“Naina.” He tried to get closer, tried to hold her, but she couldn’t let him. “It’s too late to push me away. You’re afraid of me taking over your life? What about the fact that you’ve already taken over mine? And yes, it does feel good. Better than anything has ever felt.” He leaned into her again, like a magnet, their axes perfectly positioned for the force of attraction to be at its maximum.

The back of his hand stroked the skin of her jaw, suddenly the most erogenous part of her body. “Nothing feels as good as you. Nothing.”

She removed his hand. He wasn’t listening to her. “I can’t be your instant gratification, your fix of the moment.”

This time the pain that slashed through his eyes almost cut her off at the knees. He traced the space between them, the air saturated with yearning. “You know it’s more than that. No matter how much you hate that it is. It is.”

She stepped back from that declaration, from all the declarations he’d promised he wouldn’t make but was making, because he didn’t care what she wanted. It didn’t matter in the face of his own wants.

His face twisted with new understanding. “If it were nothing, then would it hurt like this?”

“You promised this would not turn into more,” she said. “You promised you would not ask for more. You broke your promise and now you want me to take the blame for the fact that you’re hurting.”

“I’m not the only one who turned it into more. You broke your promise to yourself.” His kind, generous eyes softened again. “I’m not the only one hurting, Naina.” He tried to touch her cheek again.

She shook her head. “Don’t.” Letting him touch her again was out of the question. She couldn’t let him tear her open any more than he had. Already sewing herself back up was going to kill her. She felt like someone had put her arm in a sling, broken her.

Pain went through her arm, and she squeezed it. As a young girl, pain in her arm had woken her up at night. It had taken too much work to stop this, to stop hurting all the time.

His arm was suspended between them, reaching for her but not touching her when she didn’t want it. But how long before that stopped? He’d already disregarded her wishes. He was here when she’d told him not to come. He only ever did what he wanted.

“I’m not asking for anything you don’t want to give,” he said, voice soft and precise. How long before it turned cruel? “But you’re angry with me for making you want to give more. I don’t know how to help you with that.”