Page 106 of What You left in Me

“I want you to ask me the real question,” he says quietly. “Not the safe one.”

“Okay,” I snap, because if we’re dealing in real things, I might as well burn too. “Why? Why would you do that? Why would you break something to get to me? Wasn’t I already—I was already—” I have to swallow because my throat went on strike. “I wanted you.”

His mouth does a small, lethal curve that isn’t quite a smile. “Obviously, I know this.”

“God, you’re insufferable.” I try to pull back; he doesn’t let me. His fingers move to the side of my neck, not squeezing, just resting there like a promise with teeth.

“Do you trust your own wanting?” he asks.

“What does that even…”

“Do you need the permission slip of someone else’s mistake to make yours?” His thumb strokes once over my pulse. It jumps like an idiot. “Or do you want me without the story you tell yourself to make it palatable?”

“I don’t believe you,” I say. It comes out fast, practiced, a shield held up by habit. “I don’t. That’s what I’m supposed to say to protect the tiny scraps of my pride. So, I don’t believe you.”

His eyes soften in a way that is worse than any grin. “You do,” he says. “You just hate that fact.”

“I hate you,” I correct, because it’s easier than the other thing. “I hate that you think you can move pieces around and call it fate.”

“I don’t believe in fate,” he says. “I believe in leverage.”

“Right. So, did you do it?” I press, because if he won’t step on the landmine, I will throw it at his feet. “Tell me. Tell me you fabricated those messages. Tell me you decided to act like a puppet-master with my life. Tell me you broke up my engagement for yourself.”

He looks at me like I’m asking him to lie to make me feel better. Then, slowly, he shakes his head, once. Not no. Not yes. A refusal to play. His hand slides from my neck to my jaw, a gentler hold than I deserve right now.

“Julian is a man who would put you in glass and keep you polished,” he says softly. “That’s not safety. That’s display. He’d never cheat because cheating is sloppy. He’d cheat when it’s efficient.” He dips his head, so the words skim my mouth. “I don’t do efficient. I do inevitable.”

My insides light up like an electrical panel sparking before a blackout. “You’re fucking horrible.”

“You’re shaking,” he says, and the bastard sounds pleased and worried at the same time. “Come here.”

“I am here.”

“Closer.”

It isn’t a question. I step into him because not stepping would be an act of will I don’t have at this hour, in this room, with this man who ruins me without touching me and then insists on touching me anyway. He folds me against him like he’s been holding the shape open in his body for days. Maybe he has. Maybe I have.

“Tell me it wasn’t you,” I whisper into the line of his throat. It feels like begging and I hate myself immediately. “Tell me I didn’t… that I didn’t do this because of a lie.”

His breath ghosts my ear; his mouth doesn’t. He rests his lips there like a refusal disguised as a kiss. “You came to me because you wanted to, and it was before those messages,” he says, low. “Not because Julian tripped.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the only one that matters.”

I pull back enough to see him. “It matters to me.”

He studies my face like he’s deciding what part to demolish first. Then he says, with infuriating calm, “If I say I didn’t, you’ll call me a liar. If I say I did, you’ll make it a confession worth hating me for.” His thumb is back at my mouth, dragging slowly along my lower lip. I hate the sound I almost make. “Either way, you still want me. That’s the part scaring you.”

“I can hold two things in my head at once, I’m not a simpleton,” I snap, because I am tired of being simple even if it’s easier. “I can want you and think you’re a manipulative bastard. I can miss you and hate what you do to my life.”

His eyes flare, hunger and relief and something warm I won’t name. “Good. That means you’re finally honest with me.”

I could slap him. I could kiss him. I could let him fuck these feelings out of me. Those solutions keep shaking hands behind my eyes.

“You know what I think?” I say, because I don’t trust my hands. “I think you left because you were afraid of what you’d do if you stayed. I think you came back because you couldn’t stand the idea of me sleeping down the hall like a temptation you’dobey in your sleep. And I think you want to feel me say yes while you whisper a no that sounds like an apology.”

He bares his teeth briefly, not a smile. “You think too much when you’re tired,” he says. “You think too little when I touch you.” He bends, barely, and the world tilts toward his mouth. “Which is why you’re here. Because you know exactly what happens when I let you ask the question you really came to ask.”