Page 84 of Playing the Field

No rumors.

No carefully constructed walls between us.

There is only this.

This heat. This pull. This impossible, maddening, gravity-defying force that keeps dragging us back to each other no matter how hard we try to resist.

His hands are everywhere—cupping my jaw, tilting my head, tracing fire down my spine as he presses me into the wall.

I gasp against his mouth, and he takes it as an invitation, deepening the kiss, making me feel like I’m plummeting, untethered, into something I should have never let myself crave.

I fist my hands in his shirt, pulling him closer, desperate to drown in him.

And he lets me.

He lets me take.

Lets me have.

Like this is something inevitable—something written in the stars long before either of us knew how dangerous it would be.

His grip tightens, fingers digging into my waist, and I arch into him, aching, desperate, lost.

Then, suddenly⁠—

“Ana.”

Graham’s voice is hoarse, barely a whisper against my lips.

But it’s enough to break the spell.

Enough to make me realize⁠—

I am lost.

And if we keep going—if we let this spiral without stopping, without thinking⁠—

I may never find my way back.

I press my hands to his chest, pushing slightly, and he stills immediately, his breathing ragged.

He pulls back just enough to look at me, and what I see in his face nearly undoes me all over again.

Heat.

Need.

And beneath it all, something deeper. Something raw and unguarded and dangerous because it makes me want to throw caution to the wind and forget—forget everything but him.

But I can’t.

Not this time.

“We should stop,” he says, his voice low, strained.

And for once, I don’t argue.

I agree.