Chapter 52
1 WEEK BEFORE
The crash of a plate cut deep to my spine, Lee’s arms sweeping everything off the table in one angry sweep. He was drunk, his eyes bleary, his announcement made by a steady and consistent lean on the doorbell between the guest house and main home. I had pulled on a robe and taken the elevator, the incessant buzz of the bell ringing through the elevator, the only foreshadowing of the train wreck that greeted me.
“I never wanted this! You wormed your way in my fucking life and now that you have me, you don’t want me!” Lee breathed hard, his chest rising and falling, eyes wide, the hurt twisting his features.
“Of course I want you. I love you.”
“But you’re still with him! What kind of sick twisted girl are you? I swear to God, I can’t… I can’t take this. I can’t know that you’re going back and fucking him. It is killing me. I can’t think of him touching you.” He stared at me, his eyes pools of hurt, so much emotion swirling through them. His chest shook when he gasped, and he exhaled hard, his fingers shaking as he reached out, pulled me to him and looked into my eyes. “Tell me you love me.”
“I love you.” I met his stare and wished that he understood, my own eyes filling with tears.
“Tell me again.”
“I love you.”
He ripped at my pants, pulling the material down with one hand while the other gripped my neck so hard that it hurt. He was frantic, he was needy, and when he pushed inside of me I was not ready, and he was so hard, and I gasped for a different reason but ohmygod I did love this man.
“I can’t,” he gasped, pulling me to the edge of the table, the edge biting into my ass as his hands held me in place, and his hips started to move. “I can’t lose you, Lana. You are my everything.” His mouth shuddered against my collarbone as he dropped his head, the soft touch of his lips on that skin different than every other piece in this equation and I arched underneath his hands, pushed against his cock and pulled his head against my neck, his mouth following suit, kissing and biting the skin, making a possessive trail and he pulled and pushed and branded me with his cock, the rhythm increasing and I moaned, my hands holding onto his skin, the muscles under my fingers flexing as he fucked me with his feelings.
Then his mouth opened against my skin and he cried out, a moan of my name, his thrusts slowing as he emptied himself inside of me. Our bodies slowed, his final thrusts hard and deep, and then he stopped. Stayed inside of me while he gasped against my neck. “Tell me.”
“I love you.”
Then he picked me up and carried me to our bed. Laid me down and rolled me, so my back was against his chest, his arm wrapped around me, pulling me tightly in. He was so much larger, the tuck of my body putting his mouth against the top of my head.
“I don’t know what to do.” His voice was blurry and soft in the dark room, words almost lost in the hum of the fan. “I love you too much to leave you. But I can’t do this. It is killing me.” Then he said the words I dreaded, the ones I never wanted to hear but that had stalked me in my dreams. “You have to choose. You have to.”
Ten minutes later, his breath evened out. I laid there, his arms relaxing around me, and began to cry. Sometimes getting everything you ever wanted sucked.
It had been long enough. Any love there was would have to be strong enough. It was time. I needed to rip the roof off all of our lies.
