Page 64 of The Young & the Sinner

Mason

“Fuck.”

What the hell had I been thinking, being alone in the same house as her when Max wasn’t home? I should have made up an excuse. I should have told her I had a lot of work I needed to get done, case files I needed to read.

Which would have been true.

Yet, I went against my good sense and went to the house with her.

I looked to the painting she got for me. Something she ordered specifically with me in mind. And the way she blushed as she tried to explain why she’d gotten it…

My fist tightened around the steering wheel as I made my way through the rainy streets. I doubt the rain would let up anytime soon.

Then I thought about the kiss, and my heart plummeted into my stomach.

What was that?

How could kissing her cause such a strong reaction from me?

How could I go about kissing my brother’s ward?

The way her back arched into me, the way she yelled my name when she came. Just from kissing alone…

“Fuck,” I said again, in the silence of the car.

I could wave off this attraction as sympathy. That I sympathized with all that she went through this summer because I went through something similar myself. That I wanted to protect her because of it.

But I had felt protective of her since that first meeting. I felt it when I had no right to. And though I couldn’t bring myself to admit it, Olivia was a beautiful girl.

But my attraction to her went beyond that of physical beauty.

Everything about her called to me at a molecular level I had no way of controlling. I had thought I had a pretty good handle on things. That I could get close to her, to help her, to protect her without crossing the line. And then I kissed her.

I couldn’t think straight since that very moment she pressed her lips against mine. Couldn’t even fathom another rational thought when she opened up to me, and let me deepen the kiss.

I was a bastard.

And I needed to stay from her. I needed to stay away long enough for her to get over this infatuation with me, because I knew with just the slightest pressure from her and I would surely lose it completely.

---