“Answer it,” Ethan says.
“W—what?” I stutter, letting the door go in my surprise.
Ethan holds up his phone, showing me the black screen with white words.
Calling Firecracker.
“Answer,” he whispers.
With numb fingers, I slide the bar across until the phone connects. Once it does, I look at Ethan’s screen again, seeing that the call he was making connected too.
“No,” I say on an inhale. My phone slips out from between my shaky fingers, but Ethan nimbly catches it.
“It’s been me this whole time, little bee. Iknowyou. I know you better than anyone. The things you let other people see, and the things you don’t, your little quirks and habits. What turns you on.”
I step back automatically, like I could run from the truth, shaking my head all the while. Ethan is Seb? Seb is… Ethan Kane?
Suddenly, the disbelief gives way to rage.
“You bastard!” I shout. Springing forward, I raise my hand and deliver a slap he doesn’t bother to defend himself against. He knows he deserves it, he must know it, he can’t be that deluded. Then again, he was deluded enough to infiltrate my life under false pretensesfor weeks.
“You fucking asshole!” I shriek again, not caring if my neighbors call the police. “You lied to me! Made me think…” My fists hammer against his chest repeatedly, slamming into hishard pectoral muscles. He doesn’t flinch back from the impacts. “Do you have any idea how guilty I’ve been feeling?”
“Shh.” He grabs my wrists and leans closer so his green eyes are all I can see. “I know. I know, baby, I’m sorry.”
I don’t know who moves first, but suddenly his lips are on mine, and he’s kissing me. Not like he kissed me last night at the wedding. No, those were wooing kisses, especially in the ballroom. These are full of a desperate fire.
My anger melts into need, and that makes me angry all over again. I bite his lip. Hard. The metallic taste of his blood registers on my tongue.
Ethan groans like he deserves the punishment. Or enjoys it. I can’t tell anymore—he has me turned inside out.
Angry all over again, I push him until his back hits the door, then hit his chest again.
“Get it all out, firecracker,” he encourages. “I can take it.”
“I trusted you,” I say, my voice guttural. I shake my head, scoffing with disbelief. “I trustedSeb.”
He grabs my shoulders and flips us around until it’s my back against the wall next to the door. “I didn’t lie to hurt you,” he says. “I lied because I wanted you since Thanksgiving, and you didn’t give me a chance.”
I sneer at him. “So you made someone up?”
“Ethan Sebastian Kane, little bee. I can show you my driver’s license if you want.”
My shoulders slump as everything starts to sink in. Ethan just looks at me, letting me run the gamut of emotions with a patience I wouldn’t normally attribute to him. The Ethan Kane I knew was an annoying loudmouth who never let an opportunity to speak go by.
“Why me?” I ask as my vision blurs. If he says it’s because of my great rack, I’m going to knee him in the balls.
What he says is somehow more infuriating, but also makes my core clench. “Because you’re it for me, Barbara. You’re mine, my everything.”
“You don’t own me,” I whisper. How can I be flabbergasted and aroused at the same time?
His smile is awful with how gorgeous yet broken it is.
“I know,” he says. “And that’s why I’m terrified.”
Oh hell.
I surge forward, pressing my mouth against his. The kiss is violent. Desperate. He gasps into my mouth and I drink it down. How many times did I want to kissSeb? How many times did I think of kissing Ethan, but made myself stop?
