He hurt you. He doesn’t love you. He couldn’t say the words. He walked away.
I hate how much I still want him, and I hate how easy it was for him to breach through the walls around my heart that I thought were impenetrable. Just one heated kiss has me almost forgetting the pain he put me through. The pain of losing him because he didn’t love me.
“Mason, please put me down.”
He does without protest, but he doesn’t step away. His body heat scorches me like a wildfire, and I hate that too because I like it when I shouldn’t.
Silence stretches between us, thick and uncomfortable.
“Aria, I—”
“No!” I reply more severely than I intend, not letting him finish.
I press my shaky palms to his chest and push again. It’s like trying to move a mountain.
Panic tightens my chest, and my breathing becomes shallow, making it difficult to pull in oxygen. Mason must notice I’m about to lose it because he takes a step back. Then another.
“Please let me—”
I shake my head in denial. “I can’t listen to whatever you have to say. I just can’t.”
I try to sidestep my way out the open door, but he lifts an arm to block me. And curse my traitorous eyes for lingering on the muscles of his biceps and forearms, remembering how much Ienjoyed it when they used to cage me in as his gloriously naked body hovered over me in bed.
“Please let me pass,” I quietly beg, needing to leave before I do something stupid like kiss him again.
It seems to take effort for him to lower his arm and let me go. As soon as I dash out onto his back patio, Mason’s voice stops me in my tracks.
“I didn’t mean for you to find out this way.”
Giving him my back because I refuse to turn around and look at him, I ask, “Find out what exactly?”
“How I knew it was you. Why I’m here.”
With quaking knees, I descend two steps but stop again when curiosity gets the better of me.
“And why is that?”
“I came for you, Aria.”
Those five words slam into me with brute force. He came for me? He’s known where I lived all this time but never tried to reach out or contact me until now? Why does knowing that hurt so much?
“Well, then, I feel badly for you because I want nothing to do with you. You’re eighteen months too late.”
With those parting words, I walk with a calm I don’t feel back to my house. Of course, Mason has to get in the last word using a quote from Yeats.
“‘Hearts are not had as a gift, but hearts are earned.’And I will earn your heart again, Aria,” he says with a conviction that scares me, but also thrills me.
I glance over toward his shadow standing in his doorway like a ghost in the night. Instead of Yeats, I reply with a quote from Javan.
“Love can be magic. But magic can sometimes just be an illusion,” I tell him, quietly slipping inside my house andshutting the door… then yelp when I notice Brandon leaning on the counter island, eating a bowl of cereal.
“Who were you talking to?” he inquires with his mouth full.
“Just mumbling to myself,” I flat out lie.
I need to process what just happened. That Mason is here and living right next door, and not by coincidence either. I’m five seconds away from freaking the hell out and going into a total panic meltdown. Instead, I take out a bowl, spoon, and the gallon of milk from the fridge. Brandon slides the box of cereal my way. I’d rather have a giant bowl of cookies and cream ice cream with hot fudge and whipped topping, but malted puffs loaded with sugary marshmallows will have to do. I plan to eat myself into a sugar coma and pass out in bed after I take a quick shower. I guess my freak out will have to wait until tomorrow. I’m too emotionally exhausted to deal with anything other than feeding myself right now.
“How was the party?”
