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Rearing back as if slapped, I frown. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I saw you with Bernard.” He spits the name.
The floor creaks as I shift my weight, cocking my hips to the side. “Right. And what did you see?”
“I saw you with a man who would be a much better match than I could ever be.” He spreads his arms. “You got what you wanted, Jen. We won. You said if we had sex, it would help us focus on the competition, and it did. It’s over now.”
“So that’s it?” I’m barely able to force the words out. “That’s all this past month meant to you?” A weird mix of confusion and hurt coagulates in my throat.
I don’t even know this man.
“You have no idea what this month meant to me,” Fallon says, turning back to his bags.
“No, you’re right. And while we’re discussing things I don’t know, how about you tell me where you were the past six months? Visiting prison three times a week? Going to see your old gang members?” He freezes, and I snort. “That’s right, I found out about that. Why didn’t you tell me? Who even are you?”
“Jen.”
“You know what, I’m getting real sick of men trying to use me for what they need. Bernard wanted to use me to be the shiny new jewel in his stupid pastry king crown. You wanted to use me for… Shit, I don’t know. Sex? To win the cash prize? To get back at me for rejecting you?” Is it so much to ask that a man actually want me? “Is that why you came back after six months incommunicado?”
“No.” His voice is low, vehement.
“Right. And I’m supposed to just believe that? You haven’t told me anything about you. I worked with you for three years and I didn’t even know you had a sister!”
I’m shaking. The words are coming out of me so fast I can hardly breathe. The past month meant something to me, but Fallon just wants to pack up and leave again.
How fucking stupid can I be?
There’s no such thing as unconditional love and support. He never felt the way I do.
“Why didn’t you tell me anything about yourself, Fallon? Was the past month all fake to you?”
Fallon whirls on me, his eyes wild. “Fake?”
“You heard me. We’ve known each other for years, and you act like you care about me, but here you are packing up and leaving at the first chance. I find out through my parents, of all people, that you were in prison for three years when you were younger!” I throw my hands out to the side. “I was so stupid to think you cared about me for me. So fucking naïve—and I still haven’t learned my lesson, because I thought I was in love with you, but I don’t know a damn thing about you. I’ve never even seen you without a shirt on!”
“You want to see me shirtless?” Fallon seethes. “Fine.” Grabbing the neck of his shirt near his nape, Fallon rips his shirt off in one smooth motion.
The first thing I notice is that Fallon’s body is absolutely droolworthy. I’m mourning the past month, when I could have kissed every hard inch of his chest, traced the lines of his muscular stomach with my tongue. I could have rubbed my lips against his coarse chest hair and run my tongue over the flat discs of his nipples. I could have kissed his stomach and spread my hands over his skin, and woken up wrapped up in the scent and heat of him.
The second thing I notice is Fallon looks furious, staring me down with fire in his gaze. “This is what you wanted to see?”
“Uh…yes?” I frown. What is he getting at?
Fallon spins around, arms spreading wide. His muscles pop and writhe under his skin, and he looks like a work of art. Across his back, a massive tattoo stretches over his shoulder blades and wraps around his ribs. Two snakes twist around an anatomically accurate black heart. Each snake scale is shaded to perfection, the heart dripping black blood from each severed artery.
It’s…beautiful. Unexpected and kind of dark, but beautiful. I knew he had a tattoo, but I never expected it would look like that.
“Look at it, Jen,” Fallon says, his voice losing its edge. “This is who I am.”
I frown. “You’re…tattooed?” I’m not seeing the issue. Personally, I have no interest in getting inked, but I don’t have a problem with them. Fallon’s is hot.
“I got this tattoo when I was eighteen. My dumb friends and I wanted to join a ‘brotherhood,’ as we called it.” Shirt still grasped in his clenched fist, he turns to face me. “A gang.” He snorts. “We weren’t the smartest kids on the block.”
“I think it’s kind of beautiful,” I tell him honestly.
“No, you don’t.”
My own shirt rasps against my skin as I cross my arms, anger flaring in my chest. I’m getting real sick of people telling me how I should feel and act. “Yes, I do.”
