The sentence hangs there, jagged and cruel, and I can’t tell if she’s trying to reclaim something or destroy it. All I know is that I can’t breathe.
She realizes what she’s just said. Her hand flies to her mouth, eyes wide, breath catching. I can’t tell if she’s trembling because of what she’s seen—or because she knows what she’s just confessed.
“I’m sorry, Jacob,” she squeaks, voice breaking as tears spill down her cheeks. “I wanted to tell you—truly I did, but?—”
She reaches for my forearm, and everything inside me stops.
Her hand is warm on my skin, but it feels like a brand. A lie. A betrayal I didn’t see coming. My pulse roars in my ears, drowning her out, drowning out everything except the single fact detonating through my skull—she wasn’t mine first.
Something cold slides down the back of my neck. A flicker—sharp, metallic—cuts through my breathing. I can’t tell if it’s jealousy or grief or something darker that I’ve never had a fucking name for.
Then the images start to morph in my head.
Her, bent over. Her mouth parted. Some other man—some fucking no one—insidemygirl. Touching what I’ve starved myself for. Taking what I kept myself from having, year after goddamn year.
A crack tears through my chest so violently my vision goes white around the edges.
Someone—fuck knows who—some bar rat maybe? One of Carlton’s cowboys? The thought of her, moaning for someone else?—
It doesn’t just hurt. It splits something in the marrow of me.
And that’s when the rage hits.
Fast. Total. A wildfire crawling up my throat before I can contain it.
It rips through me, a hot animal that takes over my chest and claws for release. Words I don’t even mean spill out.
“You mean to tell me,” I roar, pacing like a trapped thing, “that I brought you here to keep you—and you’ve already given yourself tosomeone else? Who the fuck is he?” My fists curl until my knuckles ache. “Tell me.”
She looks me in the eye, but says nothing.
I don’t think. I act. I yank the desk chair up and hurl it across the room; it slams into the desktop and the monitor explodes onto the floor in a shower of glass and plastic.
“Jacob,” she sobs, her voice small and splintered.
Tears streak down her face as she takes a step back, hands raised like she’s trying to calm a wild animal.
“I was going to tell you. I—I was scared.” Her words trip over themselves, frantic, trembling, “that you’d react like this…Please, Jacob, you’ve just dropped all this on me. Please don’t do this now.”
Her chest heaves, her whole body shaking as she presses herself against the wall, eyes wide and glistening. Every inch of her is pleading with me—not just to listen, but to stop.
“I haven’t touched another woman in years,” I snarl, pacing like a caged animal. “I’ve had them throw themselves at me—half this town whispering, asking if something’s wrong with me, if I’m broken. And all this time, I thought I was doing the right thing. I was keeping myself for you.”
My voice cracks, harsh and unrecognizable. “And then I find out—by accident—that you’ve already opened your legs and given yourself—the most precious part of yourself—to some little fuckboy?”
I slam my hand against the desk, the sound echoing through the room.
“I can’t—God, I can’t—Summer.”
The words keep coming, raw and furious.
“I thought I kept you pure. Thought I kept you safe. Thought I kept you mine.” My jaw tightens, breath shredding in and out. “Fuck… what more could I have done? I was everywhere, Summer. Watching. Waiting. When I wasn’t, my men were.”
Then the thought hits—slow, poisonous. “Was it one of my men?”
Her eyes widen. She sees the shift before I even move. Fear blooms across her face.
“Was it one of my fucking men?” The roar rips out of me before I can cage it, my fist driving straight through the drywall beside her head. Plaster explodes. Dust rains down between us.
