Page 46 of Vicious Temptation

Estela shakes her head, holding back a laugh as she starts gathering ingredients for dinner.

“Where is everybody?” I ask, now stealing a handful of chocolate chips.

“Señora Amalia and Kai are out and won’t be back until later tonight. It’s their anniversary week.”

I chuckle around a mouthful of chocolate. “Week? Figures.”

I don’t know what was in the water when they all got together, but their love is adorably gross. Even decades later, my parents still act like they can’t get enough of each other.

And because my brain hates me, that thought instantly brings him to mind.

Absolutely fucking not.

It’s been almost a week since that day at the gym, and I promised myself I wouldn’t think about Thiago, that kiss, or anything else about the man I shoved into a mental vault and sealed shut.

The problem is that he keeps finding his way through the cracks.

Why are you lying to yourself, Remi?

Okay, maybe I broke down once and looked him up on social media. That hardly counts as anything, especially since the man has the online presence of someone’s grandfather. His entire profile consists of two photos from a year ago without a single caption between them. One is a sunrise and the other a sunset, both taken somewhere in Texas, if I had to guess.

I hate that I stared at them longer than any sane person should.

They were beautiful, though, and they made me wonder where he was when he took them. And what made him stop long enough to pull out his phone and capture what he thought was worth remembering. Then my thoughts drift to my mother and whether she ever stood beneath those same Texas skies when she was younger.

I smile as I picture it.

Then I mentally slap myself back to reality for the slip. It’s not that I like the guy. I just happen to have eyes, and who isn’t a sucker for a man with a pretty face who looks built to disrespect me and toss me around the way I like it?

“Remi…” Zara’s voice hits me like a bucket of ice water, and I startle more than I did when she jumped out at me by the door.

“Hmm?” I pop another piece of chocolate into my mouth and try to play it off, though it’s ridiculous since she can’t read my thoughts.

“Are you still mad at Officer Thiago?”

This child must be practicing sorcery.

I slam my fist on the counter as the chocolate goes down the wrong pipe, sending me into a coughing fit. Zara instantly jumps onto her stool and starts patting my back.

“Oh no, Remi. Maybe Estela was right. Are you gonna throw up now?”

I shake my head as the coughing slowly subsides. “No,” I manage. “I’m fine. It just went down the wrong way.”

“Who is Officer Thiago, mija?” Estela asks, placing a glass of water in my hand.

I barely catch my breath before Zara beats me to the answer.

“He was her boyfriend.”

Estela’s eyes widen. “Her boyfriend?”

Of course she would say that.

“No!” I say, swallowing a gulp of water and setting the glass down. “No, he wasn’t. He wasn’t even my friend.”

Zara turns to Estela and says matter-of-factly, “Cousin Remi kisses her not-boyfriends on the lips.”

“Zara!”