“I love you.”
Then he picked me up and carried me to our bed. Laid me down and rolled me, so my back was against his chest, his arm wrapped around me, pulling me tightly in. He was so much larger, the tuck of my body putting his mouth against the top of my head.
“I don’t know what to do.” His voice was blurry and soft in the dark room, words almost lost in the hum of the fan. “I love you too much to leave you. But I can’t do this. It is killing me.” Then he said the words I dreaded, the ones I never wanted to hear but that had stalked me in my dreams. “You have to choose. You have to.”
Ten minutes later, his breath evened out. I laid there, his arms relaxing around me, and began to cry. Sometimes getting everything you ever wanted sucked.
It had been long enough. Any love there was would have to be strong enough. It was time. I needed to rip the roof off all of our lies.
It was time to pull the roof off of all our lies.
Chapter 53
2 YEARS, 4 MONTHS AGO
The moment Brant turned, in that Belize hotel bar, at 1:43 AM, I knew something was wrong. I just couldn’t place what. Couldn’t figure out why the hairs on my arm stood up. Couldn’t figure out why the noise of the bar suddenly seemed to fade. I stood there, stared at him, and tried to place the problem.
“Hey.” He grinned. A wide grin that showed his dimple and white teeth and carefree games of football on Saturday nights. When he smiled his eyes carried the gesture, crinkling at the edges, the total effect one of a man who knew his charm and carried it easily. “You look lost sweetheart.” His hand reached forward, cupped the edge of my elbow and tugged me closer, my hand reaching out and touching his shirt. Pushing on it without any force. Just trying to stop my forward motion while allowing my mind to sort out what about this situation felt wrong. My eyes flicked right, to a polo-wearing blonde perched on the closest stool, whose outfit screamed resort employee, her hand gripped around the neck of a beer that I’m pretty sure she wasn’t old enough to drink. His other hand, the one not dragging me into his space, was resting on her bare thigh. I stared at that hand and wondered why he didn’t move it.
“Honey.” A call of a name designed to get attention. My eyes snapped up to his face, that wide smile still there, his eyes on me. He had been talking to me. Called me honey. Honey. That was a word I’d never heard roll off his lips. I looked back at his hand. Watched it as his fingers moved. Caressed the skin of her thigh. As I fucking watched.
I ripped my eyes from the sight, plastering them back to him, my eyes raping every surface of his face, looking for clues. Was he high? Pupils normal. Drunk? Didn’t really look it. He looked normal. If normal had a face that looked nothing like Brant. If normal looked flirtatious and easy-going. Like a man who had friends and watched sports. Like a man whose hand was moving further up blonde tennis chick’s leg.
I pushed hard against his chest and snapped my fingers at the girl. “You. Get out of here before I have you fired.” She blinked. Looked at Brant. Then back at me. I didn’t wait for a response, I turned to Brant and prepared to give a full ration of every pissed off emotion in my body.
His face tripped my tyrannical plans. It was irritated, his hand reaching out and grabbing the shoulder of the blonde, pushing her back down on the stool when she went to stand. “Stay Summer,” he said under his breath, the name combined with the action raising my level of pissed to a point I have not reached in… forever. Summer? He rose to his feet, towering above my hotel slippers’ height. “Miss, you should probably be the one to leave.”
Miss? I gawked at him. If Honey had thrown me off, Miss kicked me into next week. I avoided looking to my right, hating the feel of the blonde’s eyes as my boyfriend made a complete ass of me.
“Miss?” I sputtered. “What the fuck’s wrong with you?”
He shook his head, looked at the people next to him, strangers he had never met, as if I was the crazy one in this situation. He stepped closer to me, lowering his voice as he tilted his head down and stared directly into my furious glare. “Did I miss something? Did I do something to you without realizing it?” His eyes dropped, and I flushed for a quick moment when I realized he was staring at the sheer fabric of my top, the robe gaping open enough for him to see cleavage. I stepped back, wrapping the robe tighter, my mouth working, my hand thrusting his cell out, incoherent thought manifesting itself into speech, anger in the form of words, spilling out.
“I don’t know what kind of sick game you’re playing Brant, but we are through. Take your cell and get your own fucking room.”