It destroys me.
More.
The word pounds through my blood. Overrides everything. I’ve spent my whole life being enough—enough control, enough discipline, enough restraint to earn the trust they put in me.
Right now, I’m not enough of anything except hers.
I continue to kiss her—rough, unfiltered, all the frustration and hunger I’ve been swallowing poured straight into it. No testing. No hesitation. Just need slamming into need, her mouth opening under mine like she’s been braced for it.
The room closes in. The walls disappear. There’s nothing left but her breath and my grip and the knowledge that whatever line I just crossed?—
There’s no stepping back over it.
Not during the kiss—during the half-second after, when my hands are still on her, and my body is already recalibrating, already cataloging the damage.
I break it off first.
I pull back hard enough that she stumbles a step, breathless, eyes dark and unfocused. My chest is heaving. My pulse is too fast. The room feels suddenly hostile, too small to contain what I just unleashed.
“Fuck,” I mutter.
Her mouth parts like she’s about to say something—but I don’t let her. I turn away, rake a hand through my hair, pace two steps before stopping short like I’ve hit an invisible wall.
That was a mistake.
A clean one. A clear one.
I don’t get to do that. Not here. Not now. Not with her.
“We can’t,” I say, the words coming out rough, clipped. “That can’t happen again.”
Silence.
I feel her behind me, still too close, still warm. The awareness hasn’t faded—if anything, it’s sharper now, my body still keyed up like it’s waiting for the next strike.
“Because of the mission,” she says quietly.
“Yes.”
“And if there were no mission?”
I don’t answer. I can’t. Because that’s not the real problem.
I turn back to her.
Her cheeks are flushed. Her breathing hasn’t steadied yet. Neither has mine. Seeing the evidence of what I did—to her, to myself—tightens something ugly and protective in my chest.
“Because I lose clarity,” I say. “Because I make bad calls. Because people get hurt.”
“People,” she repeats. “Or you.”
I hold her gaze. This close, there’s no hiding. No armor thick enough.
“Both.”
The room feels heavier now. Charged in a different way. Not anticipation—aftermath.
She nods once, small and controlled, like she’s filing the moment away where it can’t cut her later.
