Page 46 of Desperate Games

“I’ve got you,” he whispers against my ear. “Let go.”

And I do.

I fall apart around him, all thought burned away in heat and friction and need.

My name tumbles from his lips as he follows, one final grind of his hips sealing the moment between us in sweat and something dangerously close to devotion.

Afterward, I’m trembling—spent and sore and utterly undone.

He doesn’t move for a long time.

He just holds me, arms wrapped around my middle, lips pressed to my shoulder like he can’t let me go.

And I can’t help it, I close my eyes and pretend.

Pretend this is more than it is.

Pretend he won’t walk away when this is over.

Pretend I’m not already in deeper than I ever meant to be.

Then, I do what I always do when shit gets hard.

I close myself off, flip that switch from girl who feels everything to girl who feels nothing, and I shove him right out the door.

Because the truth is terrifying.

The truth is, I’m a fucking liar.

And even if I get what I want out of this?

It still might break my heart.

Chapter Eleven-Remy

A Few Months Later

If I’d been in the country another twelve hours, maybe things would’ve gone differently.

Maybe I would’ve talked some sense into her.

Maybe I would’ve stayed in that too-small apartment, peeled her out of those bamboo sheets again, and made her admit what we both knew—that what happened between us wasn’t just some goddamn fling.

But the call came, and I had to go.

No time for long talks or long goodbyes.

Josef Aziz himself had pulled me in, tasking me with heading a detail for one of Sigma International’s highest-priority VIPs.

High-level, high-stakes, and halfway around the world.

The exact kind of test I’d been waiting for—one that would prove I had the chops to lead elite units the way I’d trained them.

And maybe, just maybe, it gave me the perfect excuse not to deal with the ache Andrea Ramirez left behind.

Still, even three months later, I haven’t stopped seeing her face.

Not once.