But I’m not the only guilty party. I open my eyes again, searching his face for even a tiny bit of remorse. Nothing. Maybe he really is as dead inside as he looks, as he wants everyone to believe. Maybe I’m doing little more than babysitting a statue with a sadistic streak.
And yet…who was that guy who was so obsessed with my running technique that he forgot he was supposed to be injured? Or the guy who shared his billion-dollar whiskey with me while we read by the fire? Or the one I coaxed into conversation over dinner?
There has to be a human being left under the cold savage. I just don’t know how to reach him…yet.
I take a deep, shuddering breath, not caring that it betrays my nerves, and take a step backward, then another, my eyes never leaving his. Letting him know that I’m not running away, that I’m not leaving his house just because he played my body like a fiddle and then mocked me for it.
For the first time in my life, I feel myself acting entirely on instinct, and although it feels an awful lot like playing with fire, it also feels oddly right.
“You know where to find me if you want to talk,” I say gently. “About the dream.”
His eyes narrow at the change in topic, and I feel a little surge of victory creeping in on top of my shame. I’m right. That whole terrible kiss and everything that followed wasn’t just about humiliating me. It was a red herring. I got too close to his secrets by waking him up from his dream, and he used sex to distract me.
It won’t happen again.
I head toward the door, turning my head just slightly to deliver my parting question. “Who’s Alex?”
He makes a growling noise, ducking his head as he braces both hands on the dresser, his breaths coming in shallow gulps.
I pause for a second, giving him a chance to respond to my offer to talk, even though I know he won’t. I’m right, of course. He says nothing.
I slip out of the room, closing the door quietly before leading forward and resting my forehead against the wood for just a second, trying to catch my breath. My thoughts.
What the hell am I doing?
I can’t actually be helping the guy. I don’t even know if it’s possible to help someone who doesn’t want to be fixed. But that’s not what really has me all wound up and on edge.
It’s that deep down, I know that the reason I came here in the first place was the naive assumption that helping Paul would be helping me. That I could somehow fix whatever is broken and rotten inside me.
I want to fix the part of me that cheated on the boy I loved. I want to fix the part of me that could betray someone I cared about more than anyone. But…
And what if Paul has the right idea? He might be a callous son of a bitch, but at least he’s honest with himself about being a barbarian. At least he’s not pretending that he can ever be anything else. So what if he’s right and we aren’t fixable?
I slowly make my way back down the hall to my own room and curl up on my side.
Sleep doesn’t come.
Not for a long time.
Chapter Twelve
Paul
Olivia doesn’t go for a run the next morning.
Did she leave?
No. Not yet. I would have heard Mick bring the car around, and I would have heard the suitcases being clumped down the stairs.
But she might be upstairs packing.
The thought fills me with…what, exactly?
I should be satisfied.
Getting rid of her is exactly what I was after last night when I kissed her with all the finesse of a werewolf. I meant to be a little rough with the kiss, though I’d never intended the kiss to be that aggressive. But then I put my hands on her, and my response was almost violent. I went at her like a fucking starving dog.
Which would have been fine if she’d pushed me away, scraped at me, or even slapped me, because I definitely was asking for that. But she responded. She responded like she was made for me.
What I did is beyond heinous.