Jomiloju's POV
We left the safehouse under a sky as gray as my thoughts.
The van Steve had prepared was already waiting—black, tinted windows, engine low and quiet like it had secrets of its own. He didn't say where we were going. I didn't ask. I knew enough to understand when answers were a luxury.
The city around us was slowly waking—hustlers opening shopfronts, taxis blaring impatient horns, newspaper vendors shouting the day's headlines. We were ghosts among them, just two shadows moving through Lagos with too many sins between us.
Steve drove like he didn't trust the road. One hand on the wheel, the other close to his gun. His jaw clenched, eyes flicking to every rearview mirror like someone was already hunting us.
Maybe someone was.
"Can I ask you something?" I said finally, needing to break the silence before it swallowed me whole.
He didn't look at me. "You can ask. Doesn't mean I'll answer."
Fair.
"Why me?" I said. "Why did you agree to take me in the first place?"
He didn't answer right away. Just drove. A long breath passed.
"Because Koleosho made it clear—he didn't want you hurt. Just hidden. And I knew most of the men who would've taken the job wouldn't keep it that way."
I blinked. "So you kidnapped me… to protect me from being kidnapped worse?"
His grip on the steering wheel tightened.
"Something like that."
The answer shouldn't have made me feel anything.
But it did.
Steve's POV
I didn't tell her the truth.
The real reason I took the job wasn't just about protecting her from Koleosho's monsters.
It was because her name—Jomiloju Dorotoye—meant something to me long before I ever met her.
Her father had once signed a death order on someone I cared about. Someone who had nothing to do with politics or power plays.
I'd taken the job to get leverage. To make the Dorotoyes bleed a little. But the moment I saw her—wide-eyed, beautiful, furious—I knew I was in more trouble than I'd bargained for.
She was more than a pawn.
She was fire disguised as silk.
And now?
Now she was in the passenger seat beside me, hair tied back, face turned toward the window, unaware that every breath she took made the space between us feel more dangerous.
Because I didn't want to let her go.
And that was a problem.
Jomiloju's POV
We arrived just before dusk.
A beach house—old, worn, isolated. On the edge of a forgotten stretch of land near Badagry. The ocean beyond it roared like something wild and angry, waves crashing like fists into the shore.
Steve pushed open the door and cleared the place first, sweeping every corner like he expected ghosts.
"Clean," he muttered, finally holstering his weapon.
I stepped inside. It wasn't much. A mattress on the floor. A cracked mirror. A table that looked like it had seen war.
But for the first time since I got back to Nigeria, I felt… free. No locks. No bars. No cameras.
Steve lit a single oil lamp. Its glow threw golden light across the walls. And then… silence.
"There's only one bed," he said.
My heart skipped.
"I'll take the floor," he added, quickly.
I didn't argue. My brain was spinning in too many directions.
Steve's POV
She sat cross-legged on the mattress, staring at the waves beyond the window.
She looked like she didn't belong in this life. Like something out of a world with softer mornings and kinder men.
But she was here. In the dirt. In my world.
I poured water from a kettle into a chipped cup and handed it to her. She took it, fingers brushing mine. The touch was electric. Too fast. Too hot.
She looked up at me.
That look again.
The one that made me want to ruin her and protect her in the same breath.
I turned away.
"You don't have to keep pretending you don't feel it," she said behind me.
I froze.
Her voice was soft, but steady.
"Feel what?"
"This," she whispered. "Whatever this is."
Jomiloju's POV
I stood slowly, the mattress creaking behind me. He was just a few steps away. His back turned. Like he was hiding from something.
I walked toward him.
Each step louder than it should've been.
He didn't move. Not even when I was standing so close I could feel the heat of his body.
I placed my hand on his back.
And that's when he turned.
Suddenly.
Quickly.
Eyes wild. Hungry.
Our faces were inches apart.
I didn't breathe.
Neither did he.
The world stopped.
And then—
He leaned in.
His lips brushed mine.
Just barely.
And then he pulled away.
Steve's POV
I wanted to kiss her.
God, I wanted it more than I wanted revenge, more than I wanted blood, more than I wanted to live.
But I couldn't.
Because kissing her meant crossing a line I couldn't uncross.
Because loving her… meant breaking what little of me was still intact.
So I did the only thing I knew how to do.
I stepped back.
"I can't," I said.
She looked at me, wounded.
"Why?"
"Because the moment I kiss you… you're mine. And I don't know how to be gentle with the things I claim."
Jomiloju's POV
That hurt more than any slap.
More than any chain.
He looked at me like I was light—and he was darkness too far gone to touch it.
But I didn't want him to worship me.
I wanted him to see I was already burning too.
"You think I'm fragile," I said.
"I know you are."
"No, Steve," I whispered. "I'm surviving. Just like you."
The waves outside roared. The wind rattled the windows. The storm between us brewed hotter than ever.
And still… he didn't kiss me.
Steve's POV
I slept on the floor.
Or at least, I tried.
She was inches away. Her breathing slow. Peaceful. I watched her until my eyes ached.
Because I knew this peace wouldn't last.
Because I knew Selina was right.
I was falling.
Falling for the girl I should've never touched.
Jomiloju's POV
Sleep never came.
Because now I knew.
He wanted me too.
But sometimes, wanting someone wasn't enough.
Sometimes, the only thing more dangerous than a kiss…
…was the one that didn't happen.