Page 14 of Sinful Desires (Sinful #4)

She ignored me and kept striding ahead. Her black dress fluttered around her thighs, way too thin for winter.

“Sane people spend nights like this indoors. Heat. Blankets. Maybe even a pulse.” My eyes trailed the goosebumps rising on her bare arms.

“Good thing I’m not sane, then.”

She reached the edge, fingers curling around the railing like she was steadying herself from the weight of whatever the hell was eating her alive. Moonlight turned her skin into porcelain.

The car ride back had been a fucking nightmare. The constant hum of the engine had buzzed in my ears, but it wasn’t the only noise. Victor had his head buried in some half-assed podcast about the dangers of smoking, the irony of it hanging thick in the air.

The man chain-smoked like he was trying to set a record. If anything, that podcast was just a pathetic distraction.

But it wasn’t the radio that had my attention. It was her.

She was curled into herself, arms tight around her knees like she was scared she’d come apart if she let go.

And then, I heard it. A sob. A small, shaky fucking sob.

Fucking Lucius Harper.

The next time I saw that bastard, I’d make sure he learned what it felt like to choke on your own teeth, to see your bones bend the wrong fucking way.

You don’t lay a hand on a woman, any woman, and walk away with your face still recognizable. Not on my watch. Not while I was still fucking breathing.

When we’d finally pulled up to her building, she’d bolted out of the car without a word, without a glance back. She hit the elevator button for the rooftop, and I had followed her up in silence.

“Don’t tell me you brought me up here to watch you swan dive off your penthouse view.”

She tilted her head, that red hair catching the wind. “Would you miss me if I did?”

“No. But scraping your body off the pavement might ruin my night.”

That got her.

Her chin tilted, lips curled just slightly. “Are you always this charming, or is this just how you flirt?”

“I don’t flirt.”

She finally turned, back flush to the railing, her silhouette carved by moonlight. “If I wanted to die slowly and painfully,” she murmured, “I’d marry someone like you.”

A slow burn sparked in my chest. It wasn’t anger. It wasn’t even lust. It was something worse. That voice of hers, soft and bitter, scraped across old wounds I had tried to bury too deeply to bleed.

She had no idea how many nights I had heard that voice in my head. How many times I had wondered what it would sound like if she whispered it again, not drunk, not drowning, but wide awake and reaching for me.

And here she was, handing it to me without even knowing what it did to me.

“I’m flattered,” I said, taking a step closer. “You dragged me all the way up here just to fantasize about our honeymoon?”

“No. I came up here to be alone. You just can’t take a hint.”

“Ah, my apologies, Miss Harper.”

Her eyes met mine. Sad. Empty. Dangerous .

“You apologize a lot, soldier. Starting to think your words don’t mean shit.”

I stepped closer. “Careful. Say it like that again, and I’ll show you just how disappointing I can be.”

She pushed off the railing, crossing toward the pool. “You leave tomorrow. Go pack your bags. Let me breathe for one goddamn night.”

I’d been given the week off for Christmas holidays. The Harper and Lazzio families were meeting for their annual week-long getaway in the Aspen mansions.

My flight to Nice left in the morning, yet every cell in my body wanted to stay put. The thought of stepping on that plane, crossing the Atlantic, and walking into the hell I’d created made my skin crawl. But I deserved it. Every second of it.

I had made a promise, and promises don’t care if you’re ready. They wait. They rot. And if you break them, they drag you down with them.

I was already halfway there.

But something inside me wouldn’t sit still. It ran hot. The thought of leaving her alone with him again gnawed through my ribs like acid.

“I will,” I said. “But if you keep pulling this rooftop shit, I swear to God, I’ll chain you to the radiator myself.”

That earned me a smirk over her bare shoulder. “Kinky.”

A sound caught in my throat. Not quite a groan, not quite a warning. She had no idea the images she was dragging out of me. Or maybe she did, and that was the whole damn point.

She kicked off her heels and crossed her arms, the wind biting at her bare skin.

“Say the word, Miss Harper. I’ll make sure he chokes on every bone I break.” I stepped closer as she watched me through half-lidded, hollow eyes.

The blue in them had lost its shine. No spark, no fight. Just the kind of quiet that came after too many nights crying alone.

“He won’t die fast. I’ll take my sweet fucking time. For you.”

She smiled, barely. Almost a reflex. “If you do that, I’ll hate you forever. He’s still my father, and I still love him?…?even when I shouldn’t.”

My eyes narrowed as disgust carved its way deeper through my chest. “Was it the first time?”

I didn’t need to explain. She knew.

“That’s how he shows love. Twisted as it is.”

“With his fucking fists?” My voice came out rougher than I intended.

“He’s not a big talker,” she whispered. “His hands do the talking.”

“Love’s not supposed to bruise, Miss Harper.”

She let out a low laugh, bitter and dry. “What would you know about love? I doubt the military was filled with hugs and kisses. Or maybe I’m behind on the times. Navy boys out at sea for months?…?I guess things get confusing . Men. Women. Whoever’s there.”

Only a woman like Scarlett Harper could look me dead in the eye and joke about me being gay. While every inch of me, every goddamn cell in my body, screamed that I fucking wanted her.

I’d trained myself for years to shut that shit down.

It hadn’t been a problem for the last thirteen years, but here I was, fighting it all over again.

“You know what the military taught me?” I said, moving closer. “Control. You learn to cage everything. Thoughts. Desires. The way your body betrays you, reacting to things it shouldn’t.”

Her eyes lifted to meet mine.

“It teaches you to look at something you want, and act like you don’t.”

She tilted her head, her gaze dropping to my lips. “What’s your biggest desire, soldier?”

After all the blood, the guilt, the weight of every sin I had to carry, the one thing I wanted—no, needed —was a chance to live. To breathe without the screams haunting my every step.

A breath caught in my throat. “To live, Scarlett.”

Her gaze dropped. A tear slipped down her cheek, fragile as glass.

I wanted to reach out, to touch it, but my hands balled into fists, fighting the urge to wipe it away.

She looked down at the water like it was calling her name.

“What if mine is to die, Théo?”

Fuck.

Her voice hit me hard, low and broken, and it knocked the air right out of me.

She meant it. I could fucking hear it. She wanted to die. And she sounded like she’d already made peace with it.

It twisted something deep in my gut, something ugly and familiar that I didn’t want to feel. But then it hit me?…?she’d said my name. Everything else burned away, fast and filthy. Heat slammed through me like a loaded gun.

Théo.

She’d never said it before. Not once. And hearing it now, from her , felt like getting dragged under by a riptide I didn’t want to fight. Like my body had recognized the sound before my brain had time to react.

It didn’t sound soft. It didn’t sound sweet. It sounded like something meant to break me.

And it fucking did.

It made me want to snap a chain around her throat, pin her down, and force it out of her lips again and again until it was the only fucking word she remembered. Until she forgot every other name but mine.

Please, Théo.

Ragged. Pleading. Mine.

Then she turned and dove into the pool, leaving me in the cold, soaked in silence, while every sinful desire I’d buried dragged their teeth across her name like it belonged to them.

The stillness turned cruel when I realized she wasn’t coming back up.