“Do you mean that?” I cut him off, my tears halting almost immediately as I jerk away from him.
“Yes, I do.” He reaches for me, but I quickly step back.
“You’re positive?”
“Yes, Calla. I’m not with you so you can have my kids, I’m with you so—”
“So that you can finish this book,” I snap and toss the crumpled page in my hand at him.
For a moment, I thought he would rush to act confused, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t even open the paper when he catches it. Instead, his chin drops to his chest.
“It’s not what you think.”
“Oh, so you’re not writing a book about two people who hate each other and get married?”
“No, I am, but again, it’s not what you think.”
“Is it based off us?”
His face wrinkles.
“I knew it.”
“Hey, the premise is us, yes, but what the characters do is not. It’s fiction, Calla. It started as a way for me to vent, and then my agent saw it. I told him no, but the offers were too good to be true, and it’s not us, okay? Like us, but not.”
“So the heroine doesn’t try to sabotage the hero?”
“Fuck. Okay, a little, but—”
“God.” I step back from him. “Oh my god.”
“Calla, just hear me out, please.”
“Was any of this real?”
“All of it. Every single day.”
“How am I supposed to believe you? This hero,” I point to his computer, “tricks her into staying married to help his writing career. Is that what you’re doing? Was the whole ‘my family believes in marriage’ the truth or a sack of shit to fool me?”
“It’s the truth, I swear.”
“And you never once thought that divorce would hurt your image?”
He closes his eyes and drops his chin to his chest again.
“Fucking hell, Beck.”
“Of course I thought of it, Calla. I am my own brand, but this book was never the reason I wanted to stay married to you.”
“So your reputationisthe only reason you want to stay married?”
“It was at first. Now—”
“Now I have no idea what to believe. You literally make shit up for a living. How am I supposed to believe you?”
“Calla,” he says slowly and reaches for me.
“Don’t.”
