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I exhaled, but hardly any air came out.
I hadn’t been able to hold much air at all.
Everything in my chest—my heart, lungs, the tops of my breasts—was all burning.
“You just couldn’t leave the mark without stopping to taste her. Isn’t that fucking poetic?”
His movements were quick—something I was noticing that I hadn’t before—and his hands were now on my face, holding me as he said, “The more I watched you, the more my feelings grew. You’re fascinating. Not when you’re in your private room—although you are there too—but when you’re out running and when you’re home alone and when you’re hanging out with Scarlett. I’m mesmerized by you, Pepper.”
Air was moving now.
In fact, it was coming in so fast that I was on the verge of hyperventilating.
“You watched me during my runs? And at home? And when I was with Scarlett?”
He nodded. “I never took my eyes off you—don’t forget; that was what I had been hired to do.” His thumbs traced around my lips.
Since Bale had been hired, I’d had no privacy. He’d watched my every move.
Every breath.
Every … touch.
Oh God, the intimate moments were adding up in my head.
The times I’d fingered myself to his scenes.
The number of times I’d rewatched his acts of denial.
“Don’t forget; you were watching me too, Pepper.”
He was in my head again.
But really, he’d been in my head since the day he had passed through the doors of Lush, and he’d been a ghost, haunting the halls of my life.
Watching.
Reacting.
Molding to what I needed.
“I couldn’t look away from you,” he said softly. “And the more I stared, the more my feelings began to grow. When you joined me in your private room, they doubled. The moment I brought you to Jacob’s house”—he tilted my face up toward his—“I knew it was going to be impossible to walk away from you.”
“But you did.”
“I had no choice. I had a job to report to, but I’ve still been watching and making sure that you stayed safe. I did everything I could from behind the scenes to ensure that. It’s just gotten to a point where I can’t protect you unless you’re with me.”
The quivers were back in my body, and I shook my head, pushing his grip away, adding space between us. And when I did, it was like I’d stepped out of a trance, the reality of everything hitting me.
“With you?” I ground my teeth together after I repeated his words. “How can I possibly be with you after everything you’ve done?” My hand moved to my heart, pushing, twisting to get the ache to stop. “The list, at this point, is endless, Bale.” I laughed again. “A name that’s not even yours.”
My stomach clenched as I thought about the feelings I’d had for him while we were downstairs in my room.
The way I’d hurt for him to return.
The way I had been so desperate to understand his departure.
“You know, you could have just as easily knocked on my door and had this conversation with me. You didn’t have to make things sexual and make me believe there could be something between us before showing me how much of a monster you are.” I glanced around the apartment—a space that had given me so much comfort over the years, that I’d worked so hard to achieve.
