Chapter 4 The Fire We Couldn't Contain

The morning after should have been awkward.

It should have been quiet glances and hurried excuses, the weight of regret pressing into the spaces where our bodies had been tangled only hours before. But when I opened my eyes and saw Ethan watching me, his head propped on one arm, his lips curved into that half-smile I had always secretly adored, none of it felt like a mistake.

"Good morning," he whispered, his voice husky with sleep, with something heavier.

I pulled the sheet higher over my chest, though the heat in my cheeks betrayed me. "Morning."

His hand slipped beneath the sheet, his fingertips grazing my shoulder, feather-light and reverent. "You're even more beautiful like this."

"Like what?" My voice came out softer than I meant.

"Like you're mine," he murmured.

My heart stuttered. Dangerous words. Words that should have scared me. But instead, they made me ache.

The silence stretched, thick and humming, before I leaned in and kissed him again. It started soft careful, hesitant but the way he groaned against my mouth, the way his hand tangled in my hair and pulled me closer, turned the kiss into something hotter, something unstoppable.

Before I knew it, the sheet was forgotten, and Ethan's body was pressed to mine, solid and burning. The morning light spilled across us, painting everything gold, and for a moment, I swore the universe had been waiting for this too.

We barely left the house that day.

Every time I thought I could catch my breath, he touched me again sometimes tender, sometimes rough, sometimes so slow it felt like torture. We moved together like we'd been waiting years for this, like every summer apart had been building to this moment of fire and release.

At one point, we collapsed onto the floor, the sound of our laughter mixing with the hum of the fan overhead. His lips brushed my ear as he whispered, "I don't think I can stop wanting you."

"You don't have to," I breathed, my hands sliding over his chest, my nails lightly tracing the lines of muscle I'd once only dreamed about.

The way he looked at me then hungry, devoted, undone ignited something deeper than lust. It was more. Always more.

By sunset, we finally stumbled out, hand in hand, our bodies still buzzing from hours of heat we couldn't contain. The beach stretched before us, quiet now, the tide rising higher with the pull of the moon.

We walked barefoot along the shore, the cool water kissing our ankles, and Ethan stopped suddenly, pulling me against him.

"Do you realize what we've done?" he asked, his eyes searching mine.

I swallowed. "We crossed the line."

He shook his head. "No, Lila. We burned the line to ash."

My chest tightened, not with fear, but with the wild, intoxicating freedom of it. "And now what?"

"Now..." His lips brushed mine, slow and sure. "We keep burning."

The kiss that followed was deeper, more desperate, the kind that pulled me under until I didn't know where I ended and he began. His hands gripped my hips, tugging me closer, and the sound of the waves crashing only made it feel more forbidden, more dangerous, more alive.

And when he laid me down in the sand, the world became nothing but the two of us, the stars above, and the fire between us that refused to die.

Later, lying beneath the night sky with his arm wrapped around me, I realized we had stepped into something we couldn't undo.

It wasn't just lust. It wasn't just summer heat.

It was a wildfire.

And there was no putting it out.