Page 40 of Runaway Girl
“Hmm, just trying to figure out what you want from me.”
“Everything…”
My lips pursed, the sincere declaration had me out of sorts. Right then, in the cradle of his embrace, I felt his true intentions and knew them to be real. But I’d been conned by him before, and I experienced firsthand how far that fall could be.
Reading my expression, Ethan delicately traced my hairline, his touch searing.
“I deserve your hesitation. And I understand your unwillingness to believe in me. But that’s the truth, Ali.”
Then, Ethan initiated his finishing move by giving me his cheeky smirk with the added twinkle in his eye—his expression all the way mischief with a side of sexy.
Someone help me with this magic voodoo shit! I repeat… SOS!
My tongue licked out to wet my bottom lip, wishing I was sucking on his instead. Ethan’s expression darkened in reply, his thumb chasing the moist edge as if imagining the same.
“There’s my girl. No more tears,” he said, voice low and husky.
“I’m not your girl.”
“Let a mandream,Alicia. Don’t cut my heart out so quickly.”
“You have a heart?”
“Only one that beats for you.”
My brows furrowed at the conflicted feelings racing through my body.
On one side, there was pure elation after hearing what I had coveted for so long. However, all my previous humiliation and pain had left a lasting impression, making me weary to fully accept him.
What am I supposed to say to that?
I disengaged from his lap and dropped into the passenger seat, creating space to breathe. I couldn’t think straight when he was so close.
”Can you—can you take me home?”
“Of course, Ali. I’ll take you wherever you want to go.”
Despite the charged atmosphere, the drive to my apartment building remained silent.
But when Ethan parked and I made to leave, a warm hand grasped mine, quietly begging me to stay.
Please, let me have the strength to leave this car.
Slowly—ever so slowly—Ethan leaned over the centre console and pressed a light kiss to my lips. It was chaste, barely existent, but that one point of contact was filled with so much promise and desperate yearning he had me reeling.
“Why did that feel like a goodbye?” I whispered, his tortured face hovering before me as my lips tingled with a roaring need for more.
His baby blues swept over me in urgency as if trying to memorise each feature, every microscopic line.
“I don’t know how you’ll feel about me after tomorrow night. So I had to be selfish and taste you one last time.”
My pulse gave an almighty thump. “Ethan…what have you done?”
“Something I should have done a long time ago. Just—if—if you choose to never speak to me again. Will you send one last message? A single text to say goodbye… so I know.”
After everything that transpired between us, he hadnevergiven up. The talk of farewells and alluding to future hurt had my lungs seizing in my chest.
My fingers squeezed around his. “You’re scaring me.”
