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“So, because you don’t truly know the people you write about, that makes it okay to spread lies about them?”
“When I wrote that story on Leah, I was brand-new to the team and was trying to make something of myself.” The less she denies, the more it stings. Each unveiled truth is more damning than the last. “That doesn’t make it okay, and I own that. But whether I liked it—whether Ibelievedit—or not, I was just doing my job.”
“Is that all I am to you? A job?” I’m struggling to keep my composure after all but crawling on my hands and knees, confessing my love for her.
“No,” she rushes to say. “Of course not.”
“Then help me understand what went through your mind last night when you accepted my gift, my body, mytrustwhile pretending you weren’t about to ruin my life.”
Fucking hell. I can barely breathe as I reach for the door, but in a blur, she ducks around me and plasters her back against it.
I’m already grieving her as I watch her soft brown eyes well with tears. The pain of losing her is so real, it feels like my muscles are detaching from every bone in my body. “Exactly how did you think this was going to work out for you, Heather?”
“I’m so sorry, Marcus.” The hitch in her chest forces her to pause, but then her voice wobbles through a sob. “I-I’ve told you everything. Let me talk to my editor. L-let me find a way to fix this, please.”
With our faces just inches apart, I give her nothing but silence, furious for craving the press of her velvet lips on mine regardless of what she’s done.
We glare at each other, and I nearly cave at the tear spilling from her bottom lash and whispering down the edge of her mouth.
“A lie for a lie,” I say, gently swiping the trail it leaves behind. She tilts her face into my palm with a stuttering exhale, and for a heartbeat longer, I hold her there before finally twisting the knob at her back. “Consider us even.”
CHAPTERTWENTY-FOUR
Heather
Iwish I could say I’m surprised Turner outed me, but I feel nothing but the familiarity of bitter solitude as I load my belongings into the car.
Marcus was right. What the hell was I thinking?
But the truth is, I wasn’t… not enough about the consequences, anyway. I was too busy absorbing every word and touch. Absorbing an unbelievable kind of love that he’d curated just for me.
I took advantage of him the way I’ve always feared being taken advantage of, and I wish it hadn’t taken hurting him to see how wrong and selfish that was. How loving someone is a two-way street, and it can’t survive when only one person gives and the other takes.
The wind carries a hint of mixed spices that has my fingers gripping the lip of the trunk.
It’s been hours since he left, but that doesn’t stop me from hoping he’s there when I turn.
Like a shadow, a dark nose appears next to my elbow. “Sparrow?”
I follow the length of her face up to a set of feisty eyes.
She bobs her head, whinnying sharply before clamping her teeth on the bottom of my shirt and yanking me backward.
“Quit that, you stubborn ass,” I say as I wrestle with her, but she keeps tugging until I’m dragged several feet from the car.
When I finally manage to pop my shirt free, I hold up the shredded edge, now covered in stains, while her lips peel back with an obnoxious neigh.
“I’m sorry, okay?” I say once she’s had her fit. “But his mind is made up.”
“And what about yours?” Penelope asks, rounding Sparrow’s flank with an arched brow.
Jango pants furiously as he trudges his old body toward me to sit at my feet. I busy my hands with rubbing the top of his head.
“If you’re here to talk me out of writing the story on Marcus, let me save you the trouble.” Turning away from them, I slam the trunk. “I didn’t write it, and I don’t plan to.”
“I figured.”
My hands still as I slowly turn toward her. “How?”
