Page 33 of Dirty Little Secrets

I blink up at him. “Depends.”

I’m never busy unless it’s at work. He drops a black envelope in my lap. I open it slowly.

Two tickets to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. After-hours access.

“I didn’t think you liked to be around so many people,” I say, heart thudding.

It’s the first time I’ve been asked out on a real date.

“I do. That’s why it’s closed.”

It’s after sunset when we walk through the massive front doors, greeted by a single security guard who clearly knows Xaiden by name.

He doesn’t say much, just nods and lets us in like we own the place.

It’s just us. Marble halls, ancient gods, oil portraits watching as we walk hand-in-hand through centuries of creation.

His fingers skim mine, his voice low as he reads me titles and dates.

We stop at a painting of Psyche and Eros—her face turned away, his mouth pressed against her neck.

Xaiden steps behind me. His breath ghosts my ear. “You remind me of her.”

“Why?”

“Because she made a god fall to his knees.”

Did I? Or did I lie to the god so he could fall.

Later, my guilty thoughts are swept away when he kisses me under the echoing arch of a Roman atrium, the light dim and gold. He doesn’t touch me like he owns me.

He touches me like I’m art.

The following week, I should’ve canceled. The clouds were already threatening, the city skyline cut in half by sheets of gray.

But when Xaiden texted me,

Xaiden: Be ready. 7 PM. Dress warm.

I didn’t even ask where or why. I was falling in love. Deeply. Guilt and all. I’ve told myself multiple times, I would come clean but I couldn’t risk it all being a lie and I would be dead anyway. I saw the anger cross his face that night in the penthouse. He didn’t hesitate. He didn’t flinch.

I’m still standing in front of my closet for twenty minutes trying to figure out what warm meant to a man who wears suits tailored to murder.

When Bash pulls up in front of Kristina’s building, I don’t expect him to get out of the car. But he does. In a wool coat. Under it, a black turtleneck and dark slacks. His eyes find me instantly, and even in the downpour, they darken.

“I said warm,” he murmurs, holding an umbrella as I slide my hand into his.

“This is warm,” I say, stepping into his chest.

I’m wearing a simple red wool long-sleeved red dress.

He smirks. “You’re impossible.”

“And you like it.”

We don’t go far. Just across the bridge into Brooklyn to a building that looks abandoned from the street. But when the elevator doors open to the rooftop, I gasp.

It’s a garden in the clouds. Covered in canvas tents and twinkle lights. Two chairs sit facing the skyline, draped in furs. Between them, a fire pit crackling and warm. Soft music hums from speakers hidden in the makeshift vines.

“You did this?” I ask, breathless.

“For you.”

We sit, and as rain tap-taps the tent, we drink red wine, talk about everything and nothing.

I hold as much information I can from my past and listen to what he likes.

His fingers brush mine more than once. When I shiver, he pulls me into his lap, covers me with the blanket, and holds me like I belong there.

And for once, I let myself believe I do.