Page 151 of Only for Him

She doesn’t believe me, but I say it again. Louder and meaner.

“I’m not fucking done.”

The ceramic swan looks old and cheap and dull. And empty, because the earrings are in my ears. The ones he kept giving me because he knew I needed something to hang on to.

I pick up the swan and hurl it against the wall.

It shatters. Good. Without this, there’s nothing.

I will finish what we started, even if it fucking kills me.

Especiallyif it kills me.

38

ROMAN

The cold emptinessof my office wraps around me, a familiar embrace that feels wrong tonight. Shadows on the walls, twisting and crawling like the memories of her I’ll never be able to kill.

All the screens are on, except the ones showing her apartment.

I can’t fucking stand to see her right now.

Her face would make me sick, not because of what she did, but because of whatI’vedone. I’m the one who let her get close enough to hurt me. Just like I let her close enough to knee me in the balls.

I’ve learnednothing.

This is my fault. All of it.

I pace the marble floor, fists clenched tightly at my sides, nails biting into my palms. Rosa will gloat, then she’ll forgive me.

But I don’t want Rosa’s forgiveness. I want Giselle’s.

I want her ankles crossed as she wraps her legs around me, I want her hair in my fist, I want my name on her tongue and her heart locked up safely in my own fucking chest.

I thought we could be a team, get justice together, and now all I have is this fucking ache, this thing in my gut that won’t stop squeezing.

I shove my fingers through my hair, run them over the dull stubble along my jaw, touching myself because I can’t fucking touch her. And I need to. I fuckingneedto.

But I can’t.

My eyes rake over my desk, littered with papers, photos, goddamn rose petals and a rapidly-disappearing bottle of vodka.

And the USB stick.

Her low, throaty laughter haunts the room. The way her eyes sparkled with our little victories, the softness in her voice when she promised me she was in this with me.

When she mademepromise.

I slam my fist against the desk. Papers scatter like ash.

I had her. She was fucking mine. I know she was. There’s no way she could’ve faked it.

Shewouldn’thave.

“She made her choice,” I say out loud to the empty room, but it sounds like a question. Could I trust her again? I want to, just so I can have her again.

Forever. Yes, fucking forever.