They spoke simultaneously.
“I thought you and I could—”
“About last night—”
They both stopped at the same time. She cringed at the flash of pain across his face.
He was just staring at her. What could she do but stare back at him, try to keep her gaze level, convince him that she was right? Not only was having sex—amazing, life changing sex, but she wasnotgoing to dwell on it any more—the night before a major competition ill advised, but ruining a friendship? He was the best thing in her life; she did not want that to change. Three weeks of a roller coaster of trauma and emotions had just led to a moment of weakness. That was it. Absolutely.
Her heart reared in protest, but she forced it to be silent.
“Look, Patrick—” She hesitated, unsure what she was going to say.
“Don’t.” His voice was hoarse, his beautiful, kind eyes full of hurt. “Don’t. Don’t ‘about last night’ me.”
“It was a mistake.” Even she could hear the lie, could hear it tearing a deeper rift between them. Maybe it could open a hole in the fabric of the universe, and she could dive into that. That would be preferable to having to look at him.
He put his hands over his face, but his mouth contorted with pain. He ran his hands through his hair instead. “You don’t mean that. You—you can’t mean that.”
Her heart sank lower in her stomach. She would really appreciate a wormhole. “I do. It’s just—it’s all too much. I don’t know what I was thinking last night. The dance and the fight and this whole stalker thing, and there were just all these emotions, and I-I think I got carried away.”
He turned away from her, and she grimaced at the bruises and cuts on his back. Then she realized he had not sustained all of those in his fight with Mikhail, and a flush rocketed across her skin.
“Patrick—”
“I’m in love with you.” He turned back to face her, his features set in an expression of pleading. “Last night was the single greatest thing that has ever happened to me.”
She recoiled as if he had slapped her, felt the words settle somewhere deep in her heart, her brain.
“You pretending it was a mistake…” He swallowed deeply. “I was there last night, Anita. You can lie to yourself, but I know you.”
“Patrick—” Seriously, she wasn’t going to throw up, was she?
He suddenly moved toward her, took her hands in his, looked straight at her. Fear and desire pounded in her chest,and her hands burned where he touched. But fire burns out.Fire doesn’t help set up the studio for the Saturday night party or pay the bills or get more ice when you run out in the middle of an event. Fire doesn’t want to hear about a bad day or accept mistakes.
“Ani,” he whispered, his voice soft and endearing. She couldn’t look away, she couldn’t. “Ani, just tell me. Tell me you don’t feel the same way, and I’ll—” He swallowed, the look on his face full of grief. “—I’ll try to go back to being friends. I’ll try. But tell me the truth. I deserve at least the truth, right?”
No, no.
Every memory from the last few weeks, the last umpteen years, crept along her skin and etched itself into place. He was her best friend. He loved her,lovedher. He deserved only the best. He did deserve the truth.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, and he backed slowly away. “I’m so sorry, Patrick, but I—I don’t love you.”
He stalked away, slamming the adjoining door behind him.
Thank goodness she hadn’t yet finished her eye makeup. It would have been hell to have to clean up the mascara running free down her cheeks.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Patrick stormed down the hallway toward the hotel gym.
What the actual fuck had just happened?
He used his hotel room card to enter the small gym, grabbed a towel and a bottle of water from the entryway, and headed straight for the elliptical machine.
He chose a pre-programmed HIIT routine, probably a mistake given the extent of his bruising, but he was past caring. He needed something else to throb besides his broken heart.
He ignored the television. He cranked up the volume on his earbuds to drown out the panting of the middle-aged gentleman next to him, and the even breathing of the toned twenty-year-old with the long brunette ponytail across the room.Shehad looked at him as he had entered. That woman he had never met, who was pretty and nubile, had eyed him from her peripheral vision, was eyeing him now as he started moving on the machine.
