Page 6 of Wrap Around (Forbidden Goals #7)

I remember the first time I saw Silas cry.

We were thirteen, maybe. His dad had taken a literal rod to him, old school biblical style, after Silas had questioned something we'd heard in church that day.

I never did know exactly what it was about, but I keep thinking it might have been a sermon about how men are supposed to behave, think, and live their lives as God intended, but I might just be projecting.

Those sermons always stood out to me, frightened me, made me feel physically ill.

It makes the memory of Silas' pain even sharper.

Silas' father was a cruel man who blamed him for everything, but most especially the death of his mother.

She got an infection after giving birth to Silas.

Elder Abraham Caldwell had tried to pray it away instead of taking her to the hospital.

She didn't make it. That kind of pain and guilt gets sewn into a kid.

I saw it even then. And Silas took every lecture, every beating, every punishment for his supposed crimes without flinching. Except that one day.

It was shortly after that incident that Silas and Lily announced that they were officially boyfriend and girlfriend.

No matter how hard I try to pick apart every memory, I can't remember even one time that they acted differently or made me feel like I was a third wheel.

I never thought, never could have guessed they were actually… doing anything.

No matter how hard I try not to think about it, my mind keeps dragging me back to that day.

Every time I close my eyes, I'm reliving the memory like I'm back there again, where the lake glitters under the early spring sun.

It's been an especially warm spring, but the water is still freezing.

Our skin is red and prickled with goosebumps from the chill.

Still, we've been out here every day of spring break, soaking in the first warm days after a long winter.

It's just me and Silas. Laughing. Splashing. Wrestling. Walking out of the water to drip dry and warm up under the sun.

I'm hard.

It's embarrassing and I can't hide it. Swim trunks don't leave much to the imagination, and I've been looking at him wrong all day. Thinking about wrong things when we were playing around in the water. It's so wrong. Wrong in a way that feels right. So right it scares me .

Silas looks down, his eyes widening when he sees it.

I step back, trying to stammer out an excuse, face flaming. But then I see it, his own reaction.

We stand in mirrored shock, breathing heavily. Neither of us can decide where to look, eyes or the obvious erections tenting both of our shorts. Then his gaze, eyes golden in the light of the sun, locks on mine.

I don't give my legs permission to move, but suddenly we're moving closer. Slowly. Tentatively. Until there's no space between us. Until our chests and our mutual hardness presses together, and I think I'm going to explode from the shock of it.

I swallow. Stare at his mouth. I want to…

But I won't. I know I won't do it. I'll chicken out and then agonize over it for the rest of my life.

But Silas isn't afraid. He closes the distance and presses our lips together.

Neither of us move at first. Just press together, breathing through our noses. Then his mouth shifts, brushing mine back and forth in a caress that tingles in the base of my neck and travels down my spine.

I've kissed a girl before. Sort of. Once, during a church lock in. It was clumsy. Awkward. Nothing like this.

This is… I don't know what this is.

This feels like those first moments when you jump off the highest cliff, when the fear of falling meets the euphoria of all the wind rushing around you.

Like the last breath you take before you plunge into the depths of cold, dark water.

Like that brief moment when you worry you won't have enough breath to make it to the surface, the pressure of your lungs expanding in your chest as you frantically kick and reach towards the reflection of the sun through the ripples you made when you splashed down .

It's invigorating, even though I know it's wrong.

The way his hand fists the waistband of my swim trunks to hold me against him is so far past sinful.

The way my skin burns everywhere his touches mine is hellfire, and the way his lips open, tongue gently pressing against the seam of my lips is an abomination that chokes on the air I let in on a gasp.

When his tongue touches mine, my knees give out.

We collapse onto the grassy bank together.

His body over mine. A thigh between mine.

Hands grip my waist, grounding me while my whole world spins.

My hands have a mind of their own, fingers biting into his skin as they curl into his shoulder blades, desperately clawing at him to keep him close, to anchor us both so we don't fling off the surface of the planet.

The heat of his skin. The weight of him. The intoxicating mix of lake water and sun and sweat. It all brands itself into me.

We feed off each other like we're starving, like we might never get the chance again.

Maybe we both know we won't. Maybe that's why neither of us stop, even after a wave of pure intoxication pulls me under.

I cry out, and he swallows my cries before he shivers against me and makes a sound that I know will follow me into hell and keep me company when I'm finally called to atone for my sins.

Even now, years later, with the distance and the bitterness and everything broken between us, I still feel that kiss like a brand on my soul.

I still hear his choked moan of pleasure.

And every time I relive it, I end up with the same sticky mess inside my shorts and the same pain inside my heart.

Because I knew, even then, that I wouldn't be able to outrun my love or my shame .

I've tried to forget it.

But I don't think I ever will.

I think I'm cursed with this love and arousal and shame spiral I've been in for three long years.