Falling for My Ex’s Brother

Chapter 1: Part 7 – The Kiss That Shouldn’t Have Happened

It started with a mistake.

One moment, I was in the hallway, fixing the picture frame that fell from the wall. The next, Kaizen was there—standing too close, too quiet.

“Let me,” he said, reaching past me.

His hand brushed mine.

I froze.

He didn’t move.

My back hit the wall behind me. I didn’t know if I gasped from the contact or from the way his eyes were looking straight into mine.

Like he still had the right.

Like he still knew me.

---

“Tumigil ka na,” I whispered.

“Sa ano?”

“Sa paglapit. Sa… tingin na ganyan.”

He didn’t flinch. “Eh kung hindi ko kaya?”

I laughed, breathless. “Kaizen, please. Don’t do this.”

“Sabihin mong wala kang nararamdaman, and I’ll stop.”

My chest tightened. “Wala na.”

“Liar.”

Then his hand grabbed my wrist. Not rough, but firm. Familiar. Like muscle memory.

“You still look at me the same way,” he whispered. “Yung parang galit ka, pero gusto mo pa rin akong halikan.”

---

That was the moment.

I should’ve turned away.

I should’ve run.

But I didn’t.

Kaizen pulled me closer, and before I could say anything else—his lips crashed onto mine.

It wasn’t sweet.

It wasn’t soft.

It was angry. Regretful. Desperate.

A kiss that didn’t ask for permission, only remembered how I used to say yes.

And damn me…

Because I kissed him back.

---

My hands gripped his shirt, pulling him even closer.

His mouth moved like he was trying to erase Zayden from mine.

And for one horrible second…

I let him.

Then reality hit.

Zayden.

I shoved Kaizen away, breathing hard.

“No,” I said, voice breaking. “This isn’t fair.”

He didn’t speak.

He just looked at me—lips swollen, chest heaving.

“Sav…”

I shook my head. “I can’t. I won’t. He loves me.”

“So did I.”

---

I backed away, heart racing, the ghost of that kiss burning on my lips.

“You were my first heartbreak, Kaizen. Don’t become my biggest regret too.”

Then I turned and walked away.

Not because I was strong—

But because if I stayed, I’d let it happen again.

---

Later that night, Zayden hugged me from behind while we brushed our teeth in the bathroom.

“Ang tahimik mo ngayon, love.”

I forced a smile at him through the mirror.

“Pagod lang.”

And in my head, I begged—

Please don’t ask me why.

Because how could I tell the man who stayed…

That I almost betrayed him with the man who left?

---

Savrielle’s Inner Monologue

One kiss.

That’s all it took to unravel me.

But maybe it wasn’t just the kiss.

Maybe it was the part of me that never really let go of him.

---

End of Chapter 1: Part 7