Page 148 of Sinful Desires
He took a sip and winced. “Yup. Definitely trauma flavored.”
Liya and Pierre laughed as Nicholas stood up, leaned over the pit, and blew on the fire to revive it. Sparks jumped. The flames licked higher, casting shadows across his face as he speared another marshmallow onto his stick.
The conversation twisted toward LA therapists.
Pierre launched into some unhinged story about how his old shrink told him he needed an exorcism after admitting he once hid a one-night stand’s car keys to keep him from leaving.
More laughter. More noise.
But it all blurred.
Because across the fire, Théo lifted his bottle and took a slow drink, eyes never leaving mine.
And in the flicker of flame and silence, that stare said everything his mouth never would.
Every word I still ached for.
It all got too loud, too bright, too much.
“I’m heading to the bathroom,” I muttered, already on my feet.
No one questioned it. I walked fast, bare feet sinking into the sand as I made my way back toward the villa. Truth was, I didn’t need the bathroom.
I needed a bed and a blanket pulled over my head like I was ten again and the world wasn’t chewing me up.
I reached for the glass handle on the back door, but I never made it inside.
A hand slammed over my mouth. Another wrapped around my waist and yanked me backward, my feet lifting clean off the ground.
I thrashed. Fought. Elbowed whatever I could reach. My heartbeat roared in my chest until I heard his voice, low and rough in my ear.
“It’s me.”
I kept struggling, but he didn’t let go.
He carried me like I weighed nothing, dragging us into the shadows behind the villa. Past the hedges. Past the edge of the pool. Toward the old garden shed where no one could see. He set me down, my feet hitting warm sand.
The night air wrapped around us.
In the distance, I could still hear Nicholas yelling something about Marlon Brando.
I turned on Théo, lungs burning.
“What the fuck is wrong with you? Are you trying to give me a heart attack?”
“Cut the shit.”
His voice wasn’t calm. It was venom dragged through gravel.
I narrowed my eyes. “What?”
“This. All of it. You wanna scream? Do it. You wanna break something? Break it. Say every filthy fucking thing you’ve buried inside that pretty little mouth while I was gone.”
He stepped forward, eyes locked on mine.
“Say you hate me. That you want me dead. That you wish our paths never crossed.”
Another step.
