PENTHOUSE 521

twenty-six | pandemonium with a background of fireworks

"I'm sorry, Reese, but we can only be friends." I looked back at Niccolò's figure, which diminished more by the second. "I made a mistake."

I started moving through the crowd, not waiting for Reese's response.

It seemed like he started to say something but the music had quickly drowned out his voice.

I moved through the crowd, not as skillfully as Niccolò managed, but enough to track him and make a left into an alleyway.

I rushed my steps, set on following him to wherever the hell he was going.

My pulse thrummed as I made another turn around a building, then another until the two of us finally reached another empty plaza with a columned building in the middle. It was probably some governmental office.

The dim, yellow-orange flicker of a lit cigarette was held between his fingers while he stood against one of the columns. Besides, the full-moon and the stars in the sky above us, it was the only source of lighting in the space.

Even though there were a few streetlights in the square we came to, I suppose the board overseeing the Festival of Life's celebrations saw no use in keeping the lights on for areas people wouldn't be in. Plus, the less light pollution the better for the upcoming fireworks.

"I expected you'd follow," he uttered without sparing a glance toward me.

"What you saw was a mistake." I didn't have to explain myself but felt like I at least owed him some sort of explanation as I took my position at the column across from his.

"Doesn't matter what you tell me, I saw what I saw, Catalina."

"But I am here to apologize. What he and I did was wrong," I sucked in a deep breath, trying to hide the messy emotions that were fighting for dominance to rise to the surface. "Don't I deserve the chance to be heard out?"

Niccolò finally raised his eyes to meet mine. He didn't say anything in response, but I saw how he took a long drag from his cigarette and allowed the smoke to flow from his nostrils, his eyes unwavering from mine. A pure display of masculinity that sent fire blazing through me.

My eyes looked over his appearance. White trousers, oxford shoes, and a designer baby blue satin shirt. It was unbuttoned at the top to reveal a stretch of his muscular, olive chest, the silver chain around his neck, and a tattoo peeking under the shirt. He looked immaculate.

Maybe it was a figment of my imagination, but I swore I heard him cockily mutter, "Still got it don't I? Even when you're at odds with me."

I blinked rapidly to break the trance he placed me in. "I am so sorry for what you saw, but I meant every word when I spoke to you on the phone last week. I want you Niccolò, and no one else but you. Tonight solidified that."

"Catalina," he said, his voice soft. The way he dragged out the syllables that formed my name. Even his words could incite the same feelings as his touch did and set me ablaze.

He broke the distance between us in three simple strides.

"I just can't tonight," he uttered after a moment of apprehension. Under the glint of the moonlight, his eyes seemed torn like he was at war with himself.