Page 190 of Stanton Unconditional

CHAPTER 28

Natasha

I sit up ion a rush. “What the hell are you talking about?” I snap.

“I want you to sleep with someone else.”

I screw up my face. “Have you gone crazy?”

“I know you want to.”

I shake my head in disgust. “No, I don’t, that’s ridiculous.”

“I read it in your diary.”

My mouth drops open in shock. Dear God, what have I written?

“Those diaries are private, Joshua.”

“But in black and white, nonetheless.” His eyes dare me to deny it.

“I don’t want to sleep with someone else. That’s ridiculous. How could you think such a thing?”

“Why would you write something like that if you didn’t mean it?”

I shake my head in disgust and get up in a rush. “I was venting. I don’t even remember writing that. You don’t take it literally.” I’m outraged, how dare he use this against me?

“I do,” he snaps.

“Oh right, so we are going to break up…is this your pathetic excuse to cause trouble with us again? Haven’t we had enough shit?” I scream as frustration pumps through my veins.

“No, quite the opposite. I am going to leave you for a week, and you are going to,” he shakes his head at his inability to say it out loud, “do it.”

He closes his eyes as if in pain. “And then we will leave for LA and start our life together. With no regrets.”

“You are an idiot if you think I could possibly sleep with someone else,” I scream. “Do you even know me at all?”

“You are going to!” He screams back. “I haven’t slept since Friday knowing this is how you feel.”

“What?” I shake my head in disbelief as my heart drops. “This is what you have been stressed about,” I whisper gently as empathy for my beautiful man fills me.

He fakes a smile. “Reading that your girlfriend wants another man’s hands on her…inside of her…will do that to a man.” He drops his head in sadness.

My heart drops as I rush and wrap my arms around him. “Baby, I didn’t mean it. I don’t want to. I would never do that to you.”

“I know you wouldn’t and that’s why I’m giving you permission.” He pulls me into an embrace. “It will have no effect on our relationship or my love for you. I know you love me. I’m asking you to do this for me.”

I shake my head into his chest as tears fill my eyes. I feel so guilty for making him feel like this.

“Josh, you are all I could ever want. Stop talking, please. I don’t even want to talk about this.”

“Tash, when I leave here in the morning I am not coming back for a week and you have a hall-pass to sleep with one man.” He pulls my face up to meet his and he wipes my tears. “Just fucking one.”

“I’m not doing it,” I stammer.

“Natasha, listen to me. I know I could never settle down with you if I had never slept around. Curiosity would have got the better of me in the end. I can’t expect of you what I couldn’t do myself. I have thought hard and long about this and I know it’s the right thing to do.”

“I’m not doing it.”