“Maybe a couple of months.”
“What?!” She spun around, her towel loosening around her fuming frame, teasing me with glimpses of skin as she snatched it tight and jerkily re-did the knot by her breasts.
I gulped back a wash of insane hunger.
This was dangerous.
Our fights always made me feel out of control, and this one was no different. Yet this time, my desire to rip off her towel and force her to understand what I was saying overshadowed my desire to stop arguing.
What I’d been trying to say all along.
If only she’d fucking listen!
“I couldn’t leave you,” I snapped, my own temper building to match hers. I hated that she’d turned this moment into something violent instead of the homecoming I desperately needed. I hated that I’d hurt her so much she couldn’t forgive me like she usually would. And I hated that ravenous appetites did their best to unhinge me and make me forget that I might be ready to accept that I wanted her in so many indecent ways, but first and foremost, I was her friend, protector, and caregiver, and she had every right to hate me for doing exactly what I said I’d never do.
“I abandoned you. I know that.” I stepped forward, chasing her as she paced the small bedroom. “And you have every right to hate me. But, Della, I need you to listen. I came back because I couldn’t stay away. I tried. I really did. I did my best to leave—to let you live your life without me ruining it even more—but each time I packed up my gear and hit the trail, I ended up doubling back until I found the same camp. I-I couldn’t go. I couldn’t stop what I feel for you.”
If I expected a thawing in her temper at my inability to walk away, I was sorely disappointed.
Her cheeks glowed with a brighter red, her chest pink and flushed. She faced me head-on, scorn painting her face like vicious makeup. “You couldn’t what? Go through with it? Turn your back on me? Your only family? Or you couldn’t leave the comforts of the city after having running water and a salary for so long? Because I sure as hell don’t think you came back for me!”
“I did. I came—”
“Don’t you dare lie to me, Ren. Not anymore. I’m done with lies.”
“Good, because so am I!”
“Fine!” she screamed. “So tell me what you came here to say and get lost!”
My gaze tripped to the floor where I stood on a page with the bold words I’m in love with Ren Wild, and my body jerked with hypocrisy. My own rage unfurled to treacherous levels as I pointed at the damning letters. “You’re done with lies, huh? How do you explain this then? How do you explain every line you wrote and every confession you shared? You stand there judging me for leaving; you yell at me for daring to come back to tell you what I’ve wanted to tell you for years, and you pretend you have nothing to say in return.”
I bent and snatched the paper, shaking it in her face. “How long, huh? How many years did you live with me, laugh with me, love me all while lying to my goddamn face? Was everything fake between us, Della? Was it?” I threw the paper at her, watching it flutter and float to its fallen friends on the floor. “I don’t know what’s real anymore. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to fix this. All I know is…you’re as much to blame for this as I am.”
“How do you figure—” She huffed in disgust. “Are you saying I didn’t love you? That I pretended to care about you even though you’ve been the only person in my life since I was a baby?”
“No—”
“Are you saying that I lied to you when I was a kid and told you I loved you? That I made it up when I said I was happiest teaching you in the hayloft or that my heart didn’t splinter when I watched you with Cassie? What, Ren? What part of our life together am I lying about?”
“I’m not saying—”
“You are.” She planted hands on her hips, showing off the swell of her breasts and the tormenting shadow of her nipple so close to being revealed if the towel slipped just a little more. “Then again, maybe you’re saying that for seventeen years, I didn’t care about you? That you weren’t the most important person to me?” Her tears started anew, fresh and glittering. “That you weren’t my world, or that I didn’t need you, or that I didn’t miss you every damn night since you left? That I didn’t curse myself for everything I’d done, every mistake I made. That I didn’t wish I could turn back the clock and change so many things. That I didn’t beg for a chance to make it all better, to find a way to stop my heart from switching in its affection, to somehow seek a way to stop all the pain and—”
Angry sobs interrupted her tirade, giving me time to grunt around my own agony, “I’m not saying any of that—”
“Then what are you saying?”
“I’m saying you lied about how you loved me! A-and I…I lied, too.”
Silence plummeted us into frigid waters, causing the fire between us to smoke and billow.
Her chest rose and fell as breathing bordered hyperventilation. We glowered at each other, truth bright and fragile and hesitant—almost as if disbelieving this was the moment we came clean.
The moment.
The moment we’d been running from for so fucking long.
Our eyes locked, clutching hard with the knowledge that this time…this time, we weren’t shoving it under the rug, or pretending we hadn’t just confessed, or running from the truth that none of this meant anything other than teenage hormones and miscommunication.
We were through with bullshit.
And it hurt to understand we’d both been hiding for so long. Both forgotten how to be honest. Both missing in a sea of deception.
Her eyes downcast, argument raging and fading while honesty made her hiccup just once. She glanced at the bold line I’d pointed at, the printed permanent reminder that I wasn’t making this up. That for years, I wasn’t picking up on signals that weren’t there. That I wasn’t going slowly insane.
I’d been reading her truth. But I’d been too afraid to face mine.
“Oh,” she finally whispered, shrugging sadly. “Yeah, that.”
My heart fucking shattered.
This time, I swooped toward her with more than just the need to touch her but with the desire to fix everything. To tell her she wasn’t alone. Not anymore.
Grabbing her cheeks, I ran my thumbs over her cheekbones as I pushed her the final distance to the wall where her back pressed and her breath caught, and I lowered my head to nudge her nose with mine. “Yeah, that,” I murmured.
My heart.
Fuck, my heart.
It cried at finally touching her in a way I’d wanted to do for so incredibly long. My body cursed for so many incidents where we could’ve solved this with conversation and not ran away.
Her teeth chattered beneath my fingers as she shook as much as I did. We’d always shook when we fought. Always been so affected by the other’s temper that our worlds were in disarray until we stopped.
The familiarity of such a thing. The realisation that this wasn’t just a girl I was in love with but the one person who’d been there every step of my existence made it hard to breathe.
I sucked in air greedily, lungs useless, panting against so many things while doing my best to chase away my trembles even as my entire body went weak and wobbly for finally holding my Ribbon this way.
The fallen papers crunched beneath my boot as I shifted my weight, leaning into her, seeking an answer. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
She flinched, her eyes closing beneath an avalanche of pain.
This hurt.
Everything hurt.
“Della…please.” My calloused thumbs caressed her silky-soft skin, catching on her young perfection with my older imperfection.
Ten years separated us.
Ten years was an eternity when she was a babe and I was a boy, but now…it no longer held such power. I refused to let it because I didn’t know what I’d do if I couldn’t touch her the way I was touching her now.
She laughed quietly, full of torture and tragedy. “I did tell you. In a roundabout way.”