His fingers curl more firmly around my knee for a beat before he says, “I’m sure.”
“Okay…” I bite down on my bottom lip, barely holding it together under the way he’s looking at me.
Mandy pulls out first, and he follows her. The silence between us returns, but his hand never leaves my knee, and the moment his hand slides slowly up my leg, then back down again, all logic evaporates. My fingernails dig into the seat as desire blooms low in my gut.
Does he have any idea what he’s doing to me? How cruel it is to touch me like this when we both know we can’t have each other?
His hand moves again, higher this time, stopping just shy of where I’m aching most, like he’s testing me, daring me to react. I steal a glance at him, but he’s still watching the road, his expression cut from stone.
I can feel it anyway—in the tension of his grip, in the faint flex of his fingers against my skin like he’s barely keeping himself in check. The urge to forget who I am, to forget every reason we’re wrong for each other, slams into me so hard I almost lean into him, almost let go and give in to this pull between us.
“Kirill…” It comes out low as I study his profile, a quiet plea for things I’m nowhere near ready to say.
His hand freezes, then tightens possessively.
“You shouldn’t look at me like that,” he says, tilting his head just enough that our eyes meet. “You make it hard for me to remember all the reasons I’m not supposed to want you.”
He wants me?
My chest throbs at the thought, at the truth behind his words.
His hand doesn’t leave me. If anything, it presses into me, like he’s staking a claim he doesn’t know how to walk awayfrom. We don’t say another word as we follow Mandy toward her place, both of us pretending nothing’s changed. But everything has.
Whatever this is between us, it’s only getting harder to ignore.
The diner is louder than usual, every clink of silverware and burst of laughter grating against my nerves as I tie my apron and force myself back into motion.
If I keep moving, if I keep working, maybe my body will forget the way Kirill’s hand felt on my thigh. The way his eyes tracked me at the stables like I was something he wasn’t supposed to want but couldn’t stop looking at anyway.
Mandy, of course, hasn’t forgotten the way he acted and is still dying to talk about it—which she would’ve done at her place, but I played the I’m-in-a-rush-to-change-for-work card. She knows all my tricks and let it go.
Until now.
She corners me by the coffee station, leaning one elbow against the counter, eyes sparkling like she’s just been handed the world’s best piece of gossip.
“So…” She drags the word out. “Are we still pretending he isn’t obsessed with you, or are we acknowledging that a very large and sexy man almost ripped someone’s head off because he touched you? Not to mention the way he touched you in the car. You know I saw that, right?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I focus on the receipts for the day, shuffling and straightening them.
She snorts. “Please. I’ve seen men jealous before. That was territorial. That man is crazy about you. I don’t care what he actually says. Actions speak louder.”
I have no idea how to answer that. If I admit how much I liked it, how badly I want him, it will only make the fact that I can’t have him that much more real.
Mandy keeps going, which is totally on brand for her. “Look, if you don’t want him, that’s fine. Maybe I can shoot my shot and see if?—”
“Don’t you dare.” My voice grows uncharacteristically harsh, and the laugh that bursts out of her tells me she was testing me.
Crap.
“Look who else can be territorial.” She wags her brows. “I’m calling dibs on the maid of honor position.”
I scoff. “Well, who else would it be?”
“Your sister?”
Rolling my eyes, I let out a chuckle. “Not if I can help it.”
“Ooh, Sloane’s being bad today. I like it.”
