“Hey,” I say when he turns his back on me again. He was going to skip out without saying a thing. Hurt flickers through me that I try to justify and rationalize, and then give up all hope on. “What’s going on?”
“It was a moment of weakness.”
“What was?” I ask, but I already know the answer.
“Me coming here.”
“Weakness?” I laugh, the irony not lost on me that his weakness is akin to my mistake. My temper fires on a dime as I study him. He’s obviously still upset, but his choice to skip out is his way of using me . . . what feels like again. “You want to know what weakness is?” I take a step closer to him. “It’s me baring my soul to you. It’s me standing in a parking lot in front of an arena somewhere telling you exactly how I feel. That I’m willing to put my professional aspirations—ones dictated by my father and to benefit my family—aside, because of and for you. It’s me standing there telling you that it’s you. It’s always been you. The one I walked away from three years ago because I was too afraid of how I felt for you, and the one I walked into this time still afraid but with a job to do. It’s you, you asshole, and once again, I shouldn’t be surprised that you’re going to take the chickenshit way out and sneak away instead of face me and talk to me.”
I suck in a ragged breath, because my body is trembling and my temper is wired as I stare at him and wait for a reaction—anything other than the pained look. He’s going to do the same thing as last time and let me go.
“You don’t get it,” he says with a shake of his head.
“Then make me get it,” I shout, closing the distance between us. After how he made me feel last night—suddenly afraid of losing him but knowing if he lets me push him away again, he wasn’t good enough for me in the first place—I’m fed up. “You don’t get to walk in here like you did last night and need me and then leave without saying a word.”
“Or what?”
“Or it will never happen again.” My voice is a low, threatening warning.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” He laughs the question out.
“It means I’m not yours to use, Hunter. I’m the shiny toy in the store you can’t have. You visit every once in a while so you can take me down and play with me so long as you put me back on the shelf when you’re done.”
“Fuck this, Dekk.” He gives a shake of his head as he moves toward the door. “You wouldn’t understand. You wouldn’t want to understand.”
“Then make me,” I scream, as I stalk after him. “Make me understand. Talk to me and tell me what I need to know, because I’m here, real and bleeding emotion while you’re standing there acting like it’s not a big fucking deal when it’s everything to me. When I’m realizing you’re more to me than I want to admit.”
“Dekker.” He stops with his hand on the door and hangs his head, my name an apology I don’t want to hear.
Tears well in my eyes. Just as I realize what I want—as I realize I want to see where things can go with us and, fuck yes, it’s scary and the end isn’t known and hurt is probably preordained . . . but I want to take a chance and figure that out.
Hurt reigns.
Embarrassment surges.
Anger wins.
“Then go. Get out. If you can’t face me, I don’t want to see you again either.” Emotion drives my words as my heart jumps in my throat, and what’s at stake hits me full force.
He turns and looks at me. His big body framed in the small entryway, and I swear to God if the tumultuous emotions in his eyes could be expressed, I’d be drowning in them. Every single one.
“You don’t mean that.” His eyes hold mine, the lines etched in his face so full of sadness that I look away when I speak my next words, my temper faltering despite my self-worth holding strong.
“I’m done being used. Just done.” I turn my back on him and walk to my bedroom.
Let him leave.
Let him walk out.
Each time I repeat the words my heart hurts. Each time I say them in my head, I’m reminded how damn gullible I am. First to fall back in bed with him, then to let Brexton’s words take hold and grow and evolve over the past two weeks. I began to believe that a true connection—a future—could be possible. The revelations last night with him in my arms making me think he realized there was more to us too.
And now this.
I brush my teeth with a vigor that might make a dentist cringe, but it’s easier to focus on my hygiene than to chase after him in the hallway to the elevator like a lovesick woman with zero self-worth.
It’s only when I dry my face off, when it’s buried in the hand towel that I let the tears that have worked themselves up slip over. It’s only when I let the disappointment hit me, and the hope I had worked up in my own mind to dissipate.
I stand there with my eyes closed and try to suck it up.
“Do you know what it’s like to feel like you don’t deserve anything?” Hunter’s voice shocks my eyes open, and a gasp falls from my lips. He didn’t leave? “Do you know what it’s like to live a life where your every step, your every thought, your every action is driven by how you can make amends for the wrongs you created?”
I take a step toward him, shaking my head as I try to follow him. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, how do I deserve this life? How do I deserve someone like you when for as long as I can remember, I was told I don’t? I made myself think I didn’t.” His voice breaks and the pain, God, the pain, is so palpable I can feel it ricocheting in the space between us. “How do I let you walk into and be a part of my life when everything I’ve done up until this point, every person I’ve pushed away, everything I’ve walked away from, is another way to punish myself for what I did to Jonah and my parents.”
My body jolts at his admission and so does his. I watch him physically reject the words he just said, almost as if it’s the first time he’s ever heard them.
And just as quickly as I see it, Hunter pulls away physically by turning on his heels and jogging toward the door.
“No. Hunter,” I call after him, and luckily, he’s distracted by the emotions or else I never would be able to catch up to him and stand in front of the door like I do.
“Get out of the way, Dekker.” His face is a mask of fury and shame, and it breaks my heart to see such distress in his every muscle.
“No. I’m not letting you walk out this door. I’m not letting you believe for another goddamn second that you don’t deserve the success you have, the accolades you’ve achieved, or the love and affection you deserve.” I’m breathless when I finally finish speaking, but I feel like I’m on borrowed time to keep him here and make him believe what I’ve said.
“No, I don’t.” He shakes his head and looks at me like a little boy wanting to believe but not trusting that he should.
“Yes, you do,” I say and take a step forward.
“You don’t know what happened. You don’t understand—”
“Then make me understand. Sit down and tell me everything and get the weight you’re carrying off your shoulders.”