Page 15 of The Promise of a Traitor

He shut his own eyes and stepped back before he could stop himself. No. He wasn't doing this. He wasn't getting pulled into her again. Not this time. Not ever again.

"What the fuck are you doing in my bedroom?" The anger surged up, the only thing between him and everything underneath it.

"We need to talk, Adi."

"I have nothing to say to you." He turned on his heel, yanked a t-shirt from the closet, and pulled it on like armour. “And there is nothing I want to hear from you. Not now.”

"You kept it." Her voice was barely above a whisper, looking at the painting.

Advik's hands stilled on the hem of his t-shirt. "Get out, Aastha."

"All these years, and you kept it." She finally turned, and this time there was something else under the grief, something he couldn’t put his finger on. "Why?"

"Does it matter?"

"It matters to me."

"Everything mattered to you once." The words came out before he could stop them, low and vicious. "Right up until it didn't. Right up until I didn’t."

She flinched like he'd struck her, and for one traitorous second he almost, almost, wanted to take it back. He crushed the impulse before it could take root.

"That's not-" She stopped, pressed her lips together, started again. "You think I don’t know how badly I hurt you?”

"If you do, then you'll understand why I have nothing to say to you."

“Don’t say anything. Listen. Please?”

He laughed, a bitterly angry sound. "There was a time when all I wanted was to listen to you talk. All I did was believe the pretty lies you told. I was a fool. One who loved you so desperately he didn’t see the dirt beneath the gloss. What was it that made you run without a word, Aastha? Was the sex terrible? Was I so repulsive? Was my love too boring?"

Something flickered across her face. Not hurt this time. Closer to anger. Good. He could work with her anger. It was so much easier than her grief.

“Don’t,” she said, her voice trembling. “Don’t make what we shared sound so-“

“It was the sex, wasn’t it?” he cut her off, taking a step towards her. She took a corresponding step back. “Was I too bland for you?”

“Shut up, Adi.” The words were a whisper.

He stopped in front of her, looking down at her bent head. “Was I not enough for you?”

“You were everything I ever wanted.”

The words were coated in a depth of emotion that his stupid heart yearned to believe was true.

“And yet, I was what you walked away from.” A grim smile touched his lips. “Forgive me darling, if I find it hard to believe you.”

“Are you marrying me to punish me for breaking your heart?”

Adi looked over her head to where the painting hung on the wall, his heart twisting in his chest. But when he spoke, his voice was calm and cold. “Don’t flatter yourself, Aastha. You aren’t that important to me.”

A single tear escaped her as she blinked up at him. “Then why?”

He looked back at her upturned face, his gaze tracing the delicate lines of it. “Why not?” he asked simply.

“This will be a disaster, Adi.” A strange urgency crept into her voice. “Please take your answer back. Say no.”

He watched her frantic worry, curiosity taking the edge off his anger for the moment. “No?” he said, allowing relief to flood her face before adding, “No, I won’t take it back.”

Her lips tightened as despair carved lines into her face.