There she’d been, worried and embarrassed andwanting moreof that kiss for two days…and he found it amusing.
“Never mind,” she bit out, her hands going back up to her hair, clenching her teeth hard to keep from saying anything she might regret. “Nothing happened.”
She scurried around him, part of her arm hitting his chest as she attempted to finish securing the bun on her head. Her throat felt tight. Her face felt hot.
Valerie heard his sharp exhale followed by his murmured curse.
It mortified her when she felt her eyes begin to sting, when her vision went blurry with her sudden tears. Every part of her longed to flee. To race through her door and run upstairs…to another place she’d be trapped. Then again, she’d been trapped in some way or another all her life. From poverty on Genesis, to her mother’s sickness and watching her slowly die because they were too poor to get her help, to Everton where she had to rely on her aunt to stay fed and housed.
And her future?
Marriage. Trapped again. Chained and trapped.
Her heart was racing in her chest and when she swiped at the tears spilling down her face, she found her hands were trembling.
“Did it…” she whispered, suddenly more saddened than angry. She cleared her throat, staring at the door, feeling his heat close to her back. “Did it really mean that little to you?”
She didn’t know what possessed her to ask. Maybe because she was tired of beating around the bush with Dravka—for five years now—or maybe because she realized he would be gone soon. Maybe she realized that for once, she wanted straight, honest answers from him. Then she’d know if she had made up the last five years in her mind or not.
“Did it mean anything at all?” she continued, turning around slowly to face Dravka. His brow bone was furrowed when she looked at him. And his expression was thunderous, but at least he wasn’t giving her that amused smile anymore. “Or was it just because you were drunk and…I was there?”
The anger that stole over his face was enough to steal her breath.
“Do you really think that little of me?” he asked quietly.
“What am I supposed to think?” she whispered, dashing away more tears. “You come here now and it’s like you’reamusedabout the whole thing.”
“And what amIsupposed to think, Val?” he asked, running a hand over his smooth scalp. “You ran away that night and avoided me for two days. I was beginning to think it wasyouwho wanted to forget that kiss ever happened. Or that you regretted it. Or you were ashamed of it.”
Valerie’s eyes went wide. Her mouth opened, closed, opened—but no sound came out.
“I don’t regret it,” Dravka said after a lengthy silence, his voice soft yet deep.
His words seemed to echo around that small space, bouncing off the walls until they were all she could hear. He took one, two, three steps closer until Valerie had to crane her neck to meet his eyes.
“You don’t?” she questioned.
“Veki,” he murmured down to her. “I remember every moment.”
A soft exhale escaped her.
“The only thing I regret,” he started and she tensed slightly, “is that we kissed for the first time when I’d been drinking. I should have kissed you long before that. Because it was a long time in the making, don’t you think,mellkia?”
Valerie imagined that the expression on her face was part bewildered, part dazed, part wary, part elated. But when Dravka’s hand came to cup the side of her throat, a small breathy gasp escaped her, her nipples pebbling hard underneath the dress she’d slipped on.
Then that hand slid up to her cheek, his thumb brushing her bottom lip, his eyes going to them. She watched his eyes flare and a muscle tic in his strong jaw.
When he spoke again, his voice was huskier, gruffer. “Which is what I came down here to rectify when I saw you’d returned.”
“What?” she whispered.
A million voices were screaming in her mind why it wasn’t a good idea to be alone with him right now, down in her basement room, when he was looking at her like this, and talking to her like this.
Dravka didn’t answer her. Not at first. Instead, he stepped into her, dropping his head down while guiding her face up.
A hushed quiet descended over them when his lips met hers. Another kiss. Only this time, he didn’t have the taste of brandy on his tongue. Only Dravka.
A shuddering sigh left her. As for all those voices inside her head ringing warning bells, she silenced them. Against her better judgment, her hands gripped his shirt to keep him in place…and she kissed him back, moving her lips with his.
