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Shaking my head, I avert my eyes for a moment before returning them to hers. “When she signed up for the dating site, it kinda made me all nutty.”
“Jealous?” she asks with a smirk.
“Insanely. I ended up creating my own profile on the site with the thought that it’d be just to keep an eye on her. But then we started talking online, and we were still hanging out all the fucking time, and the lines became blurred. I wanted her.”
“Wanted her…” she encourages.
“Like wanted her in my arms, in my bed, and in my life twenty-four seven, kinda wanted.”
“Finally,” she mumbles.
“I had plenty of opportunities to tell her the truth about the guy she was talking to online, but I didn’t. I was terrified that she wouldn’t see it as a way for me to watch over her, and keep her safe. The Internet is a crazy fucking place.
“Anyway, it doesn’t matter now. What matters is I should have told her and didn’t. But it wasn’t because I was playing some game with her, okay? I would never do that, not to anyone, but especially not to her. I fucking love her, Lex.”
“You love her?” she asks, her eyes looking brighter, probably from unshed tears. Damn it with those tears. “Like really, really love her?”
“Yeah, I do. I was going to tell her last night. Honest.”
“She said you lied in a confession time.”
Hanging my head in shame, I admit, “I did. It was stupid, but I was afraid she’d be pissed at me. My brain just told me to deny it, even though my heart wasn’t on board. I had planned to confess everything last night and tell her how I really felt, but then we had the fire call, and I had to leave. She went to my apartment and found my laptop. You can imagine what happened next.”
Lexi stares over at me, her knowing eyes trying to gauge the sincerity in my words.
“I need to see her, Lexi. If she’s not with you, then where?”
Seemingly torn between telling me or not, she finally gives me a bit of relief. “She’s at Dad’s. She went there last night. After I talked to her, he called me; said she was up crying most of the night, but wouldn’t tell him why. Just said someone she loved hurt her.” My heart literally tries to crawl out of my chest. “I knew instantly who had hurt her. Besides her family, she only loves one person, and that man was too stupid to see it. That’s why I came over here to maim you.”
Direct. Hit.
“I see it, Lexi, and I want it. Fuck, I want her love bad, but I don’t know how to get her to talk to me right now.”
“You can’t. She needs some time to think and settle down.”
“But I need to tell her the truth. She needs to know that she wasn’t some game, that I really do love her.”
“And you’ll tell her that, but just not yet. She says she needs time, and you need to give it to her.”
Time. The one thing that almost pains me to give her, but if that’s what she needs, then I guess that’s all I can do. I’ll be here, waiting (or more accurately, at my own apartment), for when she’s ready to talk. It might be a day, maybe a few. God forbid she makes me wait more than a handful of days–that thought is catastrophic.
“I’ll give her time. As much as she needs.”
“Good.”
“Now, what’s going on with you? Why were you coming at me like a rabid pitbull who hasn’t eaten in a week?”
“Because you’re the asshole who hurt my sister,” she says matter-of-factly.
“True, but that was more. You basically said all men are liars, which isn’t like you. Is it Chris? Did he lie to you about something?” I ask, gauging her reaction. My question hits bullseye, her eyes watering once more.
“Doesn’t matter,” she whispers.
“It does,” I say, kicking the chair across from me away from the table. “Sit.”
She does, and without any sass, which tells me this is something that’s really bothering her. But when she starts talking, I’m left stunned by her admission. My blood boils and my heart breaks, and for the first time since last night, I’m thinking about someone other than Abby Summer.
I’m thinking of how I can kill Chris Jacobson and make it look like an accident.
