“Why are you being like this?” he whispered.
“Being like what?” I said, coolly.
“Like… this!” he gestured helplessly.
His voice pierced my carefully constructed fa?ade: he sounded so bruised. I sat at the table, warming my cold hands on my coffee mug. I began my pre-prepared speech.
“I’m sorry I disappeared without saying goodbye. I didn’t mean for you to worry. I saw you with Brenda and… I just thought it was better for me to go.”
“I knew it! I knew that was it! Fuck, Caro!”
He sat down opposite me and rubbed his hands over his face.
“It was nothing with Brenda. Nothing! Why are you being like this?”
Oh no, he didn’t get to be the injured party.
“It didn’t look like nothing,” I hissed, my careful control sliding away. “You say you love me and then you just walk off with Brenda? Do you have the slightest idea how much that hurt? Do you? You entered into a relationship with me knowing that I’m a married woman. But it’s okay for you to get mad with my husband, and it’s okay for you to sulk when Bill pretends to flirt with me, and you tell me how upset you are that you can’t be with me in public at the stupid fun day… but you know what, Sebastian? This is what you signed on for. With me. I sure didn’t sign on to see you going off with some girl. Did you really think it was okay for you to take a nice, romantic stroll along the beach with your ex-girlfriend who obviously has feelings for you and wants you back? Did you? Because it isn’t okay. It really isn’t.”
“Wow. You’re… you’re really angry. Caro…”
No shit!
I glared at him and he dropped his eyes to the table, sighing heavily.
“I’m sorry. I am. It’s just… Brenda is… was… I guess I knew she might be there yesterday. Her dad’s a buddy of Mitch. I should have said something… I get that now… but I didn’t know what to say… I mean, I broke up with her months ago before I even met you again so I didn’t think it would matter if she did… but I didn’t know she was going to… I’m not interested in her, so it didn’t... How can you…”
He took a deep breath.
“Caro, I’ve said to you over and over again that I love you. You never say… Why don’t you believe me? Why don’t you trust me? I’d never, never do anything to hurt you. I love you.”
“You did hurt me, Sebastian,” I said, gravely. “You hurt me a lot. You say you’d never do anything to hurt me but then you go ahead and do something like this.”
I thought he was going to reach out for me, but then he closed his eyes, shaking his head slowly.
“God, Caro, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I just… I didn’t know what Brenda was going to say and I didn’t want you to have to sit there and listen to it. I thought… I thought I was doing the right thing – getting her out of the way. And… she was upset and I guess… I felt like I owed her or something. She’s been having a really tough time since…”
He stopped. It was probably the look on my face. I so didn’t want to hear him telling me how he owed his slutty ex-girlfriend and that he still cared enough about her not to want to upset her. But it was okay to upset me.
I sighed. I knew that wasn’t what he’d intended. He’d obviously thought that getting her out of my way was the best solution if she was going to start babbling about wanting him back. Sometimes he was just too damn nice for his own good.
“Caro, I’m sorry. Please, please don’t be mad at me. I love you.”
His voice trembled and his eyes begged me to believe him. And I did. I just wasn’t sure I believed in us.
I reached over and took his hands in mine, my resolve a little shaken by his renewed declaration.
But it was a mistake: the warmth of his skin, the touch of flesh on flesh – my whole body flushed with desire. The prepared speech died on my lips.
“You looked so good together.” I choked out the admission.