Page 68 of Reckless
Water is lapping at my rib cage, and I’m struggling to breathe from both the frigid water and fear tightening my chest. “No,” I say simply. “No, there has to be a way out.”
I can hear Kai running his hands across every wall, splashing as he searches the tunnel beneath our feet. Ignoring the echo of shouts growing closer, I continue to feel every inch of stone trapping us down here. My fingertips can barely brush the ceiling looming over us, forcing me to jump as I search for any sort of escape.
I’m panting, panicking, pounding on the walls. My fists find the stone in front of me, again and again. “There has to be a way!” I’m not sure who I’m shouting at. The wall. The prince. The shadow of Death I can feel looming over me.
I’m tearing at the wall with cracked nails, slamming raw fists intorock. I can’t see anything, and I doubt I’ll see anything again. The water reaches my breasts, beating against me as I struggle to breathe. I think I might be shouting with every slam of my hand into the wall. I think I might be scared of death.
“That’s enough.”
His voice is calm, so damn calm that I want to slap him across the face I can’t even see. I ignore him, as per usual, and continue to pound against the wall. A tear slips down my cheek, mingling with the water splashing across my face.
“I said, that’s enough.” He grabs me around my waist, yanking me away from the wall. I fight against him, feeling like a feral animal as I thrash in the water. “Paedyn!” My name echoes off the walls, stilling me for a moment. Then his face is beside mine, his cheek wet and cold against my own. “That’s enough.”
I hear it then. Hear the defeat in his voice. He’s giving up.
“No, it’s not enough!” I shout, struggling against the arms wrapped around me. “No, there has to be a way out. There has to be a way….”
His hands slide from my waist, delicate and deliberate, as though he’s memorizing the feel of me. Calloused hands slip up my arms, spinning me around to face him. I can’t see his face, but I know exactly what I would be looking at.
“Paedyn…” The water seems to still for his soft voice.
“No,” I say sternly. “Don’t do that. Don’t go saying my name because you think it might be the last time you ever will.”
He has the nerve to chuckle. “Your name seems like a good word to die with on my lips.”
“Kai—”
“I don’t regret it.” His words are a rush, a confession he’s clung to. “I don’t regret you, or what was between us. And I don’t regret kissingyou on that roof. But I know I’ll regret what I have to do to you for the rest of my life.”
Water licks at my collarbones as I blink at his words. The words of a man staring death in the face, determined to have the final say. “Do you regret it?” he asks, voice urgent. His hands roam up my neck to feel my face, fingers trembling over my cheekbones.
“I…” My hands find his arms, cupping his wrists. “I regret not doing it right. And I regret not being what I’m supposed to be.”
He strokes a thumb across my wet cheek. “I’m sorry you have to be anything at all.”
I know it’s all talk of a dead man. All confessions of two people suddenly aware of their imminent doom. But I melt at his words, mourn what could have been. And now I’ll drown in the regret that is him.
The tunnel is filling with water, forcing me to tip my chin up and stand on my toes. I feel hopeless in his arms, as though nothing mattered before I was wrapped in them. There is no past, no future.
Just him. Just us. Just this moment and what we decide to do with it.
Death emboldens. The end initiates.
His hands tug my face closer until I can feel his breath on my lips. Water drips from his hair to splatter onto my suddenly heated skin. His pulse pounds beneath my fingers wrapped around his wrists.
My heart aches. Aches to be reunited with the piece he’s stolen from me.
My nose brushes his.
“Pretend,” I whisper against his lips.
I am recklessness incarnate. Until the very end.
My mouth meets his.
He tastes like longing. Like regret and relief. Like nothing matters but this moment.
It’s fervent, like a sinner’s final prayer.
