Page 112 of A Lethal Game of Trust

“Right,” he said again, lowering his gaze. I had gone all out, wearing a black lacey bra that showed my nipples. “Get in the water with your underwear on. I have towels in the car. Or… go on then. Let’s go bloody skinny dipping.”

I beamed. His rejection still stung, I had been put in my place and, naked, I wouldn’t be able to cling to him like I normally would… like I hoped I could.

The water was cold for late May, but it quickly warmed up. Dom waited for me to be in the water before stripping to his swimming trunks and joining me.

“That’s not skinny dipping,” I pouted.

But he ignored me, coming so close to my body that, despite the cold water, he had my skin heating.

“Have you ever been kissed before, Leo?” he asked, looking down at me, only inches away. The small waves cut into his pecs as they hit my shoulders.

I shook my head, too taken aback by his question to verbally answer.

“Are you scared of it? I was really nervous.”

“I… just want it over with.”

“So you are scared,” he laughed, looking out at the ships past the cove.

With you, I wouldn’t be.

“A little.”

“You got kidnapped and held for over a day, killed one of the men and you’re scared of a kiss?”

“I’m scared of doing it wrong,” I said with an awkward laugh, pushing my back against his chest to watch the ships with him. He wrapped his arms around my shoulders. “I’m scared of doing it with the wrong person.”

“It’s just a kiss,” he said and I could feel him shrug behind me.

I turned to look at him over my shoulder, our faces so close. His mouth was slightly parted as he looked down at me in wonder. I wanted those lips on mine. “Yeah,” I said, not caring for how breathless I sounded. “It’s just a kiss.”

He was going to do it. Press his lips to mine and show me how. He would be the first and last person I ever kissed and I knew it in that moment.

But the seconds passed, and I knew he was losing his nerve.

When he looked up, it was over.

“Smoke with me.”

So we got out — he turned away from me and, covering his eyes, passed me a towel from his car — and I lay next to him and did just that. He hardly smoked any of it and kept passing it back to me without taking a drag.

We just stared at the stars until I questioned him about what he needed to know for his first exam. A high revision session and we were back to normal.

Until we went into my garden, still not quite done with our conversation and sitting on the sun loungers, whisperingloudly.

A throat cleared behind us.

I quickly shoved my half-undone shirt over myself as we turned to face my father, who stood there with a cocky grin. My dad was the largest man I knew. Six foot five, built like a brick wall and as wide as an AK-47 is long, he intimidated every man he met.

In the last few years, his hair had started to grey, but if anything, it just made him look more dangerous.

“Leonie and Dominic out in my garden, high at four am?” he asked, false surprise in his voice. “Well, I never.”

Dom was standing and saying, “Sir, I—”

“Don’t ‘sir’ me now,” my dad sighed.

Dom had only ever called my dad Uncle Luís as I called his dad Uncle Ivan, but since that night when they had killed those responsible for hurting me…