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But I can’t tell him that.
“El, I think you’re just thinking too much. Just lay back down with me.”
And at that, I crack. I feel it in my chest – a fissure forming at his words. With anything he could have said, he chose to sayI’m just thinking too much?Thinking too much into this? Us?
Because there is no us…
“No,” I say through a humorless laugh, shaking my head at his absurdity. “I’m not going to do that, Tyler.” Taking a deep breath, I look out the window and then back at him.
Standing in front of me, he towers over me and cups my cheek. I flinch, closing my eyes briefly.
“Look at me, sugar,” he whispers, and my eyes flutter open to look into his clear aqua eyes that I know I’ll recognize for the rest of my life. “Why are you ending this? I thought we were good. I thought this was working.”
“It was,” I tell him honestly. “Until it wasn’t. I just…”
He silences me with a kiss to end all kisses, as if he knows he’s lost me, and this is his last-ditch attempt to keep me. Or to say goodbye.
Fire races up my spine and I wrap my arms around his neck, clinging to him, never wanting this kiss to end.
But he tears away from me just as quickly as he took me, and holds me against him in a grip I can’t break free from.
“I know we said we were just having fun,” he starts, and I silence him withmylips this time, not wanting to hear the rest of that statement, or whatever ploys he has to make me stay.
I give him my everything in this kiss, knowing what I’m about to say will most likely end any chance of saving this with us.
“I have a date tonight, Tyler,” I tell him, and his face turns to stone before me. He drops his hands from around me like I burned him, and takes a step back, the small distance feeling like a canyon between us.
“What do you mean you have a date tonight? With who?” I open my mouth to tell him, but he just keeps going. “You know what? It doesn’t matter,” he says, his eyes hard and his body coiled tight like a snake before an attack. “You want to date other people? Go right ahead. I don’t fucking care.”
“Tyler,” I start, but the look on his face has me forgetting my next words.
“I can’t believe this.” He laughs without humor. “You had me going, I’ll give you that.”
“What are you talking about?”
His blue eyes turn a shade darker. I never thought I’d see him mad, and I certainly never thought it would be because of me. “If you don’t know, then that says it all. I can’t believe I bothered with all of this. You really did just want sex from me.”
He can’t believe he even bothered with me?
Rubbing the back of his neck, he flashes me a predatory smile like he’s testing me, and while I want to scream that I don’t want just sex from him and that’s the problem, I don’t. The words don’t come, and that only seems to make him laugh like I’m a joke he’s just finally getting.
Sucking in a ragged breath, I feel all the emotions I’ve been trying to tamp down start to bubble to the surface, and I know if I don’t leave right now, then I’ll end up saying something I’ll regret the moment it leaves my mouth.
“Bye, Tyler,” I say, and I’m not even able to look him in the eyes like he deserves.
I all but run down the stairs, grabbing my clothes he left folded on the kitchen island, and walk out the front door, a lone tear slipping down my cheek.
Chapter 16
I don’t think I’ve ever felt like more of a fraud in my entire life. I barely talked at work today, and I still haven’t told anyone that I have a date tonight with Caleb.
I know Courtney and Ally would lecture me on throwing away whatever I had with Tyler, and then I would feel like shit, and it wouldn’t change anything. Not a damn thing.
But since I committed to this, I have to see it through.
I never knew I had a little masochist in me, but now I know I do. I deliberately hurt myself this morning so that he never had the chance to. That’s fucked up.
Caleb seems nice enough, though. He texted me saying he’s looking forward to seeing me tonight, and that he’d pick me up at seven. Sadly, though, the telltale butterflies that I would normally get before a date aren’t there, but I methodically go through the motions of making myself date night ready anyway – hair, makeup, cute outfit.
