Page 32 of What Broke First
Sarah swallowed hard. “That’s the thing, Matt. You were. You were that man. And then you weren’t. And now you expect me to trust the next version like it won’t collapse, too?”
“I don’t expect anything,” he said. “I just want to try. I want to stop leaving you with the burden of both the pain and the healing.”
Her eyes shimmered, but her voice held. “You’re not the one who has to put herself back together every time. You want to make things right, but all it takes is one look from you, and I forget what broken feels like. That’s not healing. That’s a trap I set for myself.”
The silence that followed wasn’t peaceful. It was electric.
Matt stepped forward, voice low and certain.
“Then let me help you heal, Sarah. Not with promises. Not with flowers. With presence. With proof. I don’t want another chance. I want our forever back. And I’ll earn every inch of it if you let me.”
He reached for her slowly, giving her every chance to stop him.
She didn’t.
Their lips met again. This time, there was no hesitation, no boundary, just heat.
It deepened fast. Her hands gripped his shirt. He found the small of her back.
She felt dizzy, drunk on muscle memory and suppressed want.
Every kiss felt like it belonged to another lifetime, but her body remembered.
He backed her into the wall, one arm braced beside her head. His breath was hot against her neck. Her nails bit into his shoulders, and for a second, she forgot everything.
Then he whispered, voice rough with emotion, lips brushing the edge of her jaw, “You are the air in my lungs, Sarah. The ache I cannot shake. If loving you breaks me, then let me break. I will still beg for more.”
His mouth skimmed down her neck, reverent and aching. “Tell me to stop, and I will. But if you don’t, I’m going to make love to you with everything I have left.”
Her breath caught. The room tilted. He wasn’t taking. He was offering. All of him. And it terrified her.
Sarah pushed him back, chest heaving. “No,” she gasped. “Not like this.”
He was panting too. “Okay.”
“I mean it,” she said, straightening her shirt, trying to gather herself. “This isn’t a shortcut. You don’t get to make this right with your mouth.”
Matt nodded, stepping back. “I didn’t come here to seduce you.”
She snorted. “Well, you’re failing. Stop looking at me like that.”
Another pause. Another heartbeat of silence.
Then: “Go home, Matt.”
He obeyed. But this time, she didn’t close the door right away. She stood there, watching him walk away, heart thrumming with the ache of every unfinished sentence between them.
When she finally closed the door, she stood in the stillness, her body humming with aftershocks. Her lips still tingled where he’d kissed her. Her skin still carried the heat of his touch. She felt like a live wire, pulsing with everything she was trying not to feel.
She pressed a hand to her chest.
God, he had meant every word. That was the problem. She’d spent months building walls, brick by brutal brick, just to survive. And now here he was, walking back in like the man she used to believe in. The man she used to love like breathing.
She walked to the sink, poured the rest of her wine down the drain, and stared out the window into the dark.
“I can’t do this again,” she whispered to the night.
She didn’t know what would happen next. But she knew it wasn’t over.
