If she couldn’t protect herself, I’d be her sentinel. It was a role I’d lived before, so falling back into it would be easy. But what happened last night…whatalmosthappened… shouldn’t happen again. No matter how badly I wanted it.
Besides, she had been high, and probably had no idea what she was even doing. She would’ve regretted it in the morning, and I wasn’t sure if my heart could have handled that rejection. In a perfect world, she wouldn’t have even remembered me pushing her away.
She slept soundly beside me, face content. When I shifted away, she followed, pressing her body against me.
Fuck. The reaction was instantaneous, my cock responding to the call of her body.
No. Fuck. I needed to leave. My control was strong, but even I had a breaking point. I wiggled out from underneath Blaire, who flopped over onto her back with a snore. Letting her know where I was going would be best, but I didn’t want to wake her up when she obviously needed the sleep.
I’d be back before she woke. Grabbing a dark hoodie from the floor, I tossed it on over my sweats, barely remembering to lock the door behind me as I left.
The morning sun did little to ease my heart. A reckoning was fast approaching for both of us, and I found myself unable to stop it. The best I could do was keep us both safe, until Blaire regained some of her memories, or Conrad’s men showed up on my doorstep.
I walked the streets I knew too well, the falling apart houses more a home than my childhood one had ever been. Blaire didn’tbelong here. She belonged back in the city with people who had their lives together, whether or not she agreed.
I needed to accept that once she was safe, I’d have to take her home, and let her go.
The idea killed me. I wished I didn’t have her heartbeat memorized. I wished I didn’t have her smile tattooed on my skin. I wished everything about her wasn’t permanently etched on my soul. It would be easier to forget her if she wasn’t woven into every fiber of my being.
Maybe if I walked far enough, I’d forget the feeling of her lips on mine. I wasn’t sure how far that would be. Miles. States. Continents, maybe.
Focusing on nothing but walking meant I lost track of time. With a start, I realized how much time had passed.Fuck.
Blaire was bound to be awake by now, and I needed to get back before she gave up and left. She would understand when I explained I didn’t mean to be gone for so long. I raced back the way I came, ignoring the crowd already congregated on the porch stairs.
Pausing outside my bedroom door, I tried to catch my breath. She had to still be there. She wouldn’t leave, not yet, when it wasn’t safe.But, a tiny voice in my head whispered.But…
I sighed with relief when I saw Blaire waiting for me on the other side of the door. Then I noticed her scowl, her crossed arms. “What the fuck, Winder? You drop multiple, massive bombshells on me, and then just disappear without a word before I wake up?”
I frowned. I knew I shouldn’t have left her for that long, but this anger had to be about more than just waking up alone. “You were fast asleep when I left, excuse me for not wanting to wake you up.”
“What if I left while you were gone? Because I feel like you would’ve been kind of pissed if I just walked out behind you.”
Truth.“Would you really have run away?”
Blaire paused. “Maybe.”
Lie.
I stepped inside the room and locked the door behind me, Blaire’s fury more palpable the closer I got.
“You know, it would serve you right if I left while you were gone. Not like there’s any reason for me to hang around with a liar.” Each word was punctuated with venom, injected directly into my heart.
My suspicions were confirmed. She was pissed abouteverything. But she also knew her words would cut, words I never wanted to hear.
I spun around to face her, attempting to keep my anger under wraps. She didn’t need to see that. “Yeah, I lied. But I lied to protect you. If the situation was reversed, could you say the same?”
Chapter
Twenty-One
BLAIRE
If I had been sliced in two at this exact moment, my blood would’ve been boiling, steam filling the room. I didn’t like that Winder had left me alone this morning, alone with my thoughts and my grief and my sobriety. I couldn’t even begin to process the information I learned last night. Out of everything, the rejection probably hurt the worst, and my anger over that needed to go somewhere before I imploded.
Winder’s accusations seemed like a good place to start. He was going to learn very quickly that I didn’t take kindly to being spoken to like a child.
“Excuse me?” My voice was quiet, but laced with barbs. “What exactly are you convicting me of here?”
