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All the hair on my neck stands up, and when I turn around and see River’s face, mixed feelings from lust to rage surface.
She’s only standing a couple of feet from me, her scent intoxicating my senses as soon as I step back into the diner.
Looking up at me with her bright green eyes and blonde hair pulled into a side braid, she sways on her feet nervously.
Swallowing hard, I pin my eyes to her as my jaw clenches.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” are the first words to spew out of my mouth. They come out harsher than I intended, but considering everything I’ve been through, it’s not entirely unmerited.
In fact, I think it’s more than deserving.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
RIVER
“What the fuck are you doing here?”
His words sting, but I’m not exactly sure what I expected. After not calling him for three months, now here I am in Texas looking directly at a man who seems heartbroken and pained to see me again.
Not that I could blame him entirely. I can only hope he’ll forgive me, but I wouldn’t exactly blame him if he didn’t.
Seeing him after all this time has so many mixed feelings and old memories surfacing. The moment I saw him walk into the diner, I knew it was my chance to approach him. I had planned on calling him once I was settled into my room to ask if we could meet up, but him being here brought us face-to-face much sooner than I’d anticipated.
I’d been sitting here for the last two hours thinking of what I’d say when I finally saw him again, thinking about how I’d explain why I didn’t call or why I was here now. The more I thought about it, the more I lost the courage to reach out to him.
I had needed more time. Guess fate had other plans. It was now or never.
“I came to see you,” I finally respond, my bottom lip trembling at the way he’s looking at me. He’s angry, so angry. I can see it. Hell, I can feel it steaming off his skin.
He pulls his cap off his head and brushes a hand roughly through his hair. The same locks I used to fist my own fingers through not too long ago.
“Can we go somewhere to talk?” I ask once he doesn’t say anything. He’s just standing and staring, and I can tell his mind is running a thousand miles an hour.
Before he can respond, someone walks in through the door, bumping Alex and pushing him forward right into me. The guy mutters a weak, “Sorry,” and keeps walking. Meanwhile, my heart beats faster and harder now that Alex’s arms are wrapped around my waist to steady me.
“Sorry.” His voice is just above a whisper, and as he stands only inches away from me, it feels like we’re the only two people in here.
I watch his throat as he swallows hard. This isn’t how I wanted us to reunite, but regardless, I came here on a mission and am going to tell him what I came all this way for.
“Yeah, let’s talk.” He nudges his head toward the door, and I follow him out, so we’re not in the doorway of the diner anymore. “Where are you staying?” He faces me and asks when we’re several feet away from the entrance.
“Uh, this countryside bed and breakfast. I rented a car and was just about to head over there before I saw this diner and decided to stop and eat first.” I don’t admit that I stopped to grab a snack just twenty minutes before that.
The corner of his lips tilts up in a mock grin. “Of course.” He fidgets with his hat and hair some more. “That’s my family’s B&B,” he tells me, and when I lower my eyes, covering the guilt over my face, he snorts. “I’m betting you knew that though.”
I nod before slowly looking back up at him. “I wasn’t sure if you’d give me a chance to explain, so I figured the closer I was to you, the better chance I had.”
“What?” he growls, whipping his head. He pulls his brows together, looking more pissed off than before. “You honestly thought I’d turn you away? You think that little of me?”
I shrug, feeling worse. “No, I just wasn’t sure what state of mind you were in since—”
“Since you chose to end things without giving me a damn chance to say goodbye?” he interrupts, his voice deep and rough. “Or since you neglected to call me to at least say that you didn’t want to keep in contact? Or since you left things up in the air without giving me any kind of explanation? Do you know what I’ve been through these last three months wonderin’? Is that really what Key West meant to you? Because then I guess I read the entire situation wrong.”
