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I can’t escape the confusion and hurt in her eyes this time. My gut burns cold and tight as I look at her, sitting there, small and fragile. Jeans around her ankles, marks on her face, hair disheveled. Like a wild, broken bird that’s just survived a terrible storm.
She moistens her lips. Presses her fingers tighter against her bare legs as if she’s holding herself together. “You said you loved me.”
Roughly, I say, “Aye. I did.”
“That makes me angry.”
I try to pull air into my constricted chest. “That makes me sad.”
We stare at each other until the silence becomes crushing.
“I’ve got to get some air.”
She’s still sitting there, right fucking there, where I shoved her down, when I close the door behind me and leave.
CHAPTERFIFTEEN
This is what utter destruction feels like. I’m battered. A ship washed ashore, broken on the rocks, tender cargo sprawled out for the taking.
My throat burns. My body throbs. Inside of me there’s a storm of confusion.
What the hell was that?
Kieran said he loved me.
Then he…
I don’t even know what to call that... sex. And how can I have loved it so much?
Shaky, I lean over and hug my knees. It hurts inside my heart. So fucking bad.
Eyes squeezed tight, I fight to hold myself tighter. Gathering the ship’s timbers in vain to try to set myself right upon the sea again. To keep afloat.
The emotional discharge was so violent that it left me wide open. Raw as a peeled piece of fruit. Totally, utterly vulnerable.
It’s a horrid time to lose my armor. This is no time for weakness. I have to be strong. The days ahead are the most important of my life. If I don’t survive this, I’ll never have a chance to see Finn again.
I just don’t know if I can take another tornado like that.
Love?
This isnotlove.
Screw Kieran’s kind of love.
Love in the construct of sold souls and gilded prisons is nothing. A mere excuse for brutal behavior and cruel manipulation.
But I know he was neither. He gave me the chance to say no. I didn’t take it.
It takes all my might to lift my unsteady body off the toilet. I can’t get my clothes off fast enough. My skin feels tainted, foul, and I’m conflicted inside and out.
How can I feel the things I feel for him, knowing what he represents?
Angry tears fall as I step under the hissing spray that’s rocketing out of the shower head. The water is scalding hot. I gasp from the intensity before I set to work, rubbing my skin until it’s angry-red.
I need to be clean. I need to get him out from under my skin. I need to cleanse myself of all these thoughts, wants, desires.
Why can’t I just scrub these feelings away?
