AllFreeNovel
Share Us
That’s the problem. He’s under my skin and so innately twisted into my bones that, even though I’m trying to put my barriers up again, every word he utters thrashes them back down.
“I see you hiding behind your grief, using it as an excuse to shut me out. To shut life out.”
I wish I could shut him out. Maybe then his words wouldn’t cut so deeply. Perhaps I’d be able to hold on to the high from last night and ignore the scream pounding in my chest, tearing at my lungs as I grip the doorknob and twist it. His words are bellowing in my head, a storm I can’t see through when I swing the door open and propel myself forward, slamming straight into Leif’s chest.
I’m frozen, incapable of figuring out whether I want to hold on to him tightly or whether I want to shove him right the fuck away. All I can do is stare at his heaving chest as he stands taller, straighter. Everything about him is different, darker. His hands run along the elastic of his boxers, adjusting the underwear he wasn’t wearing moments ago.
“Like an idiot, I thought you were better than that,” he says, looking down at me from his holier than thou pedestal with a fucking frown and vacant eyes that leave me completely untethered.
I’m cut off from him as his hands hover at my sides, taunting what he could give me.
There, I’ve proven it.
A person can be an island.
CHAPTER 16
LEIF
Why?
Why did I go and push her so damn hard?
Why couldn’t I just enjoy the here and now?
The voice in my head is suffering from amnesia, because I know what happens when you don’t think of the after before you’re balls deep in more shit than you know what to do with, when the option to swim is taken away from you, and you’re sinking faster than you can be saved. I’ve been there, and it’s not a place I will ever find myself in again.
So, I pushed for certainty that there’s a chance of more with Cassidy, beyond this weekend. Things shifted between us last night. Sex aside, she was letting me in.
“You’re right,” I say, glancing down at the floor between us. “I don’t know you.” Not all of her. Not yet.
Cassidy gasps at my echo of her words. For a moment, she reaches towards me, but then she drops her hand back to her side, clutching at the sheet she’s wrapped in.
“I warned you that I have issues,” she mutters at my chest.
“Abandonment issues,” I reply, gripping my hips because I can’t touch her right now, and my hands are burning to. “I held on, Cassidy. Hell, I’m still fucking aching to hold on.”
“Until when?” She glances up at me through a knotted curtain of hair. “When does it end? Because it will. It always does. So when, Leif? When do you realise this isn’t real life?”
The question slams into my gut full force. “Feels real to me.”
“Come on, be honest. You know we’re in a bubble here. I’m not saying what we’re feeling isn’t real, it’s just not real life. Tomorrow, I’m getting on a plane, and I have no idea what’s going to happen. Maybe we’ll see each other again, maybe we won’t… things will be different.”
“I know that.”
“What if this doesn’t translate to plain, everyday life?” A long, low sigh cuts through her words, and she takes a step back.
It’s taking every ounce of strength in my body not to chase her backwards steps as she wraps her arms around herself. Maybe it would be easier to hold my hands up and back away, but I can’t. I cannot throw what we have away because it might not work out.
“What if it does?” I ask, stalking her retreat into the bathroom.
This woman is making me lose my mind because this level of investment has the kind of risk I know might blow up in my face. Still, I lift Cassidy onto the vanity, sitting her so she’s facing the toilet while I sit on the closed seat and sort through my thoughts before I say the wrong thing and fuck us up for good.
“There’s no pay-off without risk,” I say, focusing on my steepled fingers because I can’t look her in the eyes as I lay myself out for her. “Here’s the thing… I know there’s a lot we don’t know about each other yet, because if we did, then I would know who hurt you so fucking badly that you’ve shut yourself off. You would also know that I’ve been burnt badly enough in the past that I would never hurt you.”
I take a tentative glimpse up from my hands to where Cassidy’s sitting with her legs tucked up to her chest. Without her glasses, her eyes appear a little sunken, which makes the circles under them starker. All I want right now is to get up close and hug her, to make her feel safe and cherished so that she won’t second-guess where we are and where we’re going, and simply trust that we are going somewhere special, even if we can’t see it yet.
“I have trust issues, Cassidy. My ex blew up my whole fucking life, and the person I trusted with my career hung me out to dry in front of the whole fucking sport.”
