Page 49 of Spitfire

"This is all your fucking fault! You attacked us like some jealous ape, and caused that door to shatter. You. Hurt. Her." I turn completely in his direction, and watch as my words land like bullets.

He breaks our connection, and looks down between his spread legs at the floor, the veins on his neck straining, and his hands fisted, as if he's trying his best not to throttle me. I almost wish he would, and not just 'cause it would get him kicked out of here by Nurse Bree, but then maybe I would feel something, anything except the overwhelming terror that is drowning me every minute that we don't have news about Scarlett.

"I never intended to hurt her, just you, asshole. I didn't know the door would shatter like that or that she would be in the way. I didn't think at all. I was... all fucked up with rage."

His admittance makes me shake my head in understanding. When I realized she had slept with him, I felt the same type of wrath and the need to murder him. "Well, she was, and you did. You'll continue to hurt her with your shitty, unhinged behavior. She didn't choose you, Jasper." Before he can argue, I raise my hand, stalling him. "She didn't pick me either, but I didn't lose my shit and go after you like some psycho. Don't get me wrong, I wanted to, but you're not worth losing Scarlett over."

"What the fuck are you even trying to say? Speak plainly, you white-haired freak. What does you not coming after me, and how the fuck I wish you would then I could put you six feet under, have to do with losing Scarlett?"

Wow, this guy really is dense. Let me stab him, Xavier, and put all of us out of our misery. He's not even in the same league as us or your bitch.

He doesn't get it. He can't see the truth right in front of his face. At some point between the many rounds of fucking Scarlett, I was holding her tightly in my arms while she dozed, and she sighed his name. At first I wasn't even convinced I heard what I did, and that my mind or X wasn't playing games on me. Then she did it again as she snuggled deeper into my embrace. When I questioned her about it, she seemed shocked at first, but then she quickly tried to move away from me and shut down.

"Tell me what you're thinking right now. Don't run from me, Scarlett."

She turns her back on me, her shoulders now tense, and up near her ears, as she wraps my sheet around her nakedness, and everything in me wants to rip it off her and force her to admit she's mine. Yet I get the sinking feeling that if I did that, it wouldn't have the outcome I desire. He's in there too, deep in her heart and mind, taking up space that should only be mine to inhabit.

"I'll hurt you, Xavier. You should let me go."

Her words are a dagger straight to my heart. How could she ever think that was possible? All the years I've spent in the shadows protecting her, watching and making sure she's thriving. Now that I finally have a chance at a life with her, she's asking me to walk away. "Never. I will never let you go, Spitfire. I couldn't even if I wanted to. I would wither and die. You are the only reason I keep going. Life means nothing without you."

I realize in that moment how deeply profound and truthful my words are. There really is no point in continuing with the farce of a life without her. It has always been her and would always be her. There is no sacrifice I’m not willing to make to keep Scarlett. I also concede at that moment that she will not let him go. Jasper Garnier means something to her, much more than I understood before, and if push comes to shove, she might walk away from me.

My first reaction is that I’ll just kill him, remove him completely from the equation, but her next words cement where I am now, in front of an asshole I should have stabbed to death long ago, and unable to hurt him for fear of harming the woman I love too in the process.

"I... can't choose you, Xavier. I mean, I can't choose only you. You're a part of me, just knowing all that you've done for me, and our history. God, I wish you had let me know what was happening sooner. Things could have been different."

"Jasper Garnier. You're saying you can't choose between us, that you have feelings for both of us?" Everything in me wants to take back my words, to reject even the possibility, but as tears fill her dark mocha eyes, and slip past her lashes to form tiny diamond rivers down her porcelain skin, I know the truth. She's in love with him too.

Fuck, how did this happen? All these years of waiting for the right time to make myself known to her. All the time spent in the shadows as her protector, only for her to also fall in love with him. A man that I despise, who is the opposite of everything I am, and believe in. A man who might put her behind bars if he ever realizes that she's Ashmaker. Does she even understand that possibility?

"I'm sorry, Xavier. I know it's not what you want to hear, and I don't know how to explain it to you. Shit, I don't even know how to explain it to myself. He's a part of me like you are, just in a different way. Choosing between you would be like tearing out a piece of myself, and asking me to live without it."

A look of shock crosses her face as if her words surprise her. "I don't know when I became so attached to Jasper. None of it makes sense anymore. I realize now that he's snuck his way into my heart, just like you have, despite the walls that I've put up to keep me protected. The thought of losing him, of losing either of you, is almost unbearable."

"Yet you're asking me to walk away, Scarlett. Make it make fucking sense!" Anger rises quickly, heating my blood, and the monster that's always ready for violence simmers just underneath the surface. I would never hurt Scarlett, but right now the desire to find Jasper, and end his life, is almost uncontrollable.

She steps toward me, her trembling hands rising to cradle my face, as she stares up at me with sorrow. "I don't want to cause you any more pain, Xavier. You've already lived with so much, and you deserve happiness. I'm not going to lie, if you left me now, walked away from me, it would break something in me, but I can't force you to stay when I'm not willing to choose."

I couldn't answer her in that moment, and decided to change her mind using my body. I thought that if I could prove to her how I could make her feel, how much I wanted and needed her, she'd forget about him, even though I knew that was unlikely. Even when she was bleeding back at my loft, and hurt, she tried to get between us to stop us. She didn't choose one or the other, and that finally made me realize she never will, not even in death, if it were to come to that.

"She's in love with you, but she's also in love with me. She won't choose between us, no matter how much you or I would want that." He shoots up to his feet and storms towards me, grabbing onto the front of my t-shirt, and pulling me closer, until I can see the golden flecks in his dark blue eyes. He's breathing heavily, as if he's struggling not only with the truth bomb I just dropped on him, but with his own feelings of loss.

That's what it feels like for me too, to know she won't ever just be mine, so I understand him, probably better than he understands himself. "Are you prepared to lose her for good, Jasper, 'cause I'm not. I never will be. I've waited fucking years to be with her, and I won't give her up, even if that means I have to put up with you in the picture."

THIRTY-EIGHT

JASPER

Ishove him away from me, the sound of my blood thumping erratically in my ears. No, he's wrong. He's just trying to get me riled up so that I beat his ass, and get myself kicked out of the hospital. There's no way that Scarlett feels that way about both of us, it's not possible.

"Where the hell are you going, Jasper? You can't run from this," Xavier demands as I stumble down the hallway, putting distance between us, so I don't end up in a violent confrontation with him. "Jasper!"

Every recent interaction with her runs through my mind like some fucked up reel. The way she looked when she came home from her night with him. How she wouldn't promise to stay away from him when I demanded it, even though he could ruin her career. The fact that I found her with him again, allowing him inside of her body. The both of them standing underneath the water, straining, lost in the throes of pleasure, and unaware that I was even there until I shattered the door, and yanked Xavier out.

FUCK! I crash into the nearest wall and slide down it, unable to catch my breath. Patients and hospital staff give me a wide berth, passing me with curious glances, as I bring my knees to my chest with an overwhelming sense of failure and devastation. Could Xavier be right? Does she love us both? I drag my hands down my face in exhaustion, replaying Xavier's words over and over.

"She didn't choose you, Jasper. She didn't pick me either, but I didn't lose my shit and go after you like some psycho."