Page 140 of Vicious Games

Her fingers brush through my damp hair, her chest rising and falling beneath mine. I stare down at her and order myself to memorize her face. The way her cheeks are flushed, her lips swollen, her eyes dazed and shining with something that goes far deeper than just the high of sex—love.

She continues to stare back at me, her lips parting to speak, but no words come. Only the softest of smiles comes to the surface instead. A smile so fucking tender that it cracks my heart right down the middle.

As we lie there, panting, sweating, lost in each other’s eyes, it almost feels like the whole world has stopped turning. Stopped just to give us this moment.

“I knew you’d be trouble,” she finally says, slaying me with that smile of hers. “Everything is going to change now, isn’t it?”

Eyes shut, I breathe her in and nod. “Yeah, Frankie. There’s no way I’ll let you get rid of me now.”

Chapter 24

Frances

Lucky’s asleep beside me, deep and peaceful, one arm thrown across the sheets as if still reaching for me even in his dreams. I stay still for a moment, listening to his breathing, letting the sound calm me. Then I roll just a smidge to the side and look around the room again, this ridiculous, beautiful hotel room.

When Lucky said he had booked a room for us, this was not what I expected to find. Never in my wildest dreams did I expect it to be in a five-star hotel right smack in the middle of the city, much less it being the honeymoon suite.

Lucky wouldn’t be Lucky if he didn’t do things big. That’s just how he lives his life—big and loud. Is it any wonder that he’d love like that too?

From the moment I walked into the hotel room and saw the rose petals and the flickering candlelight, I knew he had put a lot of thought into every small detail to make tonight perfect. Though he really didn’t have to try so hard.

I throw a glance at the half glass of champagne that sits on the nightstand, its bubbles long gone. Then to the chocolate-covered strawberries that we barely touched, one bite taken out of the first before we gotdistracted.

I smile to myself, brushing a curl out of his gorgeous face, thinking about how he went all out for our date. Not just to impress me, but to take care of me. To make tonight… matter.

I press the sheet closer to my chest as if trying to hold all my feelings in. Though I know he would have preferred my first time to have been in this sweet, romantic setting, I’m glad it happened exactly as it did. Because it wasreal.

Losing my virginity in the backseat of a car is as close to living a normal teenage experience as I’ve ever got. And that’s the part that scares me. Because my life is anything but normal. And Lucky’s? I don’t think his life is the epitome of normal either. I mean, what senior in high school could afford a hotel room like this? Only Luciano Romano, apparently.

Needing a minute to myself, I slip out of bed as quietly as possible and grab the robe hanging off the back of the chair. It smells like him, like hotel soap and aftershave and something a little bit wild underneath. I wrap it around me and walk over to the floor-to-ceiling windows. The city is still alive out there, neon and noise even at this late hour, but up here it’s quiet. Up here, I can breathe.

Until I can’t.

Until it all crashes in on me, hard and fast, like a tidal wave I didn’t see coming.

I told him I loved him.

God, how selfish is that?

To say something so dangerous to both our hearts when I know better.

When I know there’s no future here. No safe landing.

I can’t love Lucky. Not really. Not the way he deserves.

What world does a girl like me end up with a guy like him anyway? Fairy tales don’t belong to people like me. I know how stories like this end and it’s not with white puffy princess dresses and happily-ever-afters. It’s with bruised hearts and broken promises.

Maybe Lucky’s had fairy dust scattered across his life and still believes in such magic. But me? I’ve lived long enough to know the clock always strikes midnight. The spell always breaks. And when it does, one of us will be in a world of hurt. And I’m positive it’s going to be me.

Damn it.

How could I have been this stupid? To let my feelings cloud my judgment? I always knew he was trouble. Lucky was the kind of trouble you saw coming from a mile away but ran toward anyway. No matter how much I hated him initially, it was only a matter of time until that hate turned into something else. Something that would scar me much deeper. Something that would forever change the person that I am.

God, why did I have to tell him that I loved him back?

Why didn’t I just lie and save us the pain that is sure to follow?

“I can hear your thoughts from way over here,” his voice calls out to me, lazy and deep. “Come back to bed. It’s cold without you in it.”

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