
All that mattered was her.
Her mouth.
Her breath.
Her body fitting perfectly into mine like it had always belonged there.
When we finally pulled apart, it was only because we had to breathe.
But my hands didn’t leave her waist. And her forehead stayed pressed to mine.
I kissed her like I was starving, and for the first time in months, I finally tasted something real.
Chapter 21
Daphne
Kieren deepened the kiss like he’d been waiting his whole damn life for this—like he didn’t care that this could ruin everything. His mouth was demanding, urgent, tasting me like I was the only thing keeping him grounded. I melted into it, matching his intensity, because I’d waited too. Waited for someone to want me like this, to hold nothing back.
I slid my hands into his hair, threading my fingers through the thick strands and tugging just enough to make him growl against my lips. It only made him kiss me harder. He pressed me back, one hand splayed at my waist, the other gripping the back of my neck like he couldn’t stand the thought of me slipping away.
He wasn’t gentle—but I didn’t want gentle. I wanted real.
And this?
