She scrunches up her face. “I don’t know. I don’t know where the road is taking me, Danger. All I know is that I can’t continue on it with you. I can’t pretend like we’re good for each other. Honestly, we never have been.”
Needing some distance from her, I stand while the realization sinks in of what she’s just said.
It hits me hard.
She’s leaving me for Chad.
I look around the room aimlessly, hoping to find something—anything—to help, but I come up short. “What about our house?”
“You have it. I’ll go back to my parents’ manor,” Ella states.
I turn to look at her. “You know this is only happening because you’ve been through trauma, right?”
Ella shakes her head. “No, Danger, I’ve felt this way for a long time. I just didn’t want to admit it to myself.”
Understanding pounds into me like a damn truck.
She never truly loved me.
Certainly not like I do her.
“Ella, if you were so damn unhappy, why didn’t you tell me? I could’ve been better for you. I could’ve tried harder. I thought I was doing everything right,” I beg.
“You were. Youweredoing everything right, Danger. You haven’t doneanythingwrong… not one thing. I know this will sound cliché, but this is all me.”
I groan at her words. “Goddammit, Ella, you’re fucking breaking me right now. I gave upeverything, every-fucking-thing for you. Do you not get that? I left my life foryou. I changed the person I was foryou. I broke up my band foryou.Fuck!How am I not enough?” I storm over and take her head in my hands, forcing her to look at me. “I love you, Ella… with everything in me, I love you.” I slide my thumbs to wipe away the tears falling down her cheeks.
“I love you too.” She inhales sharply and continues, “Just not enough, Danger… I’m sorry.”
The knife to the gut is so painful, so grievous, that I let her face go forcefully but lean down and kiss her forehead. My chest is rising and falling hard as I linger on her skin a little longer than necessary, then walk over to my suitcase.
“You’re making a massive mistake, Ella… and you’re fucking breaking me in the process. I know you’ve been through trauma.Life-altering trauma, but making massive decisions like this isn’t the right thing to do. I’ll give you some time to think things through… toreallythink this. Because I don’t want to give up on us. I adore you too fucking much to let you go. But I’ll give you the time you obviously need—”
“I don’t need time, Danger.” She cuts me off with a firm interruption. “I’ve made up my mind.”
Jesus, this really seems final.
“Fuck, Ella! Don’t do this. I can’t function without you.” A single tear slowly trickles down my cheek while I stare at her.
She wipes the tears from her pale cheeks and shakes her head. “And I can’t function withouthim.”
A wave crashes over me—more like a tsunami of jealousy and despair—washing away every bit of strength and, in the process, purging any ounce of energy I have left to fight. My chest heaves, and I clench my fist, punching straight through the plasterboard wall. I don’t have time to register the pain in my hand before I turn my anger toward a lamp, hurtling it across the room, while another throaty groan explodes deep from within my lungs.
Darkness creeps into my world as I hyperventilate, my blood pulsating through me while the air rushes through my lungs quickly. Blood pools, then it runs down my fingers onto the carpet from my busted-up knuckles before I turn to take one last look at Ella.
She cowers away, but I don’t care how scared she appears. With no regard for her well-being, I stare her down with a harshness so cold and distant I hope she feels it in her damn soul. “I love you more than anything I’ve ever loved.I have nothing!You have takeneverythingfrom me. I hope you’re damn happy.” My feet stomp across the floor to my luggage, which I pick up and storm out of the hotel room with anger eating me alive, as well as misery that may devour me whole.
My body is failing when I step into the elevator and press the button repeatedly. I need space between me andthat womanwho has devastated my life. I turn to the elevator, continuously slamming my finger on the button.
The door bings and opens.
Quickly, I spin back, looking at the life I had, the life I wanted so badly. I backstep into the elevator, the door quietly closing on the life I was destined for with my girl.
She broke me.
Ella fucking broke me.
Every. Fucking. Single. Inch of me.
