“We are.” He glanced away and closed his eyes. “Damn it. We are, but the only reason we’re just friends is because there’s no way we could possibly ever be anything more.”
“You want…” My lungs spasmed. It freaked me out, and I understood how Sarah must feel all the time with no control over her muscles, even her breathing muscles. I couldn’t catch my breath, and it scared me.
“Do you really…want more?” I whispered in a trembling voice.
The emotions leaking into his face gave him that haggard, regretful look I’d seen the first night I’d caught him in a bath towel. “Don’t you?” he whispered back. Then he gave a harsh laugh and glanced away. “Or is this only sexual attraction for you?”
My chest ached. I still couldn’t catch a good lungful. “You know it’s not.”
“Then why the hell are you so confused about why I’m flying off the handle?”
“I don’t know.” I winced. “Because it’s easier to play dumb?” And because he’d made it abundantly clear he’d chosen his job over me. I had every right to date whomever I wanted...whether I technically felt that way or not.
“Well, you’re not dumb. Don’t play dumb.” When he shoved his calculus book into his bag and began to gather his things, I panicked.
“Mason? What’re you doing? Where are you going?”
“I’m leaving. What does it look like I’m doing?”
And just as quickly as the panic came, it dissolved into pissed off outrage. Slamming my hand over his half-finished calculus paper that had fluttered across the table, I jerked it out of his grasp as soon as he reached for it. When he glared at me, I scowled. “So if you can’t have me, then I’m not allowed to date anyone? Is that what you’re saying? My God, Mason. Do you realize how much of a douche bag you sound like right now?”
“Yes, damn it!”
The admission came so freely from his lips, I blinked, startled to actually hear him confirm it.
Chest heaving, he sent me that tortured, haggard look of his again. “I realize exactly what I sound like. And I’m trying to stop, Reese.” His voice broke. “I’m trying here. Jesus, why do you think I’m taking off right now? If I stay, I’m only going to say something worse.”
I think his agony got to me more than my own. Tears filled my eyes. When I blinked them away, he choked out a sound of misery.
“Christ, don’t cry.”
I probably should’ve warned him that once I started with the waterworks, they didn’t just dry up on command.
“What do you want me to do?” I sobbed. “Do you want me to call it off? Tell him no?”
I have no idea what happened to all my girl power. A guy I couldn’t have was acting like a butt because I was going to spend a little time with another man. I should be cussing him up one wall and down the next for his asshole attitude. But there I sat, in tears and begging to know what I could do to make him happy.
Man, I was whipped.
His face contorted and turned an angry red as if he was going to start bawling right along with me. But then his features cleared and he shook his head savagely. “No. Don’t call it off. I want you to be happy. I’m sorry for being a drama queen. Okay? I want you to have fun with…whomever. Just have fun and be happy. Keep being you.”
More tears filled my eyes. Cursing under his breath, he practically leaped across the table to snag his homework out of my hand. Crumpling it in his fist, he shoved it into his bag.
“I have to go,” he muttered, swiping the palm of his hands across his eyes before he rushed off as if the hounds of hell were after him.
As I watched him stride away, it struck me how much I’d hurt him by agreeing to go on a date with Ethan. That hadn’t been my intention at all. I’d only wanted to save myself from getting hurt. I’d wanted to force Reese Randall to move on with her life. But watching him in pain ripped me up inside.
I was in love with him.
Dear God.
I was in love with a gigolo.
It was crazy insane; I was fully aware of that. But this was Mason. My spider killer. My leftover food vacuum. My fellow Harry Potter fan. He was my soul mate. It was easy to look past the gigolo detail when I was with him.
And so it was easy for me to scramble off my bench and fight for him.
Though he hadn’t actually run away, he’d been moving fast when he’d left. Chasing him, I entered the main building, only to spot him nowhere in the glass-ceilinged main atrium. I glanced left down one hall with no luck. When I looked the other way, I saw his retreating back and took off in hot pursuit.
“Mason!”
He heard me and slowed to a stop but didn’t turn around.
“I can’t believe you just walked away from me like that,” I began to rail as soon as I was ten feet away. “We are so not done talking about this.”