“Liev,” her soft voice reaches me, and I realize she’s watching me. More accurately, she’s staring at my mouth.
She licks her lips, and I think I might literally explode.
Sera clears her throat. “Could you… um…” Her cheeks flush a beautiful rose in the low light. “Could you try to kiss me?”
“What?” I had to have heard that wrong.
Please god, don’t let me have heard that wrong.
“Never mind.” She shakes her head embarrassed. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have?—”
“What do you mean,try?”
“Forget it,” she whispers, cheeks blazing as she echoes my words from before.
“Sera.” I soften my voice. “We’ve carried a dead body together. Covered up a murder. If you can’t trust me, who can you trust?”
I waggle my brows, deliberately absurd, trying to lighten the tension.
She exhales hard and then says words that I think might break my heart with how defeated they sound. “I can’t kiss.”
I frown. “Are we talking technique? Because I don’t think any man would complain about your mouth being on them in any kind of capacity.”
“No,” she huffs, offended. “Not technique.”
I search her face, but I’m at a loss. “You’re going to have to spell it out for me,malyshka.”
Her jaw works. “I haven’t been able to let anyone… touch me like that, since...” Her gaze drops to the coffee table. “I’ve tried a few times, but I always freak out. Even when I tell myself it’s just a kiss. That I’m in control.”
Ice floods my veins.
I stare at her bowed head. “Did he rape you?”
Her shoulders jerk.
I close my eyes briefly, forcing my breathing to stay steady. “Aaron,” I say carefully. “Did he rape you before he threw the acid?”
“No,” she says quickly. “He never raped me.”
There’s a long beat before she continues. “But things weren’t… good… between us in that way. The night he tried to force me… It’s why I broke up with him.”
Rage simmers low and lethal in my chest, but I keep my voice even. “But you think you could kiss me?”
She doesn’t blink, the gold in her eyes sparkling against the green. I hold my breath waiting for her answer.
“Like you said. I trust you.”
Savage satisfaction surges through me, but I manage to keep my body relaxed. “Just a kiss,” I say when I trust myself to speak again.
She nods.
“Friends who kiss?” I quirk an eyebrow.
“Yes.” Her eyes cloud a little then flick to my mouth and back up again.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” I can see the nerves now, threading through her resolve. “You can change your mind.”
“I want to try,” she says. “I don’t want anything from you.” She winces. “That came out wrong. I’m just trying to say I’m not going to like make this be athing…” She gestures helplessly between us. “I thought maybe if I tried with someone I trust like an…"
