Page 113 of Play It Sinful

KENZIE: FYI. She knows.

Damn it, Kenzie.

“Yo, Sean. Where are you going?” Alex asks from across the room.

“Uh, Ash wants to talk to me.”

“Oh no. Does she know we’re all here?” Zoey asks.

“I don’t know.”

Probably. Kenzie obviously can’t keep a secret.

When I open the door, I come face to face with my sister. Before I can ask, she says, “She’s in the car.”

“Is she mad?”

“I’m not sure. She was pretty quiet on the ride here. She wasn’t angry with me though.”

I pinch my brows together. “Why would she be angry with you? You didn’t withhold information from her for three years like I did.”

Kenzie nods. “True. Well… good luck.”

She walks into the house, but before she closes the door, I hear one of the twins say, “Oh, I gotta see this.”

Shit. I bet everyone will rush to the window to witness this convo. I take a deep breath and approach the car. It’s damn cold outside, and like a dumbass, I forgot to put my coat on. I veer for the driver’s side of the car with the intention of getting in, but Ashley opens her door and exits the vehicle. I stop in my tracks and watch her circle around the front toward me. She’s moving pretty fast for someone who’s been in a hospital bed for the past two weeks.

“Ash—”

“You jerk!” She hits my arm, then winces, but the fire doesn’t leave her eyes. “How could you not tell me?”

“I was protecting you.”

“Protecting me from what?”

I guess we’re doing this now with our friends watching from the window. So much for privacy.

“The truth. It wrecked me. I didn’t want you to feel as horrible as I did.”

“Oh my God. You don’t think I was a fucking wreck just the same? Do you have anyideahow many nights I lay awake wondering what I had done to deserve what you did to me? You didn’t only break my heart, you leveled me to the ground.”

Remorse hits me like a cannonball, making me sick. “I thought it’d hurt less if I just ended things. You don’t know how tormented I was about it. It was torture, believing I had fallen in love with my own sister.”

“I had the right to know.” She wipes tears from her eyes.

“I know, but I don’t regret keeping it a secret from you. The knowledge that we were related didn’t make me stop loving you, and every time I saw you and wanted you so badly I couldn’t breathe, it made me hate myself. I didn’t want that for you.”

“And yet, three years later you kissed me while still believing you were my brother.”

“My self-restraint had worn thin after all that time, and jealousy made it snap.”

The fire seems to vanish from her eyes, but the hurt is still there. I take a step closer, and another, until I’m in her space.

She looks up and keeps staring into my eyes. “Do you still love me?”

“I never stopped.”

Her lips tremble, and I see the tears forming in her eyes again. I pull her into my arms carefully, conscious that she’s still recovering from fractured ribs. She rests her cheek against my chest, and I kiss the top of her head. I want to claim her lips and lose myself in the taste of her, but a chaste kiss is as far as I dare to go.

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