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“Because I’m your best friend and we need to talk this out. I’ve let you have a few days, but now I need you to lay it all out for me so I know what it’ll take to fix this. I miss you, Laney.”
Now it’s not just my gut clenching but my heart. God, this is fucking hard. I’ve loved this man for years, and hurting him feels a lot like hurting myself, but I know it’s time. I can’t keep going on like this.
Bile rises in my throat as a riot of nerves overwhelms me. This is it. He’s left me no choice but to lay it all out right now.
“Fine, let’s talk inside.”
We walk into the room, and I move to my coat closet to put away my jacket and purse. As soon as the door clicks shut, he speaks.
“I can’t lose you, Laney. I’ll do whatever it takes to keep you in my life. That’s a promise. And right now I need you more than ever.” He rubs his black hair in a nervous gesture he’s had for years. “My new PR team wants me to have a public relationship—a fake one—for the next six months to help repair my image. I don’t want to do it unless I can pick the woman, and I want you.”
The earnest expression on his face makes my stomach somersault—and not in a good way.
“You know me,” he says. “We already spend a ton of time together. It won’t feel awkward or forced to be seen in public on dates together. We can work on the fine details of what this all entails, but I need you, more than I ever have. You’re the only woman I can do this with. And maybe we can even take that time to work through our own issues. I know you’re mad at me about my birthday—”
“This isn’t about your birthday.”
His mouth snaps shut and his brows furrow. “It’s not?”
“No, it’s not.”
“Then what’s it about?”
I’m exhausted from this conversation and the hardest part hasn’t even happened yet. “Dom…”
He steps closer, panic flaring in those light-blue eyes that have always held me hostage. “I’ll give you whatever you want if you agree to do this with me, Laney. If you want space from me afterward, I’ll give it to you, even if it fucking kills me.”
I swallow thickly and then clear my throat. “Even if I tell you I don’t want to see or talk to you for a year…or longer?”
His jaw clenches and his nose flares, but then he nods. I know him well enough to know it’s probably not that simple, and honestly, I don’t think I can last six more months of this. I doubt he’ll even want to do this fake relationship with me once I confess the secret I’ve kept from him for years.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea, Dom. I can’t pretend to be your girlfriend,” I say, swallowing down the building anxiety at finally confessing my feelings. My heart races and my breaths get short.
“Why not?” he asks, sounding genuinely confused now.
I close my eyes, because I can’t bear to see the look of pity I know will appear in his gorgeous eyes when I spill my heart. “Because I love you.”
“I love you too, but I don’t see—”
“No. I’m in love with you.”
Silence.
Utterly terrifying silence that leaves only the booming sound of my heart racing in my ears. I can’t believe I just told him that. I can’t believe I really did it, after all this time of holding back. Saying the words themselves was shockingly easy. It’s the deafening silence that feels like a painful eternity in limbo, but I can’t take back the words now that they’re out there. I can’t pretend I was joking. He’d know.
There’s no going back.
More importantly, I don’t want to.
I’ve kept my feelings to myself for too long. If I really want a new beginning, then it’s time to be brutally and painfully honest.
After what feels like five minutes, but is likely only one, I can’t take the silence anymore, so I open my eyes. His crystal-blue gaze is locked on my face, but it isn’t filled with the pity I expected. There’s a deeper emotion there I can’t name and that almost scares me more. He’s not reacting the way I thought he would. He’s not reacting at all. He seems frozen as he stares at me with his intense expression.
I stare at him for another minute, thinking he’ll snap out of it and say something—anything—but he doesn’t.
The minutes stretch longer and longer as we stare at each other until my heart is racing so fast, it’s all I can hear.
“Dom?”
