Chapter Eight: Wide Awake

Amelia

I couldn’t sleep.

I’d been lying in this damn bed for hours, staring at the ceiling, the digital clock on the nightstand mocking me with every minute that crawled by.

2:17 AM.

2:38 AM.

3:01 AM.

I tossed the covers off for what felt like the hundredth time, my skin too hot, my body aching in places I didn’t want to think about.

This wasn’t supposed to happen.

I wasn’t supposed to feel like this. Not over him.

But the problem was — it wasn’t new.

Not really.

It wasn’t just tonight.

It wasn’t just the car ride.

It was years of it.

Years of stolen looks and sharp words meant to hurt because kindness was too dangerous.

Years of pretending I hated him because wanting him felt like betrayal.

To my brother.

To myself.

I sat up, running a hand through my hair, frustration simmering beneath my skin.

His voice wouldn’t stop playing in my head.

You shouldn’t have worn that.

You knew what you were doing.

I’m not a good man, Carter.

God. That voice. Low and rough, like gravel, like whiskey in a dark room, like something that belonged against my ear with his hand in my hair and my back against the wall.

I pressed my thighs together, hating how easily my body responded to the thought.

I should’ve been disgusted. Angry.

I should’ve called Chloe, vented about what an arrogant, insufferable, infuriating bastard Dominic Blackwood was.

But I hadn’t.

Because some small, traitorous part of me didn’t want to be talked out of this.

I slid out of bed, padding barefoot to the window, tugging the curtain aside to stare down at the city below. Lights glittered against the inky sky, the streets mostly empty at this hour.

Somewhere out there, he was awake.

I knew it.

He wasn’t the kind of man who slept.

He was the kind who worked, who drank in empty rooms, who collected ghosts and mistakes like trophies.

And I wanted to be one of them.

I bit my lip, hating myself for it.

This wasn’t a harmless crush anymore.

It wasn’t teenage infatuation or some misplaced rebellion against my brother’s overprotectiveness.

This was dark.

Complicated.

Dangerous.

I didn’t want sweet. I didn’t want safe.

I wanted him.

And not the polished, distant Dominic the world saw.

I wanted the man who’d looked at me in that car like he was starving.

The one who flexed his hand like it hurt not to touch me.

The one who told me he wasn’t good — like it was a warning, like he was already imagining what he’d do if he let himself have me.

I closed my eyes, my pulse pounding in my throat.

I could still feel the heat of his thigh against mine. The brush of his fingers at my neck.

My skin tingled with it.

I pressed a hand to my stomach, trying to steady my breathing.

This was a bad idea.

I was playing with fire, and we both knew it.

But God help me… I didn’t want to stop.

Not anymore.