The rain starts coming down. Heavy drops that hiss as they hit the hot ground, sending up the smell of wet ash and earth, coating the back of my throat.
I think distantly that the sky has terrible timing. Or maybe it’s perfect timing. But I don’t know whether being trapped in this shallow cave until the rain stops is terrible or not, because Kilian’s mouth is sealed to mine. He’s breathing right through the kiss, pulling air directly from my lungs. I can’t think when I can’t breathe, and I can’t breathe when he’s this close.
He grips my jaw, fingers pressing into the hinge, tilting my face up. His tongue pushes past my lips, and I let him.
And I know… I know exactly why I’m letting him. The lie I’ve been feeding myself crumbles right there, and I can’t pretend anymore.
His tongue curls against the roof of my mouth, strokes slow, then tangles with mine until he draws it forward between his lips and sucks. Hard.
He does it again. Draws my tongue out and sucks, and each pull drags another noise from me that he swallows before it fully forms, stealing it, swallowing it down like we’re not alone, like there are walls too thin and ears just beyond them.
This must be what drowning feels like. Being pulled by the current, no solid ground for your feet to touch. Everything the water touches gets swept away.
Not the guilt, though.
The guilt doesn’t go. A rock sits at the bottom of my chest, and I feel its weight every time I inhale.
He lost his best friend. Took in a child not his own. Uprooted his entire existence to this mountain for her. And I threw the vilest accusation, crowned myself the savior. I called him a sexual predator. To his face.
The memory stabs through mid-kiss, and I flinch. Kilian catches it. His grip tightens for a second, but he doesn’t stop to ask. He goes harder instead, his mouth more demanding, hungrier, and I let him do that too because he’s swallowing my guilt along with the rest of me.
Thunder cracks, a deep growl that shakes the rock walls.
His chest slams against mine with every breath he drags in. Every exhale scorches my face because he won’t pull back far enough to breathe anywhere else.
My chest is concrete. Even here, even with his mouth on mine, I can barely breathe. So I kiss him harder because what else am I supposed to do when my conscience weighs this heavy? I shove it into the one thing that makes it quiet. That’s what.
Kilian’s mouth tastes of smoke and salt and the storm’s clean bite. My hands are on his shirt. I don’t remember putting them there, but they are, fists full of damp fabric. They won’t stop shaking either.
I became my parents.
I did the very thing I resented most: looked at someone and decided I already knew the whole story.
How could I have been so wrong? How could I see a monster when the person in front of me is a man who fights to protect?
His hands are trembling. Against my jaw. At my waist where his palm presses flat. The quaking seeps from his skin into mine. He told me about Simon. That’s what this is, probably. He doesn’t know how to land after that confession, so he’s pouring every unspent edge into this. Into me.
I take it all. His mouth, his hands everywhere, the rough drag of his body against mine. I take him all because every second scrapes the guilt thinner. This kiss is a forgiveness I haven’t earned. A mercy I’m stealing.
The alcove isn’t much shelter. The overhang barely holds back the downpour, but Kilian positions himself with his back to the opening. He takes the full brunt of the rain without saying anything. Just the instinct of a soldier who blocks a blow. A man who defaults to a shield. That fact sits in my chest beside the guilt.
Water cascades down the rock, over his shoulders, splashing cold onto my arms where they’ve circled his back. But I can barely feel the chill. Only the heat where we’re pressed together matters.
He moves, and I’m going down. My backside hits the leather spread over the packed earth. The rough stone wall bites into my upper back through my blouse. But only for a moment before he slides me lower, easing me flat on the ground.
Thunder roars again. Lightning splits the sky right after, and for a second I see his face clearly. Hovering. Staring down. Rain glues his shirt to those wide shoulders, rivulets tracing paths down his face before dripping onto my blouse. The fabric goes transparent, clinging to my skin, and I watch his eyes track every curve now visible through the drenched cotton.
I’m soaked. Not just from the rain. I’ve been wet and pulsing since he first kissed me, maybe before that, maybe since he dropped to his knees and fought a fire with his bare hands.
You’re Sara’s teacher.The thought lands cold in the middle of everything warm, grounding me.
Kilian senses the shift.
His hand stills on my thigh, and he pulls back just enough for rain to drizzle between our bodies. His eyes find mine in the dark. But then his head dips. His mouth latches onto my nipple through the drenched blouse, teeth scraping the tight peak, and whatever thought I have about Sara… about propriety… disintegrates before it finishes forming.
He’s not holding back now.
He tears my blouse. Buttons pop, sharp little sounds the rain almost drowns. My breasts spill free, and he shoves the lace bra up and out of his way. Rain pelts my bare skin, cold needles tightening my nipples to painful points. He latches on again, this time on bare flesh. His tongue flattens, then swirls, then sucks hard enough to pull my gasp.
