then we’re moaning onto each other’s tongues. With him this close, I can’t do anything but feel him, want him, and he knows it.
He pulls away and I lunge for him, latching onto his throat, suckling his neck, inhaling his scent and loving his sounds as he runs his hands down my sides.
It’s then I realize I’ve been waiting for him, and worse, hoping for him to show. It’s no mystery to me why he feels so familiar. Because I know him, and the reason I know him is that the essence of who he is was fed to me in bits and pieces by Sean and Dom. Ironically, a large part of me is drawn to him because last summer as I was falling for them—in a way—I’d been falling for Tobias too, his ideals, his ambitions, his agenda, his take on life. I tear myself away and collapse on my back, frustration brimming as I turn my head to avoid his gaze. “Just leave. Nothing good is coming out of this. And this wasn’t a part of our deal.”
He dips and kisses the hollow of my throat, and when he gets no reaction from me, he tenses, his exhale audible. “Maybe I am sorry for more than the negligee.” If he’s feeling remorse, it’s much too late. He can’t have a heart. He’s never supposed to have a heart. He’s not allowed to, and neither am I.
“Please don’t.” A long silence passes as he stays suspended above me. I feel his need, our yearning for the other ricocheting between us. He’s becoming familiar, and it’s terrifying.
This was not supposed to happen.
We are not supposed to happen.
We cannot happen.
I refuse to let us happen.
“I ransacked your life out of anger…” he swallows, and I shake my head.
“Don’t plead your case to me, Tobias. I know why you did what you did. You felt just as betrayed, but we took it a step further, and we can’t undo that now. No amount of apology will ever make this right. You did what you set out to do, so fucking deal with it.” I turn my head and gaze up at him. “We are just business.”
His face ripples with ferocity as he lifts himself to sit. “You think this is about your fucking love? This was an apology you turned into melodrama. It’s a nightgown, not a declaration.” A light sting of rejection tints his face, and I know I’ve struck another nerve. “You think I won’t fuck you if I feel like it?”
I plant my bare foot on his chest from where I lay, my jean shorts riding up my thigh. “Then fuck me, Tobias, call my bluff. Go ahead, you mean, silly monster,” I taunt, wrinkling my nose. “Let’s get fucking dirty and turn this into a real shitshow.”
He scoffs. “You’re being ridiculous.”
“Of course, I am.” I lift to sit. “I’m just a stupid little girl.”
He grips my jaw, his eyes dropping to my lips. “I said lonely, not stupid.”
“Lonely people make stupid decisions. Allowing you into my bed is proof. Apology not accepted, get out.” I pull a school brochure from the mail pile on my bed and begin flipping through it.
He’s silent for long moments before he speaks.
“You drew the right conclusions. I knew about you. It was my decision, my call, to keep you out of it. I’m the one that hid you.”
He pulls the brochure from my grip and tugs my hand to rest between his. “I’m the one that made the decision years ago to keep you out of it. I failed you. I got distracted, and I dropped the ball. I promised myself long ago that no matter how far I decided to go in bringing down your father, you wouldn’t suffer for it. I was never going to let you pay for his mistakes.”
I try to rip my hand away and he hauls me toward him, so I’m forced to look at him. “I failed you. Not Sean, not Dominic. Me. And when I found out you’d been pulled into this…and just how far.” Ire laces his voice when he speaks. “I was too late. So, when I told you, when I tell you that you were never supposed to be a part of this, I mean it. I failed you, Cecelia. I handled it in a way that I’m not fucking proud of. In a way that could potentially destroy everything I’ve been working for over half my fucking life.”