“Anything.” She laughed, a horrible, scraping sound. “Anything excepttell me.”
Such a small slip-up he’d made. So easy to dismiss, to explain away, if his stumble hadn’t involved something she couldn’t second-guess or doubt.
She’ddecided months ago not to mention being fat-shamed on dates to Marcus. It was a very deliberate, very conscious omission, one intended to spare her pride. She’d told herself that part of her past didn’t matter, really, not when hedidlove her body exactly the way it was.
If she hadn’t caught that damning little slip, would he ever have told her? And how long, precisely, had he known the truth?
“Did you know who I was when you asked me out on Twitter?” Her tone had hardened now. Turned colder, as her tears dried.
He frantically shook his head. “I had no clue who you were. I swear. Not until you told me at dinner.”
That blank look of shock when she’d shared her fanfic name. Those initial, probing questions about Marcus—abouthimself, and how she felt about him—on the Lavineas server. All those conversations where he pretended to know almost nothing about fanfic.
“You’ve been keeping this a secret from our very first date,” she whispered. “From our first fucking date.”
He grabbed the back of his neck, squeezing hard. “April, you have to understand—”
“Oh, how wonderful.” She’d never used that voice, rich with sarcasm and disdain, on him before. Not even once. It made him flinch, and she was savagelyglad. “Yes,pleasetell me what I have to understand. I can’t wait to find out.”
“If anyone knew I was writing fix-it fics in response to the show, if anyone knew the things I said about the scripts on the Lavineas server...” He sounded so sincere, each word a heart-wrenching plea. A hell of a good actor, as always. “I could have lost the role of Aeneas. I could be sued, potentially. And no one would want to cast the guy who—”
Enough. She didn’t need a lecture on how grave the consequences could have been, or how grave they could still be. Ofcourse his showrunners would be unhappy. Maybe even his colleagues. But he’d lied to her, and she wasn’t letting herself be dragged off-topic.
She held up a steady hand. “I get it, Marcus.”
“I don’t think you do.” His lips tightened, just for a moment. A flash of anger, when Marcus was never, ever angry at her—at least, not until he was caught in a lie. “Not really.”
Ignoring that attempted feint, she cut to the most crucial, most hurtful part of this absolute shitshow. “I also get the real issue here.”
“Therealissue?” It was almost a growl.
“You don’t trust me.” She sat back in her car seat and laughed again, and the sound was just as horrible, just as sharp, as before. “We were friends for over two years online, and you’ve been living with me for months, and youdon’t trust me.”
She’d been so sure of him. Of them.
And from the very beginning, she’d been building a relationship on quicksand.
The anger had faded from his expression, and the desperate shake of his head must have hurt his neck. “No, April.No. That’s not—”
She bit her lip, her cold, calm facade cracking. “I w-would never have told anyone. Not a soul. Not my coworkers. Not our friends on the Lavineas server. Not my mother.No one.”
The honest fucking truth, and she hoped he recognized it.
“I know that!” He flung his hands in the air, his own voice breaking. “Do you honestly think I don’tknowthat?”
The air seemed simultaneously too thin and too thick to breathe, and she wanted to fling open the car door and run. Instead, she stayed and faced him dead-on.
“Right. Of course.” Her lip, now bitten red and raw, stung asshe gave him a mean little smile. “Except for one problem: if youknew that, if youtrusted me, you would havesaid something.”
He clawed at the seat belt as if it were strangling him, finally stabbing at the release to fling it free. The violence of the motion didn’t seem to satisfy him, though, and his chest heaved with labored breaths.
“I was scared.” It was a blunt, rough statement, unvarnished enough that her desolate sneer faded despite her best efforts. “When we met in person, I was cautious about sharing something so damaging, and I think that’s understandable, even though you may not agree. Then I knew I could trust you, but I didn’t—”
Jaw clenched with frustration, he seemed to search for words.
“I didn’t trust that I’d say the right thing when I explained. I didn’t trust that I’d be enough to make you stay, once you knew I’d been hiding something so important all this time. From that first date.” His brows had drawn together, a mute plea for understanding. “I love you, and I was terrified you’d leave me.”
Her sudden inhalation removed all the remaining oxygen from the car. Dizzy and sick, she stared at him.
