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Her jaw drops as she flips through a few pages and I stand frozen. Her letters to me are taped to the pages, the edges well-worn and dark.

Her head snaps toward me and in her eyes I see it. Fear. Because all these years, I’ve had my eye on her. Her and no other woman in the world.

“Put it back,” I grit out.

She doesn’t move. Except for her trembling fingers.

“Whatisthis?” she asks. Her voice catches, looking at me, as I try to pin her down with my eyes.

The fact that she’s fucking kneeling in front of me isn’t helping mattersat all.One glance in the mirror behind her gives me visions of her doing something else entirely there on herknees and my cock responds with a powerful throb and a rush of semen sticky against my boxers.

“Put itback Kat.”

She doesn’t. It’s like she can’t.

Because this is the fucking Rubicon. Now she knows. Now there’s no going back.

With a deep breath, she breaks the silence. “I don’t… I don’t understand.” Her eyes are strong enough now to look up and meet mine.

And in those pretty brown eyes I see her fucking fire.

“I told you to put it down. Why the fuck don’t you listen, Kat?”

She stands up slowly, lips trembling. “You… youthinkof me? Like…” Her lips shake even more, almost bursting with tears, with emotion. “Like…that?”

Goddamn it.If she takes one step closer, there’s no fucking telling what I’ll do.

But she’s holding me fucking hostage with those eyes. Those cheeks. That face.

We should both be embarrassed and I know it. But neither of us is, I know that too. So here we are, at the darkest place, the forbidden threshold.

One of us better fucking flinch. Because if we don’t…

She reaches out and touches my forearm. The lightest touch, but it’s a fucking knockout punch to my heart. It’s like I can feel her own heart pounding through mine. “Kat,” is all I manage, then grab her flip flops off the floor, turn herby the shoulders, and shove her out the door with her sandals behind her.

I shut it behind her, and then fall back on the bed, grabbing my head and squeezing.

It is my fucking duty to resist this. My fucking honor to keep her safe. From anything. From anyone.

From me.

Six

Kat

Ican’t feel my legs. I feel dreamy, woozy, off-balance. All I know is I need to be away from him and clearly, he wants me to be away from him.

The beat of my own heart tells me that the sight of his photos, the journal, the tattoo—it brought up all the feelings in me that I have shoved away.

For so long, I convinced myself my feelings wouldn’t be reciprocated.

No, that’s not enough. My feelings werewrong. Theyarewrong. More than wrong, dirty.Filthy. An abomination.

No matter what I saw in that journal, it doesn’t matter. It’s impossible.

I move through the unfamiliar house, like a visitor lost, and head downstairs. A stack of moving boxes catches my eye, piled up by the dining room. Moving boxes I recognize. I packed themafter Mom and Dad died, and Trent insisted on paying for movers and a storage unit until I got settled somewhere new.

When he’d asked about my new living situation, I lied again. Telling him there was a new, gated complex with lots of younger people moving into a up and coming old neighborhood, but my place was too small for all the family stuff, so he said he’d just keep it in storage until he got back, then we could deal with it together.