He set his jaw. ‘Because this is pointless.’
‘Just give it a chance to help you feel better. My mom always says that’s it’s amazing what a good night’s sleep can do for you too. Admittedly, that was mostly because she needed a good night’s sleep after being kept awake by the little ones when we were younger.’ I put the soup down on my desk next to his untouched tea and went to hug him but he moved away again. Alarm bells were ringing. But he’d been like this a little the other day when he got upset about his mom and the envelope with the cards in it, so perhaps this was just another sign of his inner turmoil and I needed to let him have his space.
He was turned towards me, but his eyes were averted still. He put the papers he was holding down on the arm of the sofa and shook his head.
‘I’m not talking about the soup being pointless. I’m talking about us.’ His tone was low and flat.
‘Say what now?’ I breathed, like his words had sucker-punched me in the stomach.
‘This dating arrangement between us. It’s time to call it a day.’
‘That’s…not what I was expecting to hear considering…’ I swallowed, trying to keep it together for the sake of my own dignity. ‘Considering how I left you. What…what changed between me leaving for soup and coming back?’ I attempted a faint laugh. ‘I was only gone fifteen minutes.’
‘I just had time to think.’ He retreated further towards the door and I fought off the urge to leap in front of it. He couldn’t just drop that on me and walk. Could he? The Stephen I knew wouldn’t be that cold. Not to me. I’d seen him be this hard, frosty version with other people – his father, the boys at the bar who threatened us – but they had deserved it. I deserved more respect than this.
‘No. That’s not enough of an explanation. You’ve woken me up, got me to run around after you and now you’re going to dump me, with no more explanation than “I’ve been thinking.”’
‘Okay. If you insist, I’ll elaborate.’
‘Don’t take that patronising tone with me, Stephen,’ I warned him.
‘I wouldn’t dare.’ He stood up straight and looked me dead in the eye. ‘I was thinking about my father, how he tried to make it work all over again with another woman, another child, and hestillcouldn’t stick it. He didn’t learn from his mistakes. But I’m going to. This thing with us, I’ve been trying but what’s the point when we both know how it’s going to finish.’
‘What do you mean, you’ve been trying? What have you been trying to do?’ My heart was simultaneously leaping and stalling. Had he been having the same thoughts going through his head? That I hadn’t been imagining this growing connection between us unleashed a desperate hope in me, even as he was saying he wanted to leave.
‘To…’ He shook his head. ‘Nothing. Just to stick it out.’
‘Stick it out?’ Any light of hope I had went dim. Something cold was crawling around my ribs, looking to gain access to my heart. ‘Until when?’
‘Probably until I went to England. But I can’t.’
‘So…you can’t “stick it out” with me? Like I’m some kind of chore? I neveraskedyou to “stick it out” with me.’ My throat hurt. I remembered how I’d been practically begging him to kiss me on Independence Day, how weirded out he’d been in the morning, so concerned that he wasn’t going to hurt me. Had this whole thing been out ofpity?
‘No,’ he said coolly. ‘You didn’t. And this is entirely what you expected from me, anyway isn’t it? You figured me out back in the lobby of Beth’s hotel at Christmas, just like you figure everyone out. Surely, this isn’t a surprise?’ He lifted an eyebrow at me.
Ice. His voice, his manner, were all ice and they skewered me. It was like the Stephen I’d grown to care for and believed in had never existed.
Of course he hadn’t. He’d been acting hadn’t he? Just like he acted it up with everyone. Mr Charming, pretending to like my family, pretending to be interested in his colleagues and my books and that he was bothered, in the slightest, about hurting me. The throbbing in my chest intensified. Was this his revenge for New Year’s? The final score on the board between us. He waited to see just how much I would give myself over to him before he pulled the rug?
‘No.’ My voice was hollow. ‘No. This isn’t a surprise. This is precisely what I expected from a man like you.’
I must have imagined the way he flinched; my vision was wobbling with unshed tears. I wasn’t going to show him my tears.
‘You can go now,’ I said, copying his coolness as much as I could.
‘I’ll pay you for the soup.’ He put his hand in his pocket and I knew, I just knew, that if he stayed a moment longer, I was going to lose it. I couldn’t let him see that. I couldn’t let him see he’d won.
‘Forget about the goddamn soup.’ I moved past him, my shoulder brushing the wall to avoid any risk of touching him. I yanked the door open. ‘Just leave.’
He walked out, back straight, eyes forward but he paused at the top of the shadowy stairs. The florescent bulb down the hall left a sickly yellow pallor across his face. He caught me watching him. ‘It must be wonderful to be right all the time.’
I slammed the door.
Chapter Eighteen
Despite having only drunk one beer at dinner with Trevor the night before, I woke with a hangover. A splitting head and aversion to the mere idea of food. I guessed it wasn’t from alcohol, but from drama. I’d let myself get embroiled in all kinds of soap opera antics this summer. Things had gone from being completely under control to volatile and emotional pretty much from the point that I bumped into Noelle again.
I didn’t need that in my life, and she didn’t need someone like me in her life either. So now things were over between us and I’d got the answers I wanted from Trevor, everything could just go back to normal.
