Am I really such a fucking monster? Could a monster feel so broken in the face of what he’d done? The destruction he’d caused?
I’m not coming to your little birthday party, Billie, just so we’re clear
Youlikeme? What is this, second grade?
How much to breed you?
Echoes of the horrible shit I said to her stab my ears like daggers.
“You weren’t supposed to get to me. That’s not what this was supposed to be.”
“No shit,” she whispers. “But that’s what it was.”
Panic grabs me around the throat. “Not was.Is.”
“Was!” she shouts, voice cracking, stomping away from me, her shoulders shaking with sorrow. “I hate you. Ihateyou.”
I’m stumbling after her, breaking in half. “No, you don’t. Please don’t.” But she’s already out the door and running for her horse on unsteady legs. “Come back here.”
“I’ll never come back here,” she says, mounting her horse and wheeling around, preparing to ride away from me. For good. “I was wrong about you,” she whispers, her damp eyes looking down at me.
I go numb.
Shewaswrong about me.
She saw something that wasn’t there. I could never have been good enough for her.
As Billie rides away in a cloud of dust, she drags my black heart out of my chest, still beating, but damaged beyond recognition. She was willing to heal it for me and I just lost my chance to find out if she could.
Of course she could.
It belongs to her.
Do I have a chance in hell of convincing her to take it back?
To…try to see the good in me again?
I don’t know. But I have to try.
Because now that I’ve been graced by her light and honesty and goodness, I can’t live without her.Billie, come back.
ten
Billie
It’sthe evening of my birthday and the last thing I feel like doing is celebrating.
The scent of vanilla wafts through the crack beneath the door of my room, a clue that my mother is baking me a cake for after dinner. My aunt, uncle and one remaining grandmother are coming to dinner tonight and I have no idea how I’ll force myself to be social. There’s an invisible knife protruding from the center of my chest.
I can’t seem to stop myself from crossing the room and easing back my curtains, allowing me to look out at Knox’s house, where it sits atop the mountain. Was I naïve to think he felt something more than lust for me?
Does he miss me at all?
Probably not.
I drop the curtain and slump.
For all I know, he’s going to send the bank to reclaim our ranch any day now. After all, I didn’t fulfill my end of the bargain. Not completely.
