Page 417 of Summer Heat
But then she came back into my life.
Stumbling toward me and looking up at me as if I was the one she’d been looking for all this time.
As if I could be her savior and take her pain away.
If only she knew.
She brings out what I hate most about myself.
Selfish, ruthless, possessive.
I tried to be a good man. To be cold and distant and warn her away.
She should have taken the hint and run.
She didn’t …
And now she’s mine.
Preface
Addison
It’s easy to smile around Tyler.
It’s how he got me. We were in calculus, and he made some stupid joke about angles. I don’t even remember what it was. Something about never discussing infinity with a mathematician because you’ll never hear the end of it. He’s a cute dork with his jokes. He knows some dirty ones too.
A year later and he still makes me laugh. Even when we’re fighting. He says he just wants to see me smile. How can I leave when he says things like that? I believe him with everything in me.
My friend’s grandmother told me once to fall in love with someone who loves you back just a little more.
Even as my shoulders shake with a small laugh and he leans forward to nip my neck, I know that I’ll never really love Tyler the way he loves me.
And it makes me ashamed. Truly.
I’m still laughing when his bedroom door creaks open. Tyler plants a small kiss on my shoulder. It’s not an open-mouth kiss, but still it leaves a trace on my skin and sends a warmth through my body. It’s fleeting though.
The cool air passes between the two of us as Tyler leans back and smiles broadly at his brother.
I may be seated on my boyfriend’s lap, but the way Daniel looks at me makes me feel like I’m alone. His eyes pierce through me with a sharpness that makes me afraid to move. Afraid to even breathe.
I don’t know why he does this to me.
He makes me hot and cold at the same time. It’s like I’ve disappointed him simply by being here. As if he doesn’t like me. Yet there’s something else.
Something that’s forbidden.
It creeps up on me whenever I hear Daniel’s rough voice; whenever I catch him watching Tyler and me. It’s like I’ve been caught cheating, which makes no sense at all. I don’t belong to Daniel, no matter how much that idea haunts my dreams.
He’s twenty-one now and I’m only seventeen. But more importantly, he’s Tyler’s brother.
It’s all in my head. I tell myself over and over again that the electricity between us is something I’ve made up. That my body doesn’t burn for Daniel. That my soul doesn’t ache for him to rip me away and punish me for daring to let his brother touch me.
It’s only
when Tyler speaks to him that Daniel looks away from me, tossing something down beside us.
Tyler’s oblivious to everything happening. And suddenly I can breathe again.
