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“So why don’t you quit? You don’thaveto work for him, right? You can get your own job somewhere else?”
“Ha. Yeah, right. With what qualifications?” Hannah glares. I shrug, feeling pretty useless right now. “You don’t get it, Colt. It’s fine, you never had to worry. Your parents were…”
“Assholes,” I growl, cutting in before she can even think about paying them any credit for a shitty upbringing. “And yours aren’t. At least they weren’t the last time I checked.”
Hannah rolls my arm from around her and closes her body off from me. Suddenly the warmth in the room has escaped into the wintery snowstorm outside.
“Exactly. You disappeared, Colt. You left without saying a word. No one knew where you went. Still, to this day, no one knows where you are.”
She runs a gut-kicking glare the length of me. I could tell her she’s the one who didn’t return my calls for days after the event. Instead, I stare at her lips as they move, remembering that kiss.God.It’s fucking torture. I’ve wanted her so much, so badly my entire life. She ruined me for anyone else and my heart has belonged to her ever since that night I laid the kiss on her.
“You don’t know what it’s like to have it tough. Up here all alone…” She looks around the cabin. “I wouldn’t expect you to understand. You have everything, Colt. Everything.”
A burning feeling ignites. I rise from the sofa, placing the mug of tea to the table, trying my best to hold the burning split between my eyes.
“You wanna know why I left, Hannah?” I feel my heart racing.
This isn’t how I had planned the reunion in my head. When I laid awake at night thinking about her, I pictured being a hell of a lot closer to her than we are right now.
“You really wanna know?” My chest is fucking exploding with emotion I haven’t felt in years. “It was because of you. Did you ever stop to think about that while you’re drowning in your own self-pity? Huh?”
She straightens. “Me? What the hell did I do?”
I fall to my knees, grab either side of her face and hold her steady. She’s so painfully beautiful. So goddamn gorgeous. And stubborn.
Jesus Christ.
She hasn’t changed. And that’s the damn problem.
She’s still just as wonderful as I remember.
“This. You did this.”
I pull her into me, our lips colliding together with a heat that detonates instantly. A twist inside my chest grips me hard and I slide a tongue across Hannah’s soft lips. She parts them, allowing me in only for a moment, but it’s long enough for me to taste her again.
I want more.
I want her.
I want to make her feel as good on the inside as she makes me feel. She shouldn’t be saying these things about herself.
I step back, breaking the kiss and releasing my hard grasp.
“Ten years.” My voice is raspy and firm. It’s shaky and fucking terrified at the way she’s destroying me inside. “It took me ten years to get a grip on living up here. I’ve been on the brink of falling to a devasting death many times. And you know what? There are times when I wouldn’t have cared if I did die up here all alone. And it’s all because of you. Don’t tell me I don’t understand what it’s like to have it tough. Every day up here has been a battle.”
Hannah flicks her eyes up at me. Something painful pulls in my chest but I race out the back door and don’t look back.
Even when the door crashes to the floor, obviously sliding of the hinges again. Fucking shitty cabin.
I leave it hanging on its hinges. Fuck it.
I storm through the wind, shielding my eyes against the snow. Short of breath, I reach inside the vehicle sitting in my driveway and twist the keys. They fall in my hand and I just stare at them, struggling to even out the thoughts in my mind.
She can’t leave. She can never leave.
I crawl beneath the vehicle, locate the fuel line and reach for the pocketknife attached to my belt.
Tears swell in my eyes as gas spills around me the moment the line breaks. Liquid flows, burning my nose and narrowly missing my mouth.
