Maybe they’ll hold the answers I’ve craved all these years.
On our way back to our seats, I detour to the bathroom and hang around in the hallway outside the ladies’ restroom to confront the woman who haunts my dreams.
I want to know why she did it.
Why she ran straight back to him after professing undying love for me.
I love you, Dillon. I love you more than words could ever express. For as long as I live, I will never forget you.
But you did, Viv.
You forgot me the second your plane landed on Californian soil. The instant you raced back into his arms.
Pain rips through me like always. Her last words are imprinted on my heart and in my brain and I will die whispering them under my breath, even if they are the greatest lie she’s ever told me.
Vivien emerges from the bathroom, stumbling and clutching her purse to her chest when she spots me. Fuck, she is spectacular. So fucking gorgeous. She takes my breath away, and the longing to cross the gap between us, pull her into my arms, and kiss the shit out of her is riding me hard, only adding to my torment.
A sob escapes her lips as we stare at one another. Emotion shines in her eyes, but I can’t trust it’s real. I drink her in, from head to toe, with hungry eyes, as I’m internally screaming and writhing in pain.
“Hey, Hollywood,” I choke out over the messy ball of emotion in my throat. My fingers twitch with the need to touch her.
“Dillon,” she whispers.
I push off the wall and walk toward her. Placing my hands on either side of her head, I lean in and close my eyes, soaking her up. Her familiar scent tickles my nostrils as her body heat seeps into my skin. I’m hanging by a thread, barely keeping my hands off her.
I have to remind myself she isn’t mine to touch anymore.
She’s pregnant—with her husband’s child.
I was such a fool to ever let her go. If I could go back in time, I’d do it all differently.
I would never have let her get on the plane that night, and he wouldn’t have had the chance to stick his claws in her again.
Everything would be different.
She’d be here with me tonight, and that baby in her belly would be mine.
I’m suffocating, dying inside all over again. My eyes open. I stare at her with my heart trying to beat a path out of my chest.“Vivien Grace,” I murmur, peering deep into her eyes. “Still so beautiful.” Electricity crackles in the tiny gap between our bodies and she’s got to feel it too. This can’t just be me.
She scrambles out from under me. “I’ve got to go.”
Icicles form in my veins, replacing the blood flow as she reverts to form. “Run away, Hollywood,” I shout after her. “After all, it’s what you do best.”
I stand rooted to the spot, unable to chase after her because I’m heartbroken all over again.
For a few seconds, I indulged the dream and forgot reality.
But that reality is staring at me from the end of the hallway.
Reeve frowns as he looks over at me before wrapping his wife in his arms and escorting her back inside the auditorium.
I slump to the floor and raise my knees, burying my head in my hands as crushing pain stabs into me from every angle.
I think I’m destined to always live with this pain.
Because I can’t cut her out of my heart, no matter how much I need to.
PART IV
