I want to be strong, but I’m beyond it.

’Cause you taste like the Fourth of July—sweet cherry liquor and gunpowder kisses, my lipstick smeared against your cigarette mouth. Every touch is a spark, every kiss a firework burning too close to the skin, dangerous and dazzling all at once.

The party sways around us, music thick in the air, the bass rattling through my ribs. Someone’s laughing too loud, someone’s spilling their drink, but all I can feel is him. Rafe Cameron is dangerous in all the wrong ways—but that never stopped me. He stands too close, one hand curling around my wrist, the other resting at the dip of my spine, anchoring me to him. There’s something about the way he looks at me, like I’m the last good thing in his world, the only thing tethering him to something soft. But love like his isn’t tender. It’s raw, reckless, laced with desperation. He doesn’t just hold me—he clings. Doesn’t just want me—he needs. And when Rafe needs, it’s ruinous.

He doesn’t trust easily, and when he does, it turns to possession. His hands are velvet one second, steel the next. He’s careless with his own life but terrifyingly careful with mine, like I’m something to be locked away, hidden, kept. When I pull away, he pulls harder. When I run, he chases.

“Where you goin’, angel?” He asks when you try to pull away. His voice is honeyed sin, low enough that I feel it more than hear it.

“Rafe—” I start, but his grip tightens, just enough to keep me still.

“You think I don’t see it? That look in your eyes?” He tilts his head, smiling like he already knows how this ends. Like he always does. “Go ahead. Tell me you don’t want me.”

I swallow hard. He waits.

And the worst part? I can’t say it. Because I do. God help me, I do.

Rafe Cameron doesn’t let go. And maybe—just maybe—I don’t want him to.