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I swallowed. “I’m working on it.”
“Was that guy you kissed him? The one you’re supposed to marry?”
“I… It’s complicated.”
He snorted derisively. “I’m sure it is.”
“Excuse me?” I tried to yank my hand back, but he held on. This felt awfully familiar. “You don’t know who I am or what my life has been like for the past eight years. Who are you to judge me for the choices I’ve made? You don’t even know what those choices are.”
His eyes dropped to my chest for a long moment before coming back to my eyes. “I know more than you think.”
“I sincerely doubt that.”
His lips lifted in a mockery of a smile. “I know that I’m bad for you in every possible way, and yet you have no problem being locked in a closet with me. I have to question if your taste in other men is just as bad.”
“And why would you care either way?”
“You’re Nacio’s little sister. It’s bad for business when you let your… partner’s siblings walk into bad life decisions.”
“So your solution is to pull me into an empty closet? I thought you said I should stay away from you?”
He leaned forward, bringing his face so close there were only scant inches between our lips. “You should. So stop looking at me like I’m your long-lost love.”
Anger burned in my cheeks. I wasn’t a blusher, but I could feel the flush spreading, making my skin itch. I wanted to pull away, but I already knew I couldn’t break his hold, and I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of trying.
“Don’t worry,” I said, giving him the overly sweet smile I’d used a hundred times before when dealing with jackasses and reporters and everyone else I’d rather flip off than make nice with. I didn’t have to worry about my family’s good name while alone in a closet with Samuel. Anything that happened here was his word against mine, and the very act of being in a closet alone with him would be the worst hit to my reputation. But I had a feeling flipping Samuel off would amuse him, and the smile seemed like a better weapon at the moment. “I have no interest in repeating the mistakes I made when I was fifteen. You don’t want me, and I don’t want you.”
He didn’t let go of my wrist. His eyes bored into mine, and for a second I could swear they seemed to glow with the force of their intensity. “You’re lying.”
I glared at him. I’d prefer to call it faking it till I made it rather than outright lying, but I wasn’t about to admit that to Samuel. He’d made it clear he wasn’t interested, and I knew better than to be interested in him either. “Believe what you want. I don’t have anything to prove to you.”
Samuel growled. Literally growled.
And then the space between our lips disappeared. He kissed exactly the way I remembered—rough and possessive and deliberate. His hand tightened around my wrist and tugged me closer while his other arm wound around my waist.
And then the kiss became very different from the first time. His fingers spread out on my bare back, holding me securely in place as his body pressed against mine.
I gasped into his mouth as he rolled his hips. Even with the thick velvet of my skirt in the way, I could feel the way we fit together, the way all the hard parts of him lined up with all the softest parts of me.
This was Samuel. He was my first kiss. The guy I’d dreamed about for longer than I’d admit to anyone. I probably had been looking at him like he was my long-lost love earlier. But I couldn’t do this. The last time Samuel walked in and out of my life, it had taken me years to stop fantasizing about him.
I’d had years to entertain the fantasy when I was fifteen. I wasn’t a child anymore, and I didn’t want to go there again. Samuel wasn’t my prince or knight in shining armor. He was the wolf who derailed me from my path.
He sucked my lip into his mouth, and every thought in my head sort of evaporated as he tugged gently. I felt that tug all through my body.
I ground my hips against his, chasing some kind of relief from the pressure building in my core, and I might have whimpered a little.
And then Samuel pulled back.
“What—?” I gasped.
He chuckled, but it sounded off and his eyes were dark and hooded, not alight with humor. “I knew you were lying.”
I don’t think I’d ever wanted to slap anyone more in my life, and that was really saying something given some of the dates I’d been on. But Samuel wasn’t worth it. At least that’s what I was telling myself.
So I pulled myself together, shoved away the anger, the lust, and the hurt. “Goodbye, Samuel.”
It didn’t feel as good as I’d expected to be the one walking away. It felt pretty shitty actually.
