“I said I know,” I snap, more harshly than I meant to. “You don’t have to keep reminding me. I’m not stupid.”
He hesitates but backs off.
I finally look away from the poster, just in time to catch a quick glance of Matteo across the hallway.
He’s standing with Milo and Marco, and he’s laughing, head thrown back, a devilish smile carved into his face like sin. For the briefest second, his eyes flick up and catch mine.
No smile. No reaction. Just a look.
And the spark that says this masquerade won’t just be about masks.
It’ll be about the war neither of us can escape.
Chapter 6
Matteo
Two days since I kissed her, and I still taste the sin. I’m fucked.
I shouldn’t have done it; I knew it the second I walked away from her. Leaving her pinned to the wall, her lips swollen, her eyes wide. I could feel the echo of her breath burning in my lungs. My hand still remembers the curve of her throat, the way it trembled under my touch.
I enjoyed the feeling of her neck in my hand.
And still, here I am. Midnight walking through the gardens like I’m some ghost looking for the reason I’ve lost my mind.
The air is damp, fog coils through the hedges, dragging whispers in with it. Even the trees seem to lean in closer, like they want to hear my confessions, or tell me I’m a fucking idiot.
I’m not proud of it. But I’m not sorry either.
That’s the real problem; I’m not fucking sorry about kissing her. It’s been the only thing I can think about since I blew smoke into her mouth on the cliff. What her lips would taste like and they tasted like fucking heaven.
She’s been avoiding me. I’ve watched her from every damn corner of this place. She walks tense, tight shoulders hunchedwhen her cousins are around, flinching as if she’s waiting for a war to break out in her own bloodline. Her smiles are fake, but she’s still beautiful.
And I still want her.
Even knowing I shouldn’t.
Even when every reason in the world says I should walk the other way and forget the feeling of her mouth against mine.
I drag my fingers through my hair and turn toward the far edge of the garden path, boots crunching over damp stone. The moon hangs low behind a sheet of clouds. The lighthouse flashes out in the distance, steadfast, merciless.
Just like her eyes when she looked up at me that night.
There’s movement ahead. Laughter. Smoke.
I already know who it is before seeing them. Marco and Milo lean against a marble column, cigarettes glowing red in the dark.
“Look who crawled out of his brooding hole.” Marco smirks. He’s an asshole by choice.
“Didn’t know ghosts made footprints,” Milo adds, and I tell him to fuck off.
“How is Rosa?” I ask Marco more than Milo, and he sticks his finger up at me.
I grunt and grab Marco’s lighter off the stone wall, lighting a cigarette of my own. I exhale smoke, looking at the shadowy night.
“You good?” Marco asks, raising a brow.
I know what he’s asking about, and I shrug. “Classes are shit. Waste of time.” Not answering the question in the way he wanted me to.
