Page 7 of Ava After Midnight

My voice is low, rough, edged with something dark. “If you’re going to accuse me of ruining you so completely that no one else could ever claim you—of something that filthy, so no one else can ever touch you without feeling like a mistake—then at least let me prove you right.”

Her nails press into my skin, just a little too hard, like she needs to ground herself. Her breath comes uneven now, a quiet curse slipping past her lips before she bites it back.

“Dance with me, and I’ll make sure you never forget what it means to be the queen of the Seven Sins.”

She moves first, and I follow. Of course I do.

The staff exit spills into the VIP section, where the air thickens with heat and smoke—the bass vibrating through the floor like a second heartbeat.

She doesn’t take my hand. She doesn’t need to.

Ava steps into the VIP section like she owns the place, like she’s already made her choice. Maybe she has.

The VIP section envelops us with darker, heavier bass, the kind that sinks into your skin and makes bad decisions feelinevitable. Her hands slide up my chest, nails grazing through fabric as she presses closer.

Hips rolling with deliberate, taunting precision. Every grind is a challenge, a dare, a whispered promise in the language of bodies that know exactly how to push and pull. My hands find her waist, fingers digging in just enough to let her know I’m right there, feeling every movement.

This should feel like a mistake. The ring on her finger says so. The way my body reacts says otherwise.

Her body heat seeps through my clothes, her scent—expensive, feminine, with a trace of coconut and trouble—sinking into my skin, clinging like something I’ll never wash off.

We move as if we’ve done this before, as if the rhythm was waiting for us to meet. She dares, I answer. She teases, I take control. Our bodies write promises we both know we’ll break, but for now, it doesn’t matter.

I lean in, close enough that she has to tilt her chin to hold my gaze. “You sure you can handle this,princesa?”

She smiles, slow and dangerous. “Guess we’ll find out.” She presses closer, each slow grind teasing, pushing, waiting for me to be the one to break first.

“You move like the wind before a storm,” she breathes, turning to press her back against my chest. “Charged, restless, impossible to ignore.” Her hair smells like paradise and temptation, brushing my face as she moves closer to me.

Not close enough.

“You haven’t seen anything yet,princesa.” My hands grip her hips, steering her into the rhythm. The music shifts to a Latin beat, and I give in to the muscle memory of a past life before I can think better of it. My body remembers long before my mind catches up—how to shift my weight, how to let the beat dictate the next move, how to own the space around me.

Flashes of a past life hit like strobe lights—quick, disorienting, but impossible to ignore.

A packed dance floor. The sound of heels clicking in sync with mine. Laughter, whistles, the heat of an expectant crowd waiting for the next move.

Mateo’s voice in my ear—cocky, taunting. “First one to make someone swoon wins. Don’t choke, hermano.”

The woman in red—not Ava, someone else, someone long gone—smirks at me, waiting. I take the challenge, guiding her into a spin, watching the surprise flicker in her eyes before it melts into something breathless. I know that look. I used to chase that look.

I used to live for it.

I remember loving that feeling. Knowing I could make someone lose themselves to me, if only for a song.

“You’re a dancer.” Ava’s voice snaps me back. It’s not a question.

The music is still pulsing, but the memory vanishes like smoke. She’s watching me, reading me, her expression curious and sharp.

She rolls back in my grip, her ass grinding against the front of my slacks.

“Was. Different life.”Before everything went to hell.

Before I learned that owning a place doesn’t mean you belong in it. Before I learned that watching people lose themselves isn’t the same as feeling it yourself.

She drags a teasing nail down my chest, slow, deliberate, a smirk curling at the corner of her lips. “Show me what you got, then. Or are you all talk?”

I shouldn’t.

---