AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He shook his head, reclaiming the distance I put between us. “I can’t.”
“Don’t make this any fucking harder than it already is! I’m a train wreck. Ok? Since you’re not getting it, let me spell it out for you. I don’t deserve you!”
“You deserve more than me. You deserve everything.”
I took another step back just to watch him move with me, like magnets chasing each other. “We’re kidding ourselves here. This, whateverthisis, was never going to work. Youknowthat!”
“Youdon’tknow that!” he shot back.
“We can’t be together. It’s a death sentence. You said so yourself.”
“It won’t always be like that. Things are changing.”
“That’s great—foryou. You can go be with someone who actually fits in your world. Not some piece of shit you picked out of the gutter.”
Fury sparked in his eyes, swift and sudden. “I fucking hate how you see yourself! I hate that you’re so convinced you’re not worthy or deserving of anything good. You second-guess everything that brings you one moment of happiness. I wish I could go back in time and save you from all of it but I can’t. I can only be here for you now and in the future, if you would just fucking let me!”
If I could make him angrier, maybe he’d finally walk away. Even though I knew it was going to hurt like hell, hehadto walk away. I couldn’t drag him down with me any more than I already had.
“A for effort but I hate to break it to you—you’re wasting your fucking time.” I pushed my shoulders back, chin tipped up, channeling as much haughtiness as I could. “There is no such thing as ‘happily ever after.’ It’s a fucking fairytale. But the twenty-five thousand sitting in my bank account right now?That’sreal and that’s all that matters.”
“He paid you twenty-five thousand dollars?” Misha’s face blanched. I couldn’t tell if he was angry or sick. Probably both. It was a dual feeling I was intimately familiar with.
“Yeah.” I held his gaze, watching each little tic on his face as Mr. Calm’s mask started to slip. It was working. At any moment, he’d turn and walk away and everything would return to the status quo, the way it should have been from the beginning instead of this ridiculous detour into Fantasy Land. “So go kill him if you want, it doesn’t change what I did.”
He swallowed thickly. “Did you—”
“Fuck him? Yeah. I did. All fucking night.”
His eyes iced over and his voice dropped. “You’re lying.”
“Why else would he give me that much money?” I threw back quickly, amazed he didn’t believe me. All signs pointed to that conclusion. Maybe it was the optimist inside him,hopingit was a lie. Honestly, I had no idea if I did or not. It didn’t feel like I had but who knew how long I was unconscious before that fucker called an ambulance. I wouldn’t have been the least bit surprised if he took advantage of the situation first.
“Why do you need that much money? More importantly, why didn’t you ask me? You know I would have given it to you!”
“Oh my God! I just told you I fucked another guy and you’re pouting because I didn’t give you the chance first? Jesus Christ!” I shook my head and started down the sidewalk again, repelled from his astounding optimism like someone had gone and flipped my magnet over.
I didn’t get far.
Misha grabbed my bicep and shoved me up against a building with none of the gentleness he usually had. Bracing one hand against the wall, he made it look like we were having a casual conversation and not like he was two seconds away from ripping out my throat.
“There wasn’t enough time,” he said, his voice dipping into another growl. “From the time you entered the lobby to the time the hotel called an ambulance, there wasn’t enough time for you to order room service, let alone fuck him. You know what therewastime for? Plenty of time for you to take four times the amount of G anyone should take. Plenty of time to mix it with alcohol, almost ensuring you passed out and woke up with zero memory of the night.” I opened my mouth for a rebuttal but he kept going, leaning even closer. “I know what you’re doing, Marek, and I’m not letting you push me away. I don’t give up on the people I love no matter how cruel they try to be. You trusted me once with the truth. Why can’t you trust me now?”
I didn’t have an answer for him. It wasn’t that I didn’t trust him—I didn’t trust myself not to fuck everything up, which is exactly what I was doing. Self-sabotaging, like he said. Because it’s what I fucking did. And yet again, he showed up like some white knight, trying to save me from myself.
“What do you need that kind of money for?” Misha asked when I refused to answer his first question, the muscle along his jaw tightening.
I licked my lips and looked over his shoulder, trying to think quickly. A car loan? A lawyer? What the fuck could I tell him that he’d actually believe? Probably nothing at the moment. Iwasa liar and he knew it.
“Goddamn it, Marek!” He shoved away from the wall and took a step away from me, turning his back as his hands clenched and unclenched at his sides. “I can’t help you if you fucking keep things from me!”
“I never asked for your help!”
He whirled on me so quickly I slammed myself back into the wall to avoid running into him. “I know! I gave it to you despite yourrepeatedattempts to subvert it! Why? Because I love you! In case you didn’t hear me before, I love you, Marek, and if I have to bribe, threaten, or kill this entire fucking city to prove that to you, then so be it! Just give me a name to start with!”
His crystalline eyes sliced through my defenses. Whatever comeback I’d been trying to assemble dissolved into nothing.
“Alonzo,” I sighed, closing my eyes so I didn’t have to look at the pain on his face anymore. Pain thatIcaused. Again. “The money was for a guy named Alonzo.”
