I want to scream.
I want to break something.
If it wasn’t pouring out, I’d light that fucking gazebo on fire right now, so there’s no place to have a wedding in two days.
I march up the stairs to my studio, ready to tear the entire room to shreds. I pull a pack of cigarettes out of my back pocket and light one with shaking fingers. I’m a mess. I can’t think straight.
I just keep replaying that entire conversation, trying to find the part where I’m confused, because this can’t be real. Why is this happening? I’m being fucking tested, that’s what this is.
I couldn’t get a simple wedding to win a bet with. No, I had to get a wedding with the one man I’ve loved and his sleazy maniacal fucking arsehole of a fiancé, and I have to go through with this.
I have to make this wedding happen. I have to. That was my goal. That’s what I wanted.
Do the wedding. Win the bet. Get the house. Live in peace.
Because if I don’t do that, then what? Then I’m stuck forever facing the dark void of infinity alone for the rest of my life. Forever watching wedding after wedding in my own home, knowing that I’ll never have that.
I’ll never find love or companionship—the things everybody wants and searches for. It will never be in the cards for me. Any chances of that were stolen from me somewhere in my youth byan ever-evolving tempest of grief and trauma that went uncured and instead built a man incapable of attachment.
I can’t face that.
I can’t face anything.
The only place where it’s easy is when I’m alone, or I have my art and my demons, and we have no one to answer to. Where life isn’t cruel but quiet, and I’m not constantly reminded of the person I had and the love I threw away.
Rather than pick up any brushes or clay, I dig for the bottle of whisky that rolled under the table before this whole charade began. It’s only half full, but that will be enough for tonight.
Trading puffs off the cigarettes for pulls from the bottle, I drown myself until I can’t feel it anymore. Until the gnawing reminder that I’ve lost Colin forever doesn’t feel like the weight of an elephant on my chest.
Because this was the nail in the coffin. He’s not just marrying Pierce. He belongs to him—truly belongs to him.
The way he once belonged to me.
When the bottle is empty, and the liquor hits my bloodstream, the room grows fuzzy and dark. It muffles the pain and quiets the voices. When I crawl onto the mattress, all I know is that I can’t feel anything—except for a warm pair of arms wrapped around me as I drift off to darkness.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Colin
Eight years ago
Tuscany
I’m waiting for him on my knees. Exactly as we discussed on the phone. My hands are shaking, and I’m biting my lip when I hear the cab door close outside.
What if it’s not Declan? What if it’s the Italian rental homeowner who’s just popping in to find a British actor naked on his floor?
I need to get out of my head. We discussed this.
This week would be different from all the rest, because this week, I would be hisfor real. Well, for real, in the kinky bedroom sense. Not for real in the romantic relationship sense.
I’ve given up on that ship—it sailed a long time ago.
No, this week, Declan and I made very specific plans to take our sexual relationship to the next level. The hardest part might actually be not running into his arms when I see him. Missing him during our year apart gets harder and harder every year. And it never makes a difference how many people I sleep with or what I do.
In fact, I actually found another friend with benefits this year. Except we don’t have sex. He’s just taken me under his wing to show me all the kinky, submissive things I want to know. He helps me to understand why I enjoy this so much. And how to set boundaries for myself without feeling like a people pleaser all the time. So I no longer feel so weird about the things I like.
The automatic lock to the front door sounds, and my spine straightens with excitement. He’s here. This is happening.
