I don’t.
The second kiss is different, deliberate, measured, and somehow that makes it worse, because this time I feel everything. The weight of his hand at my waist, the subtle movement of his thumb, the way his body holds mine exactly where he wants it, and the way I let him.
My fingers tighten at his neck again, my body leaning into his without resistance, like I’ve already made the decision I’ve been trying to avoid since the moment I got here. The tension doesn’t break, it tightens, pulls sharper, until I pull back just enough to breathe, just enough to think.
“This doesn’t mean anything,” I say, the words coming too quickly, like I need to say them before I lose whatever control I have left.
Ethan doesn’t move. His hand stays at my waist, his gaze locked on mine, steady and certain.
“It means everything,” he says.
The words land with weight, with certainty, like there was never a question.
My pulse stutters. “That’s not?—”
“It is.”
Silence stretches between us again, but it’s different now, deeper, heavier, something that feels like it’s already shifted too far to go back. I shake my head, even as my body betrays me by staying exactly where it is, still close, still caught in the space between us.
“You don’t get to decide that.”
His gaze drops briefly to my mouth, then lifts again. “I don’t decide. I just see it.”
My breath catches, because I know what he sees, because I feel it too.
“You want to know why I’m so bossy?”
“Yes,” I answer.
He exhales slowly, like he’s reaching for something he doesn’t usually let himself touch. “Because something happened to my sister a long time ago. She’s okay now, lives in the city with her family, but she wasn’t always that way. She had a boyfriend in high school, and when she broke up with him, he didn’t take it well. He followed her, spread rumors, posted photos around the school, tapped on her window late at night. He terrorized her.”
My chest tightens. “That sounds terrifying.”
“He was,” he says quietly. “Until I did something about it.”
“What did you do?”
“What I had to.” His jaw tightens with the memory. “I’d do it again. I should’ve gone to jail for assault and battery, but I was only seventeen, and everyone in town knew what he was doing to her. I think a lot of people breathed a sigh of relief. I rearranged his face late one night, broke an arm and a leg. I looked at that guy and just saw red.”
He drags a hand over his head, like he can still feel it there. “Judge sent me to basic training. That’s how I avoided jail time. I saw a lot of bad stuff in the desert, but nothing compared tothe rage I felt that night.” He exhales, slower this time. “I haven’t thought about that in a long time. Buried it deep, I guess.”
His eyes hold mine for a long beat, steady and unflinching.
“But that’s why I am the way I am,” he continues. “Why I live to protect women and children. I knew that night it was why I was put on this Earth, and I’ve lived it every day since.”
I don’t say anything right away. I just let his words settle, let them sink in, feeling something tighten in my chest as tears sting unexpectedly in my eyes.
Outside, the wind shifts again, something moving through the trees, a quiet reminder that the danger is still there, that none of this is happening in isolation, that this shouldn’t be happening at all.
And yet I don’t step away.
Neither does he.
And that might be the most dangerous part of all.
Chapter 12
Ethan
