One Night Of Consequences Collection. Annie West

isn’t enough for you? You’ve been there from the beginning, more or less. You’ve helped me make it what it is.”

      “No. I just bake cupcakes. And there are a lot of people who can do my job.”

      “But they aren’t you.”

      She closed her eyes and let the compliment wash over her. She’d say this for Zack; he gave her more than most anyone else in her life ever had, including her family. But it was still just a crumb of what she wanted.

      “No,” she said, “some of them are even better.”

      She wove through the crowd to the edge of the waterfront. People were kneeling down and putting the flower arrangements with their lit candles into the stream. The crowd standing on the other side of the waterfront was lighting candles inside tall, rice paper lanterns, the orange spreading to the inky night, casting color and light all around.

      Zack was behind her, she could sense it without even turning around. “I’m glad we came tonight,” she said.

      Zack swept his fingers through Clara’s hair, moving it over her shoulder, exposing her neck. He didn’t normally touch her like that, but tonight, he found he couldn’t help himself. Things were tense between them. The kiss at the temple certainly hadn’t helped diffuse it.

      He wondered if most of the tension had started in the bedroom back in the villa. That moment when they’d both looked at the bed and had that same, illicit thought.

      If it had started there, they might be able to finish it there.

      Temptation, pure and strong, lit him on fire from the inside out. She turned, and his heart slammed hard against his rib cage, blood rushing south of his belt, every muscle tensing. He could feel the energy change between them, like a wire that had been connecting them, unseen and unfelt for years had suddenly come alive with high-voltage electricity. He knew she felt it, too.

      “We broke things, didn’t we?” she whispered.

      It was like she read his thoughts, which, truly, was nothing new. But inconvenient now, since his thoughts had a lot to do with what it might be like to see her naked.

      “Because of the kisses?”

      She nodded once. “I can’t forget them.”

      “I can’t, either. I’m not sure if I want to.”

      She took a deep breath. “That’s just what I was thinking earlier.”

      “Was it?”

      “Yes. I should want to forget it, we both should. So we can get things back to where they’re supposed to be but …”

      He leaned down and pressed his lips to hers, soft again. “Do you think we could break it worse than we already have? Or is the damage done?”

      “I have no idea.”

      Everything in him screamed to step back. Because this was an unknown. A move that would affect his life, his daily life, and he couldn’t see the way it would end. And that just wasn’t how he did things. Not since that night when he’d been sixteen and he’d acted unthinkingly, impulsively, and ruined everything.

      He wasn’t that person anymore. He’d made sure of it. If he didn’t walk away from Clara now, from the temptation she presented, if he didn’t plan it out and look at all the angles, he was opening them both up to potential fallout.

      He stepped forward and kissed her again. Deepening the kiss this time, letting the blood that was roaring in his ears drown out conscious thought.

      Clara knew she should stop this. Stop the madness before it went too far. It already had gone too far. It had gone too far the moment she agreed to come. Because the desire for this, for the week to turn into this, had been there. Of course, she’d never imagined that Zack would—could—want her.

      The breaking of things wasn’t just down to the kiss. It was the day at the river, the intense moment on the balcony. The fact that she’d realized she was deeply, madly, irrevocably in love with a man who was just supposed to be her friend.

      He kissed the tip of her nose, then her cheeks. “Zack,” she whispered.

      “Clara.”

      “Are we trying to see if we can break things worse?”

      “Actually, I’m not thinking at all. Not about anything beyond what I feel right now.”

      “What is it you feel?” she asked, echoing what she’d said after they’d kissed.

      “I want you.”

      She hesitated, her heart squeezing tight. “Do you want me? Or do you want to have sex?”

      He looked at her for a long time, the glow of flames across the river reflected in his eyes. “I want you, Clara Davis. I have never slept with one woman when I wanted another one, and I would never start the practice with you. When I have you, I won’t be thinking of anyone else. I’ll only have room for you.”

      His words trickled through her, balm on her soul. Exactly the right words.

      The real question was, did she want to accept a physical relationship when it was only part of what she wanted?

       You only have part of what you want now. A very small part.

      “Just for tonight,” she said, hating that she had to say it, but knowing she did. Because she knew for certain that there could be no romantic future for them. She loved him, she was certain of it now. She had for a long time, possibly for most of the seven years she’d known him. It had been a slow thing, working its way into her system bit by bit. With every smile, every touch.

      And he didn’t love her. Looking at him now, the light in his eyes, that wasn’t anything deeper than lust. But if that was all she could have, she would take that. Right now, she would take it, and she wouldn’t think about the wisdom of it, or the consequences.

      Because she was staring hard into a Zack-free future, and she would rather have all of him tonight, and carry the memory with her, than be nothing more than his trusty sidekick forever, standing by watching while he married another woman. Watching him make a life with someone else, someone he didn’t even love, while her heart splintered into tiny pieces with every beat.

      “One night,” she repeated. “Here. Away from reality. Away from work and home. Because. We can’t keep going on like this. It can’t be healthy.”

      The people around them started cheering and she looked around them, saw the paper lanterns start to rise up above them, filling the air with thousands of floating, ethereal lights.

      “Just one night,” he said, his voice rough. “One night to explore this.” He touched her cheek. “To satisfy us both. Is that really what you want?”

      “I want you. So much.”

      He kissed her without preliminaries this time, her body pressed against hers, his erection thick and hard against her stomach as his mouth teased and tormented her in the most delicious way. She wrapped her arms around his neck and gave herself up to the heat coursing between them. When they parted she felt like she was floating up with the lanterns.

      One night. The proposition made her heart ache, and pound faster. It excited her and terrified her. She didn’t know what she was thinking. But one thing she did know: he wanted her. He wasn’t faking the physical reaction she’d felt pressed against her.

      The very thought of Zack, perfect, sexy Zack wanting her, was intoxicating. Empowering. She wanted to revel in the feeling. One night. To find out if her fantasies were all she’d built them up to be. One night to have the man of her dreams.

      One night to make a memory that she would carry with her for the rest of her life.

       CHAPTER