A Kiss to Keep Read online

  A Kiss to Keep

  Willow Winters

  Contents

  Also by Willow Winters

  A Kiss to Keep

  Prologue

  1. Chloe

  2. Sebastian

  3. Chloe

  4. Sebastian

  5. Chloe

  Hard to Love

  Also by Willow Winters

  About Willow Winters

  Copyright © 2019 by Willow Winters All Rights Reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations within critical reviews and otherwise as permitted by copyright law.

  NOTE: This is a work of fiction.

  Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author's imagination.

  Any resemblance to real life is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2019, Willow Winters Publishing. All rights reserved. willowwinterswrites.com

  Created with Vellum

  Also by Willow Winters

  Sinful Obsessions Series:

  It’s Our Secret

  Possessive

  A Kiss to Tell

  Start Carter & Aria’s saga with Merciless, today for 99c!

  Merciless

  Heartless

  Breathless

  Endless

  Jase & Bethany - Irresistible Attraction Trilogy

  A Single Glance

  A Single Kiss

  A Single Touch

  Standalone Novels:

  Broken

  Forget Me Not

  Sins and Secrets Duets:

  Imperfect (Imperfect Duet book 1)

  Unforgiven (Imperfect Duet book 2)

  Damaged (Damaged Duet book 1)

  Scarred (Damaged Duet book 2)

  Willow Winters

  Standalone Novels:

  Cards of Love: Three of Swords

  Second Chance

  Knocking Boots

  Promise Me

  Burned Promises

  Forsaken, cowritten with B. B. Hamel

  Collections

  Don’t Let Go

  Deepen The Kiss

  Valetti Crime Family Series:

  Dirty Dom

  His Hostage

  Rough Touch

  Cuffed Kiss

  Bad Boy

  Highest Bidder Series,

  cowritten with Lauren Landish:

  Bought

  Sold

  Owned

  Given

  Bad Boy Standalones,

  cowritten with Lauren Landish:

  Inked

  Tempted

  Mr. CEO

  Happy reading and best wishes,

  W Winters xx

  A Kiss to Keep

  A Kiss to Keep

  W. Winters

  It started with a kiss. A single kiss that shook me to my core. A kiss to silence me, and a kiss to numb the pain.

  I took his hand and in turn, he took me away. I thought when we ran away, we’d never have to look back.

  I was wrong.

  I think Sebastian knew, and so did I, that he’d be pulled back into this life one day. There was no way we could have gotten our happily ever after. Scars don’t ever fully go away, and this sinful place is etched into our flesh.

  I don’t know how I’ll ever forgive him for bringing me back here. Even when he kisses me the way he does… no kiss can take away this pain.

  He’s still my everything, but I don’t know how we’ll survive this.

  A Kiss to Keep is an extension of Chloe and Sebastian’s story, A Kiss to Tell. Although it can be read on its own, it’s recommended you start with A Kiss to Tell.

  Prologue

  Chloe

  I remember the hum of the engine. It’s funny how that’s what stayed with me all this time. We took off in the shadows of the night, with what little bit we had that was worth taking with us and we drove away as fast as we could.

  We didn’t stop running, not for a long time, and I didn’t have to ask him why.

  No one leaves that place and gets away with it.

  Crescent Hills is nothing but sin and misfortune. It’s designed to keep every soul trapped there in a fog of devastation. I grew up surrounded by violence and agony. Living in fear and in anger. The constant turmoil kept me fighting, but I knew I would never be anything more than a name on its list of victims. That’s the truly unfortunate part. I never wanted to call it home, but back then, I knew I’d never have another.

  Until Sebastian.

  He was always the only one for me, because he stained my lips with his and scarred my skin with his burning touch before I ever considered letting a boy touch me. Well, any boy other than him. No one else could have compared.

  It all started with a kiss.

  He followed me behind our high school. I didn’t know it and I never would have guessed he felt even a fraction of what I’d felt for him. He had to have though, because that unfortunate day, I turned around after crying so hard and there he was. I was embarrassed to be inside with the other kids, so I hid outside, trying to suppress the shameful tears. The second I heard him, the second I turned around to see who’d followed me, Sebastian pushed my back against the brick wall and crushed his lips against mine.

  Stunning me. Stealing my breath from me. Forcing me to think of him. Which was worlds better than being consumed with the tragedy that plagued me. That moment changed everything.

  Because he kissed me, and I never forgot that kiss.

  Because I took his hand and he led me away.

  A sad smile plays at my lips as I rest my cheek against the cold glass. It was freezing cold when we ran away over a decade ago. We were barely more than kids then. Time’s changed us so much. But it can’t change everything.

  It’s fitting that it’s bitter cold now that we’re returning.

  Now that we’re going back into the nightmare.

  “I never thought we’d go back,” I whisper into the silent cabin of the car. The stereo works just fine, but I can’t stomach the idea of music right now. I don’t want to ruin any songs with this ominous day, knowing they’ll be forever associated with this memory.

  Bastian lays his hand on my thigh, and I merely glance at his touch, ignoring his warmth when he tells me, “I didn’t either.”

  I think he just says what he thinks I want to hear.

  I think he knew one day, he’d be drawn back to this life.

  “I love you,” he tells me in a rough voice, one that’s been silent for hours. My sad smile lifts just slightly, and I lay my hand on top of his although I don’t want to.

  I love him, but I hate this place.

  He says we’re coming home.

  But this was never my home.

  I don’t say “I love you” back. And Bastian doesn’t react when I don’t. That’s what hurts the most. He knew what this would do to us.

  And he did it anyway.

  1

  Chloe

  We’ve been driving for days now. The snow’s barely slowed us down. The prolonged silence, however, makes every minute seem longer than it is.

  The closer we get, the faster the snow falls though. And we’re close now. I know we are. I recognize these streets, even the backroads that have no names.

  The air has changed, and it makes my stomach churn harder every time I breathe in.

  “So you had a good time then?” I ask Bastian, picking at some barely perceptible fuzz on my sweater. My heart ticks faintly in my chest, almost like it’s afraid to really beat and pump life through me. Inst
ead it’s this timid movement, leaving me counting the seconds until things are right again.

  Clearing his throat, he shrugs. The motion draws up his jacket, pulling it tighter around his shoulders as he turns the wheel and the car takes a left down a back alley.

  It takes real effort not to close my eyes as we pass the bar. A bar I know so well and wish I didn’t.

  Everything is different, yet it’s all painfully familiar.

  The sign looks worn and old, but even when I was a child, it looked just the same. Ragged and decrepit. Time’s aged it, but not enough to really change it.

  “It was a good week,” he finally answers me, and his answer pulls my gaze from the gutters full of dirty snow to his steely blue eyes. “I’m sorry I had to go so quick and for so long. I missed you though,” he adds with a warmth in his voice that travels straight to my veins.

  He’s my drug. A living, breathing drug. He’s been gone a little over a week, leaving me all the way across the country to come back here. Now, I’m joining him, which is a nightmare come true for me.

  “I missed you too,” I admit although the words come out strangled still and I have to rip my eyes away to stare back out the window.

  As if beat-up houses and barren streets were something I’d ever want to look at.

  This particular road has stayed with me all my life. As the disquiet forces me to readjust in my seat, I ask Sebastian again, “Are you sure we should be here?”

  Tick, tick, goes my heart, then a pause. My heart refuses to do anything at all, leaving a chill to travel down my arms as we pass Dixon Street, and Sebastian gives me a pointed look. We grew up on the same street, this street, but we’ve never lived in the same world.

  I don’t know how I fooled myself into thinking running away from here would change that.

  “I know this is sudden…” He trails off and reaches his hand for mine, but I’m already crossing my arms so I pretend not to see it.

  I swallow my response along with the regret from saying anything at all.

  He can comfort me, but he’s ignoring the flashing red light warning that this is exactly what we shouldn’t be doing. I don’t want comfort in that. He can keep it for himself.

  “Never mind,” I whisper and my warm breath fogs the window.

  As the car moves over a speed bump and then a pothole in the old road, I jostle with it, passively letting the movement take me how it wants.

  “How are you feeling?” Bastian’s voice is low and apologetic, yet strong. He’s always strong. Never faltering, never needing to lean on me.

  It should be a blessing, but it feels like a curse.

  “Second trimester is worlds better,” I tell him and breathe in deep, feeling my shoulders stretch and rise before settling back down against the heated seat. “And I love this car,” I comment.

  “Smooth ride, huh?” he says just as we go over another pothole and I have to let out a small laugh at his dry humor and irony.

  The second of ease between us is spoiled when we drive past our old high school, filled with haunted memories.

  Mostly. The only two days I want to hold on to are the first day he kissed me and the day when we drove away years later. Every other day I spent here can rot in hell.

  “It took me years to get over this place,” I tell him, feeling the raw admission scratch up my throat with every word. Like I had to drag them out of me.

  A second passes as the car slows to a stop under a red light.

  “I know,” Bastian says and this time when he lays his hand down for me to take, his eyes stare at me. His eyes pierce into me, begging me to feel what he feels. “I have to do this, Chlo.”

  I can’t resist pulling down the seatbelt to lean over the center console so I can kiss his cheek. His rough stubble is short and it nearly scratches my lips as he tries to capture my own with his. But I avoid the kiss, settling on giving him a peck on the cheek.

  Sebastian leans closer to me, ready to take one regardless, I know it.

  With the groan of the leather seat protesting the movement of his broad shoulders, I prepare to give him a cheek and nothing more. I just can’t kiss him; I can’t give him that bit of me, not when he’s hurting me the way he is.

  He won’t tell me why he has to be here. Why now? Why are we back?

  Without a straight answer, things can’t go back to being right between us. I won’t allow it. He needs to know that. And all I know is that it has something to do with Carter Cross.

  The red light turns to green as he sits up, and with it the car behind us beeps. Bastian’s focus doesn’t budge, not until I grip his hand. I thread my fingers between his and pull his hand to my lips, kissing the back of his hand as the car behind us beeps again.

  Sebastian’s frustration shows with his sharp, narrowed gaze aimed in the rearview mirror at the person behind us.

  Always with a temper. What did I expect marrying the man everyone used to fear? He earned his reputation, and some bad habits die hard. The very thought makes me close my eyes with contempt. How could I think they’d died at all?

  “Let’s just go.” I push out the rushed words as Bastian sits there, staring in his rearview and ready to pick a fight. “I want to lie down,” I say, giving him the excuse and he buys it. His expression softens, but only slightly.

  He doesn’t ask and I don’t tell.

  I ask and he doesn’t tell the whole truth.

  We can’t live like this, but we can suffer in silence until it kills us.

  Well, mostly silence. The quiet hum of the engine keeps us company for a moment until he speaks.

  “You can’t hold back from me forever.”

  His words are heard, but not answered. Not for another two blocks.

  “And you can’t keep lying to me and keeping secrets,” I finally counter, although my voice isn’t as strong. It never comes out as strong as his, but it doesn’t need to. My words are just as right as his are, and we both know it.

  He’s reticent again until we drive out of Crescent Hills, away from where our past lies restlessly. I don’t understand why we didn’t stop or where we’re going.

  He said we were going home. And Crescent Hills is the only home I’ve ever known, but we’ve driven out of it.

  It’s not until we pull into a long gravel driveway, nearly fifteen minutes away from the world I once knew, that I give him a questioning gaze laced with worry.

  “I thought here would be better,” he tells me and with his words, massive iron gates part, creating a large opening for us to enter.

  They’re beautiful and behind the gates is a grand estate, but it’s far too much and there’s no way in hell I want to live like that. In a massive house with more rooms than I would ever fill.

  “We could never afford something like this.” Anxiety consumes me, wondering what the hell he did, who he stole from, or if he sold his soul to the devil until he speaks.

  “Not this one,” he tells me when he catches my gaze. “That one’s not ours.” The relief is only slight.

  “None of these are ours,” I remind him. “Our apartment is on the other side of the country. I said I’d come for a week, but none of these are ours unless we decide together.” I stress the last word, together, waiting for him to look me in the eyes. I can hear the gravel lift up under the tires just as easily as I can hear the pounding of my chest. Even if it still feels like a faint tick. That damn tick is loud.

  “I know,” he finally agrees with me, rounding the large white stone home and driving past it, down into a tree line for a slow minute and then another. The trees are a mix of burnt auburn and evergreen. And the evening light casts shadows and sprays of light on the gravel road and barren dirt path.

  We have to drive deep into the winter forest before I see a much smaller house. I almost want to call it a cottage, but it’s too contemporary. I have to lean forward in my seat to get a better look as he parks the car, although he keeps it running.

  The word “motherfucker” nearly l
eaves me under my breath. If I could pick a dream house, it would be this one. It’s set back deep under a canopy of mature trees, but with an opening for sunshine. There’s a wraparound porch and so many windows with pale blue shutters.

  “This isn’t going to be like the last time, is it?” I ask him and he doesn’t answer immediately. “You’re not going to buy this house and wait for me to cave, are you?” I push him. Suddenly, that tick is becoming more of a slam with his ever-passing silence.

  “Do you like it?” he asks me and I close my eyes, refusing to believe he did it again.

  “You didn’t,” I whisper, praying he really didn’t.

  “I bought it,” he tells me, letting the words slip out as if they don’t matter. Just like the last time he decided to have a house built here.

  “Motherfucker,” I mutter, finally speaking the profanity aloud.

  “I’ll sell it if you don’t love it, Chlo. We can up and leave and sell it no problem,” he’s quick to tell me, but that’s not the point.

  “You can’t keep doing this shit!”

  “Keep? It’s only here, only about finding a place to stay,” he argues back, letting his voice rise.

  “Yes! Only here, the place I told you I never wanted to see again,” I retort, and my voice cracks with outrage. “Do I have to remind you what happened to the last place? Good things don’t happen here, and you should have taken that as an omen!”