The CEO'S RULEBOOK

Drunken confessions

Mila’s POV

My entire body went still, like someone had pressed pause on everything, including my ability to think.

I could not understand what was happening. His lips were on mine, urgent and desperate, like he was begging me to kiss him back, to feel everything he was pouring into this moment. His breath was ragged. His touch sent electricity straight through me, and my brain, which normally never shuts up, went completely quiet.

As always, it tried to catch up. I wanted to overthink it, to pull it apart the way I always do. Why was he here? Why did he smell like scotch? Why was he kissing me as if the world owed him this? But my body had already made its own decision and did not bother consulting me. His lips were soft, unbearably soft, and before I could talk myself out of it, I was kissing him back.

I kissed him back hard, my fingers finding his hair and pulling just enough to drag a groan out of him. His lips fit against mine in a way that made no logical sense but felt like the most natural thing in the world. A rush moved through me so fast it made my head swim. I stopped thinking about Armando. I stopped thinking about anything. There was just the faint smell of coconut in his hair, and the warm sting of scotch underneath it, and his mouth on mine, and nothing else existed.

His kiss deepened like he could taste everything I had been trying to keep hidden. A sound escaped from both of us as he pressed me back into the wall without breaking the kiss for even a second. His hands found my waist and pulled me flush against him, and I grabbed at his back with both hands because my legs had stopped being reliable and I needed something solid to hold onto.

I clung to him harder than I meant to. My legs were trembling beneath me, and I knew it, and I still could not stop. His touch felt like something I had never let myself want, but could not bring myself to pull away from now that I had it.

His fingers trailed down my side, and every nerve ending in my body lit up at once. His cold hand slipped under my shirt, and I gasped out loud before I could stop it, my back arching into him on its own as my body had already agreed to things my mind had not approved. I wanted more. I did not even pretend otherwise.

I felt him smile against my lips when he felt me give in, that quiet knowing smile, and somehow that made it worse. The kiss shifted, got deeper and hungrier and less patient. He bit my lower lip gently and tugged at it, and I forgot every single reason this was a terrible idea. Before I even registered how it happened, I was straddling him on the couch, my hands on his chest, feeling the muscle beneath his shirt, both of us burning and neither of us willing to stop.

His lips left mine and moved to my neck, and I let my eyes close. My hands moved across his chest, and I wanted all the fabric gone. I wanted to feel him properly. I wanted everything.

Angel was intoxicating. Completely, dangerously intoxicating.

He made me feel things Armando never had, not even once. This was different in a way that scared me a little, the kind of different that should have sent me running, but I could not find the part of myself that cared enough to go.

Then his lips left my skin, and his breath was still rough and uneven when he said it.

“Damn.” Low and gravelly, like it had been dragged out of him. “You’re driving me crazy, Mila. Does Armando make you feel this way?”

Everything stopped.

It hit me the way cold water hits you when you are not expecting it, sharp and immediate and sobering. The word surfaced in my mind and would not go back down. Drunk. He was drunk. Whatever this was, whatever it felt like pressed against that wall, he would not carry it with him tomorrow. He would not even remember saying my name like that.

I pulled back.

“No,” I said. My voice came out breathless, and I hated myself for it. “Stop, Angel. You’re drunk. I can’t do this anymore.”

It felt wrong coming out of my mouth. But I had to say it. I could not let myself fall into something that only existed because of a bad night and too much scotch.

He looked at me, confusion and hurt hitting his face at the same time, and I made myself look away before I could change my mind.

“You have to leave,” I said. My voice shook a little despite everything I was trying to hold together.

Angel did not argue. He just nodded slowly, as something had gone out of him, and started walking toward the door.

He was almost there when I opened my mouth.

I still do not fully understand why.

“Angel.” I stopped. Swallowed. Started again. “I mean, Mr. Harris. You can stay here for the night. You’re drunk; I don’t want you driving like this.”

The words fell out in a nervous rush, and I regretted them the second they landed. What was I doing? What was I actually doing?

But he did not say anything strange or sharp. He just looked at me, with a small smile at the corner of his mouth, his eyes catching the moonlight coming through the window in a way that did absolutely nothing good for my chest.

“Come on,” I said, my voice not as steady as I needed it to be. “I’ll put you in my room. You can sleep there. My sister is out, so I’ll take her room.”

I was already second-guessing myself before I finished the sentence. I led him upstairs anyway. He held my hand the whole way up, and I felt it in every part of me. I focused on the hallway ahead and told myself it did not mean anything.

He is going to hate the room, I thought, which was a ridiculous thing to land on, but my brain was clearly not operating at full capacity.

I pushed the door open and stepped aside.

“This is my room,” I said, laughing a little out of pure nerves and nothing else.

He nodded and sat down on the edge of my bed, that same quiet smile still on his face.

I turned to leave.

“Mila.”

One word. Soft, almost gentle. But it stopped me like a hand on my shoulder.

“Please don’t leave me. Stay with me.”

His voice was low and rough and warm all at once, and it went straight through me the way his voice always did when he was not trying to be difficult. My heart knocked hard against my ribs. My breath caught somewhere in my throat and did not come back.

I did not know what to do with him.

I did not know how to walk away.