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“Yes.” The twinge in my chest doesn’t agree.
“Anything for you.” He sighs.
“Swear it,” I state in a flat voice despite the way my vision blurs from unshed tears.
“I promise not to come back here.” He rolls his luggage toward the door. His hand hesitates around the knob before he looks back. “I’m sorry for hurting you. I wish I was different. Stronger.Sober.”
I wrap my arms around myself and turn away, hiding the tears streaming down my cheeks. With one last sigh, Cal shuts the door to his room, leaving me alone to crumble. I pull my legs up against my chest and cry until my eyes swell and my head feels like it might explode.
I’m not sure how long I stay in his bedroom, crying myself hoarse, all while wishing for Cal to come back and claim that this all was some sick joke.
Brady Kane comes into the room with furrowed white brows. “Where did Cal go?”
I look up at him with tear-stained cheeks. “He left.”
The wrinkled skin around his blue eyes softens as he takes me in. “Oh, Alana.” He pulls me into his arms. “I’m so sorry. I thoughtsomething like this might happen.”
“How?”
His lips press together.
More tears leak from my eyes. “Why wasn’t I good enough?” For my dad. For Antonella. For Cal. It always feels as if I’m fighting everyone to stay when all they want to do is leave.
He rubs my back. “This has nothing to do with you.”
“Doesn’t it? If Cal loved me, he would have stayed. He would have fought for us.”
“He can’t even fight for himself right now, let alone you.”
I shake my head. “I didn’t want him to go.”
“Anyone who has spent time around you two would know that.”
The ache in my chest intensifies. “But I made him promise to never come back.”
His hand moves in small, soothing circles. “Is that what you want?”
I sob against Brady’s chest. “Yes? No? I don’t know.”
“Things will be okay. I’ll make sure of it.”
Except here I am, six years later and still feeling everything but okay.
Things are different now. You’re not the same broken-hearted girl anymore.
Aren’t I, though? Because all it takes is one interaction with Cal for me to remember everything I spent the last six years trying to forget.
The curve of his lips as he flashes me a smile.
The tug in my chest that always draws me back to him despite all the years of hurt.
The warmth that spreads through my body whenever he cracks a joke, threatening to melt the ice wrapped around my heart.
A part of you still loves him.
I bolt from the couch and escape to my bedroom, although the unwelcome thought follows after me like a dark, threatening storm cloud.
Just because you love him doesn’t mean you’rein lovewith him, the reasonable voice speaks up.
