Chapter 2
Sienna's POV
I didn't remember getting into the car. Didn't remember starting the engine or pulling out of the parking lot. One moment I was standing in the rain outside our apartment, watching Ethan's silhouette disappear behind the curtains. The next, I was three blocks away, hands white-knuckled on the steering wheel, vision blurred by tears I couldn't stop.
I pulled over in front of a darkened café, killed the engine, and sat there in the sudden silence. The check Eleanor had given me was still in my coat pocket, burning like a brand against my ribs.
"You are just a mistake to me."
The lie tasted like ash, but I'd said it. I'd looked him in the eyes and destroyed us with words I could never take back.
My phone buzzed. His name lit up the screen.
I turned it off.
And that's when the memory hit—sudden and vicious, dragging me under like a riptide.
Flashback - Eight months ago. San Francisco
It was our eighth month together.
The San Francisco summer night was suffocatingly hot. The apartment's air conditioning had broken, and the repairman wouldn't come until tomorrow. I sat on the living room floor, back against the sofa, holding a glass of ice water that was rapidly turning to lukewarm liquid.
Ethan emerged from the bathroom, hair still dripping, wearing only black athletic shorts. Water droplets traced down his neck, disappearing into the shadows of his collarbones.
I looked away, focusing on the glass in my hands.
"Still hot?" He sat down beside me, close enough that I could feel the heat radiating from his skin through the thin air between us.
"Yeah." My voice came out tight.
We kept about four inches of distance between us. Not far, but not close either. It was the safety margin we'd wordlessly agreed upon—enough to seem like "just friends hanging out," yet close enough for our body heat to tangle, almost imperceptibly.
But tonight, that distance suddenly felt dangerous.
"Sienna." He said my name, voice rough and low.
I knew what he was going to say. For the past month, we'd both been carefully avoiding certain topics, certain looks, those words that almost escaped: "I want you."
Because we both knew—once we crossed that line, there would be no going back.
"Don't," I cut him off, setting the glass down on the floor, fingers trembling slightly.
"Why?" He turned to face me, his gaze scorching. "What are you afraid of?"
What was I afraid of?
I was afraid of drowning. Afraid this forbidden relationship would destroy him. Afraid that one day Eleanor would tear me apart in front of everyone, and I wouldn't even have the right to defend myself.
But right now, in this suffocating night where I could barely breathe, what I feared most was—I didn't want to stop at all.
"Ethan, we can't—"
"Why not?" He interrupted, fingers gently catching my chin, forcing me to look at him. "Tell me. Why can't we?"
His eyes held a wildness I'd never seen before. The kind that comes from being suppressed too long, finally about to explode.
"Because..." My voice caught in my throat. "Because I'm..."
I couldn't say it.
The word stuck between us like a thorn.
Nominal niece.
Inappropriate.
Scandal.
"I don't care." His voice dropped to barely a whisper, thumb brushing across my lower lip. "I don't give a damn."
Then he kissed me.
Not the tentative, careful kind of kiss. But one filled with eight months of pent-up desire and madness, threatening to consume me whole.
My brain screamed stop, but my body responded honestly. My fingers tangled in his still-wet hair, nails digging into the back of his neck, as if trying to tear him apart, devour him, fuse him into my bones.
His hand slipped under the hem of my t-shirt, fingertips burning, trembling with restraint.
"Sienna..." He gasped against my ear, voice breaking. "Tell me to stop."
I said nothing.
Because I was crazy too.
He lifted me, crossed to the bedroom in a few strides, and pressed me down onto the bed. Moonlight filtered through the blinds, carving his face into planes of light and shadow.
"We're going to regret this," I heard myself say, voice shaking.
"I know." He leaned down, forehead against mine, breathing ragged and chaotic. "But right now, I only want you."
His fingers undid the first button of my t-shirt.
The second.
The third.
Each movement agonizingly slow, as if giving me time to change my mind.
But I didn't push him away.
Because I wanted him too. Wanted him so badly I was going insane.
His kisses fell on my collarbone, my shoulder, lower still. Every inch of skin felt ignited, burning until I trembled all over.
"Ethan..." I gripped his shoulders, nails digging into his muscles.
He looked up, eyes bright and fierce in the darkness.
"Are you sure?" His voice was hoarse. "Once we start, I won't stop."
I closed my eyes, took a deep breath.
Then nodded.
His kiss descended again, more frantic, more out of control. Clothes were torn, discarded, the sounds of breathing, heartbeats, broken whispers weaving into a forbidden symphony.
We both knew this was wrong.
But in that moment, right and wrong didn't matter anymore.
What mattered was—he was above me, I was in his arms, and we finally didn't have to pretend to be "just friends."
Afterward, we lay side by side in bed, neither of us speaking.
Outside the window, San Francisco still slept, only the occasional passing car breaking the silence with a faint engine hum.
I stared at the ceiling, mind blank.
"Do you regret it?" He turned on his side, fingers gently tracing the outline of my face.
I turned to look at him.
His eyes held worry, guilt, and a kind of desperate tenderness.
"No," I heard myself say, voice strangely calm. "But we're finished."
He was silent for a long time, then pulled me into his arms.
"Then let's be finished together," he murmured against my ear. "I was finished the moment I fell for you anyway."
I closed my eyes, burying my face against his chest.
His heartbeat echoed in my ears, steady and rhythmic, like a countdown.
I knew this relationship had no future.
I knew that someday, Eleanor would find out.
I knew that someday, I would be torn to shreds.
But in that moment, in his embrace, I chose to deceive myself—
Maybe, if we were careful enough, we could keep this going forever.
Maybe love really could bridge those impossible chasms.
Maybe...
Today, sitting in my car with Eleanor's check clutched in my hand, I finally understood—
Those "maybes" had been lies from the very beginning.
And that sweltering summer night wasn't our beginning.
It was the first chime of a countdown to the end.
