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I cringed inwardly. I really did owe her so big. Even if she was telling him right now to just cut his losses and send me packing, she’d gone above and beyond by vouching for me and for giving me any advice in the first place. Not to mention spelling out to me exactly how badly I’d fucked up a year ago. Of course I’d known that, and getting a verbal beatdown had sucked, but I didn’twantanyone to go easy on me. The last thing in the world I deserved was friends who tried to make excuses for me or poured on the platitudes about mistakes and forgiveness. I wanted her tough love. The “you absolute dipshit” and “how did you not realize what a keeper you had?”, followed by “you screwed up big time, but you’ll get through this.” I adored her unvarnished honesty and her unconditional love and friendship; she wouldn’t pull punches about how bad I’d fucked up, but she still stood by me as my friend and helped me through the worst of it.
And by the looks of it, she was talking Owen down at least somewhat. I didn’t have to hear what she was saying to know she wasn’t telling him to give me another chance, that he’d overreacted, or that mistakes happened. If I had to guess, she was filling him in, word for word, on our conversation from earlier. Which was good—the more he heard from her, the more he’d hopefully believe that I’d come over here with every intention of telling him the truth.
As she spoke, his posture relaxed minutely. The anger ebbed, and though he wouldn’t look at me as he worked his jaw and listened to Lia, his expression moved toward resignation.
Finally, he said, “Okay. Thanks for filling me in.”
A moment later, they ended the call, and he gave back my phone. I didn’t know what to say, so I just pocketed the phone and studied him, waiting for him to give his verdict.
Owen leaned against the doorframe, looking anywhere but at me. Was he waiting for me to say something? Because I was at a complete loss. I’d come here ready to confess my sins. This? I hadn’t been ready for this, and I still didn’t know how to address it. Even apologizing again didn’t seem like the right thing to do. It would just sound hollow and empty; something akin to “you’re only sorry because you got caught.”
After an age had passed, he pushed himself off the doorframe, lifted his gaze, and fixed tired, wet eyes on me. “I need some time to process this.”
And without any further preamble, without waiting for me to respond, he stepped back into the condo and closed the door.
Staring at the door, I wavered on my feet. I could barely get my breath to move. I wondered if it would’ve hurt less if he’d slammed it in my face the way he’d slammed it behind me the night I’d left. All I knew was that quietly shutting it had sent my heart into my feet, and the click of the deadbolt may as well have been gunfire.
I also knew that Owen wanted me to leave.
So… I left.
On autopilot, I shuffled back to the elevator and requested the ground floor. I made it to my car somehow, and I started the engine. Then I just… sat there. Staring up at the building. Hovering in a bizarre emotional place between physically hurting and absolutely numb.
I should’ve told him.
I should’ve been honest with him.
Closing my eyes, I pushed out a ragged breath.
I should’ve just… not fucking cheated on him in the first place.
I hadn’t imagined it was possible to hate myself more than I had over the past year.
Turned out…
I was wrong.
Chapter 7
Owen
That motherfucker. That absolute asshole. That piss-poor excuse for a partner and a human being. He cheated on me? And then he pretended he hadn’t after I’d lost my memory? What the actual fuck?
Pacing in my empty condo, I alternated between seething with rage and absolutely crumbling from hurt. Sometimes I even managed both at the same time, which fucking sucked.
I couldn’t believe this. I was more lost and vulnerable than I’d ever been in my life, and the one person who knew my situation had turned out to be a complete fucking douchecanoe, and I had no idea how to process any of this. What was I supposed to do?
I needed to vent. Ideally while my blood alcohol content was dangerously high. And under normal circumstances, I had my sister and any number of friends who’d gladly get drunk with me so we could bitch about whoever’s ex-partner had fucked up most recently.
These were anything but normal circumstances, though. I couldn’t talk to any of them now. Not without first explaining what was going on with my memory, and I was way too worked up and freaked out to go over that again. No, I needed to cut right to the part that had me livid and devastated and…
How the hell could hecheaton me?
What the fuck, Matteo?
This was too much. All of it. Ironically, the thing I wanted more than anything to was to forget. Forget about waking up in an unfamiliar place. Forget about Matteo being so sweet and kind. Forget about him actually being a bottom-feeding slimeball who couldn’t keep his dick in his pants.
I didn’t want to forget it all permanently, but I did want to forget it today.
