Page 39 of The Heartbreak Hotel

“Which part?”

“All of it.”

Ella looked down at her lap. “I mean, yeah, it’s true my life fell to shit, and that’s why I’m here. But I think I’d been living like that for a long while before.”

Riley recalled what she’d said about her ex-girlfriend/ex-boss. Was that who she’d wanted to phone the other day?

“I guess I never realised how much I was doing just to please other people,” Ella continued. “What I thought I should do. Taking a step back, I can see that a lot of those things weren’t making me happy. Not really.”

Riley knew the feeling.

After what happened with Elodie, she’d chase anything to take her mind off the pain. But running only takes you so far; she had to stop and walk through it to finally see she was just feeding and extending the process.

Some habits she still fell into from time to time.

Her gut soured at the sight of the glass of whisky in her hand. She didn’t want to be like her dad. She downed the liquid so she didn’t have to look at it anymore, then set her glass on the table.

Ella followed suit, spluttering a little as it slid down her throat—an action Riley found far too endearing—and they fell back onto the sofa together, limbs entwined. Ella’s hair had curled from the rain and fallen over her face. Riley’s hands itched to reach out and move it, to trace her jaw with her fingertips, but she wasn’t brave enough.

“Did you mean what you did at the ruins?” Ella asked, and Riley realised she’d been staring at the woman’s mouth again.

Heat flushed her cheeks, nerves multiplying in her belly. Though she was fairly certain of where Ella stood on the kiss, she could never be one hundred percent sure. This was not exactly an everyday situation they found themselves in.

“The kiss, I mean,” Ella confirmed, then adding in a whisper, “Do you regret it?”

Riley’s hand folded over Ella’s instinctively. “I don’t regret it. I kissed you because I wanted to.”

“Okay. Good. Because I don’t want to be something you regret, Riley.”

Riley’s heart fluttered. Ella’s vulnerability called to her in a way that made her want to be brave as well. She looked down at their entwined hands, Ella’s small and warm underneath hers. “I won’t lie to you and say this doesn’t scare me—because it does. I feel completely and utterly out of my depth and…” She chuckled, remembering Ella’s words at the ruins. “Out of my comfort zone.”

The curl of Ella’s lips told her it was the right answer. Her brown eyes flickered to Riley’s. “What about now?”

There were many things Riley could say to that, complicated and tangled in a mess of other things, so she answered simply. By capturing Ella’s lips with hers.

When she switched off her mind and followed her body’s instincts, it was a no-brainer.

Ella sighed into the kiss, her fingers threading into Riley’s hair and pulling her closer. Her soft lips explored Riley’s, parting her mouth to brush their hot tongues together.

Oh my god.

Everything inside Riley turned to jelly. Soft, pliable putty that Ella could shape in her hands. She played her like her favourite instrument, lighting up music all over her skin, with a loud thumping drum pounding between her legs.

The kiss started softly, quickly intensifying, lighting a fuse that burned all the way up Riley’s spine. Her pulse quickened, the heat blooming outwards, leaving them breathless when they parted.

Those deep brown eyes, flecked with caramel under the warm light, stared back into Riley’s. Her body hummed with Ella’s energy, craving more, needing more.

Those kisses were dangerous. Riley would sign over her soul to Ella as long as she kept kissing her like that.

She hadn’t felt this way in a long time. Not since—

Her brain jolted awake, feeding her with warnings and flashing lights, and she looked away. The boy’s screaming. The headlines. Picking a bloody and drunken Elodie up from the pavement. How a split-second accident upturned their whole lives.

Ella cupped her cheek gently, and the touch grounded Riley, quietening the voices.

“So, how are we going to do this?” Ella asked. “I know we’re not in normal dating circumstances, but…” Riley’s eyes flickered to hers, and a warm, gooey honey spread around her heart. “I don’t want this connection to go to waste.”

“I don’t either.” She sighed, feeling shaky from the adrenaline and endorphins pounding through her system. “And I don’t want to distract from your experience here. The course and everything.”