Blowing out a breath, I scoff. "Well, I should've known that. She told me you lied to her, so I should've guessed you'd lied about that, too."
He hangs his head, his tatted fingers running through his hair as he closes his eyes and sighs.
"How much do you know?"
Tapping my fingers against my cup, I roll my lips, wondering if I should lay all my cards on the table so early, or if I should continue to use this against him, but when he looks up at me with a tortured expression on his face, my decision is clear.
"I know you betrayed her," I state, gulping more of my coffee as I watch my words settle in. "I know you lied to her for years, making her feel like she could trust you and love you, just to pull the rug out from beneath her years later after sending her father to prison and upending her whole life."
He winces, and his eyes drop away from mine in shame.
"I know she's the reason you have that scar on your face, and I know you're the reason she doesn't allow people to get close to her anymore."
"I didn't intend on hurting her," he mutters, staring down at Jellybean, who's sitting between his feet, peering up at him.
"Well, unfortunately, you really did a number on her, buddy."
Slowly, his regret-filled eyes meet mine.
"Do you know how she is?"
My brows raise, surprised by his question.
"I haven't spoken to her in a while, but I became friends with her a few years ago at college… honestly, she's a cold-hearted, badass bitch."
He frowns, his lips turning down and his brows shadowing his dark eyes.
"We were roommates. Probably because we were both from Mafia families, and for some reason, the dean thought it would be a smart idea. We didn't get along at first. She hardly spoke, just shot me threatening looks any time I tried to speak to her. When she did speak, she was a bitch, but eventually, I managed to break through all the walls she surrounds herself with, and we became friendly."
"How'd you know about me?"
"Well, we went out to a party, got stupidly drunk, and as I was practically dragging her back to our dorm, she broke down in tears. It was the first time I'd really seen any emotion from her. She was so angry, to the point where she ended up hitting me, telling me to leave her alone because she couldn't trust me."
Jellybean moves away from Leo, padding over to me, and I lift her up onto the bench beside me. She lies down, tongue lolling out of her mouth.
"I wasn't going to leave her alone on a dark campus in the middle of the night when there was a bunch of drunk guys around, so I kept prodding her for information, trying to get to the bottom of why she was so upset and hellbent on being alone. That's when she spilled her guts, telling me all about you. She even showed me the one picture she still had of you two together on her phone. She'd drawn a dark red line across the left side of your face, exactly where she'd marked you."
He shakes his head, making a sound of amusement.
"Of course she did… and that's how you recognised me?"
I nod, twisting my lips together as I drag a hand through Jellybean's fur, and watch as the man beside me digests all of the information I just dumped on him.
Guilt wafts off him, and although I'd promised Avery if I ever saw the bastard who hurt her, I'd gut him, I know I never could.
There's clearly more to their story, more that Avery either didn't tell me or doesn't know herself. But going off how broken the man beside me currently looks as he stares off into the distance, I can tell he really did care for her, despite the fact he hurt her.
After a few minutes of silence, he clears his throat and stands from the bench, the disinterested, cold look back on his face as he glances down at his watch.
"We should start heading back," he grunts.
Rolling my eyes, I stand up, throwing my empty coffee cup into the bin beside the bench and then clip Jellybean's lead back onto her collar.
"Nope. I want to go and explore some more," I tell him, walking off in the opposite direction to where he was about to start walking. "If you must insist on babysitting me, then you can follow along behind."
He grumbles something I don't hear, but then I hear his heavy footsteps on the path as he catches up to me, and I smirk.
My husband may think he can control me and keep me locked away in his apartment, but he's sorely mistaken.
