When she so was.
“Enough to say that I am so excited for you,” she said, and he could hear the sincerity in her voice. It was right under the hurt and disillusionment. “I guess all that’s left to say is congrats.”
Eyes on Harper, Adam asked Roman, “Could you give us a minute?”
“That’s okay,” Harper said, the panic tightening around her neck.
She didn’t want to be alone with Adam. Because in one minute she would be doing the only thing that could possibly top her most humiliating moment. Bawling her eyes out over discovering her pretend relationship had been pretend.
But Roman was already nodding and walking away, which meant she needed to dig deep and tap into all of those acting skills her mother had tried to instill in her.
“I really am happy for you.” He went to speak, so she shoved the banana in his hand. “Hurry before it melts. Gotta go.”
“Harper.” His voice willed her to stay, but the pity she knew was on his face had her legs moving. She made it three steps when she felt a warm hand gently lock around her wrist, halting her escape.
“What you heard . . .” he began, and to his credit he did seem genuinely upset that he’d hurt her. “It came out wrong. You are special and—”
“Don’t.” Harper spun around, the anger from a lifetime of rejection building up inside of her. “You have never lied to me, so let’s not start now.”
His face fell at her harsh tone. “I’m not lying. You are special and sweet.”
“And your friend?”
“Yes.” He said it as if it weren’t shattering her heart. Erasing everything that had happened in the past few weeks.
“Then we could have left it at that,” she said, her voice cracking. “I was fine with friends. Fine with naked friends. You were the one who made me believe it was more.”
“It is more.” Adam reached out to touch her face, but she backed away before he could. She would crumple otherwise. She could feel it. Her stomach was already chilled and a sharp stabbing sensation was forming behind her ribs.
“How much more?” She needed to know, because she wasn’t going to let him put this on her inability to read signals. “Because you said you’d wake up just to catch a glimpse of me, that I was your sunrise.”
She stopped and felt a hysterical laugh build up. “Oh my God, they were lines. That’s what you say to someone at a bar, and I thought it was charming.” She placed a hand on her mouth to keep the sob from escaping. It didn’t help. “I thought your pickup lines were charming. How stupid is that?”
“They weren’t lines, Harper.” But she wasn’t listening.
“You charmed me. Made me feel sexy and beautiful and like I was special.”
“You are. God, you are.”
“I don’t feel very special right now. I feel stupid.” Just like she had when she’d discovered Rodney liked her friend, and Curtis didn’t listen to Ricky Martin for his music, and Clay wanted to date a Mom-bot.
Only this was worse. This wasn’t humiliation—it was devastation. Something she hadn’t felt since she’d learned her mom had been only two towns over and hadn’t come to visit. Something she’d gone out of her way to avoid ever feeling again.
And she’d done a damn fine job until Adam charmed his way in, and now he’d blown a hole through her chest to get out.
“You told me you weren’t a sure bet, that you didn’t do long-term, and I listened,” she said, and that was when the first tear broke. “But then you said mine, and I believed that too. Believed it so much that I stopped believing all of the rest, stopped listening to that voice inside of me telling me that this was too good, that you didn’t mean it, that you couldn’t love curls. I believed you to the point that I let myself become yours. Heart and soul, Adam.”
He stared at her, horrified, as if her declaration had stunned him. Stepping close, he reached out to tuck her curls behind her ears. “I do love your curls.”
“But do you love me?”
Adam opened his mouth and nothing came out, just a rush of air, and Harper’s chest caved in on itself. She might not be great at nonverbal communication, but he’d just made himself crystal clear.
“I guess the problem was I didn’t take the time to think it through.” But in that millisecond she thought everything through, realized that this wasn’t just an isolated event, and finally, finally, understood what had started with her father when she was three, repeated itself with her mother, then repeated over and over until she was ready to listen.
She wasn’t ready now, wasn’t sure she’d ever be ready, because once she accepted it, her life would never be the same. It wasn’t about sensuality or allure. It was sadly about love.
Closing her eyes, Harper went up on her toes and placed a gentle goodbye kiss on his cheek. She let her lips linger, taking in his smell, putting to memory the way his skin tasted.
With a final brush of the lips she whispered, “No matter how much I love someone, it doesn’t mean they’ll ever be mine.”