He shook his head, forehead pressed to mine.
“You’re not leaving me,” he said, voice shaking but steady in its conviction. “You’re protecting yourself. And me.”
My chest cracked.
He pulled back just enough to look at me properly, tears streaking his cheeks but he smiled anyway. God, that smile. Soft. Brave. Heartbreaking.
“My home is always open to you,” I repeated, like a vow. “Anytime. Day or night. That doesn’t change.”
“I know,” he whispered. “I love you.” No hesitation. No fear. Just truth spilled from his lips.
I kissed him again. Slower this time, reverent. A promise instead of a plea. “I love you too,” I said. “More than I know how to say.”
He stepped back first. Let me go. That might have been the bravest thing he’d ever done. “Go,” he said gently. “Before I change my mind.”
I got into the truck before I could look at him again. Behind me, I heard Elliot break. The sound of it—raw, unguarded—followed me as I pulled away, chased me down the drive, clung to the back of my skull like a bruise I’d never stop pressing.
The road was too bright. Sunlight glaring. Storefronts lit up. People moving through their lives like nothing had just split open inside me. My hands shook on the wheel. My chest caved in with every mile.
By the time I pulled into my driveway, I couldn’t move. I stayed there, forehead against the steering wheel, breathing like I’d run a marathon I hadn’t trained for.
I grabbed my phone with numb fingers and hit Thomas’s name before I could talk myself out of it. He answered on the second ring.
“Anthony?”
My voice gave out completely. “I fucked this up,” I choked. “I tried to do the right thing and I still—God, I still hurt him.”
There was no judgment. No lecture. Just a quiet, steady, “I’m here.”
I broke then. Full-body, shaking, the kind of crying that feels like it’s coming from somewhere older than memory. I told him everything—the argument, the things David said, Elliot chasing me to the truck, the way he’d smiled while letting me go. Thomas listened to all of it without uttering a word. Just gave me his full attention without hesitation.
When I finally went quiet, he said softly, “You didn’t leave because you don’t love him. You left because you do.”
“I promised him I wouldn’t disappear again,” I whispered.
“And you didn’t,” Thomas said. “You set a boundary. That’s not the same thing.”
There was a pause. One that hung with the weight of expectation.
“Have you thought about talking to someone?” he added, careful. “A therapist. Not because you’re broken. Because you’re carrying too much alone.”
I scrubbed a hand over my face, exhaustion settling deep into my bones. “I’ll think about it,” I said.
“That’s all I’m asking.”
After the call ended, I sat there for a long time before finally getting out of the truck.
I promised him I wouldn’t leave again. And I did anyway. The guilt gutted me. But staying—staying there—would have destroyed him.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered even though he wasn’t here to hear it. “I’m so fucking sorry.”
And for the first time since loving him stopped feeling dangerous. It felt unbearable.
CHAPTER 23
ELLIOT
The door slammed shut behind Anthony with a finality that hit my sternum like a shockwave. I couldn’t move. I just stared at the place he’d been like my will alone could bring him back.
