Holding my hand out, I took a step back. “Wait, let me get this out.”
If he touched me, I wouldn’t be able to speak.
He took two steps backward, and his brown eyes softened. “Okay.”
“I don’t know if I explained what it was like for me in Chance, but it was bad. I was the center of attention a lot, and it was never a good thing. It was a lot of mean-girl behavior and groupthink. And it started because a cute popular boy liked me, a cute fat girl. My parents believed that I should rise above it, continue to strive for perfection and I’d show them. Because that’s what they did growing up. But it was a different time, and what I was going through was different than anything they had experienced. There were no allies. There were no support groups. I was being specifically singled out, targeted, and terrorized. For five years. And they would bully others out of a relationship with me.” I chewed my bottom lip. “Reading those comments and watching the commentary surrounding you and me brought all that back up, and I don’t want to go through that again.”
“I’m sorry for what happened to you then.” He ran his hand over his beard. “I’m sorry for what’s happening to you now.”
“I appreciate that,” I murmured. “I really do. But I…”
“You what?”
“I can’t do the negative attention, and I can’t go back to how I felt in Chance.”
“And you don’t have to.”
“I’m having nightmares. They’re saying…”I can’t tell him I’m the reason he may not get Defensive Player of the Month.“The focus should be on you and your career, not dragging me down. And the only way to avoid all this is to avoid the spotlight.” My eyes started stinging. “And the only way to avoid the spotlight is to…”
“Is to what?”
I dropped my head and covered my face with my hands. “Is to not be in the spotlight.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that you should put it out there that we’re not together.” I let out a huff of air before lifting my head and looking at him. “Ifyou told them that we’re just friends, they’d leave me alone. They’d leaveusalone.”
His face was stoic and still. The tension in his body made him closed off and guarded. His eyes were different though.
He looked at me, and I couldn’t tell if he was mad, hurt, disappointed, or confused. But he was clearly affected. The way his gaze burned into me felt hot. We were an arm’s length apart, but I could feel the confliction radiating off him—and maybe he was feeling it from me, too.
Because on one hand, it was the truth—we weren’t together. But on the other hand, I wanted us to be. I still wanted him in my life, even if we had to be just friends. I didn’t want to lose him entirely, but I needed to protect my peace and my heart.
“And that’s what you want?” he asked. “You want me to tell people we’re not together?”
“Well, I mean, we—we’re not,” I stammered.
He took another step forward. “So, what are we then?” His voice was softer, deeper.
“I mean…” The rest of my sentence died on my lips. My heart was in my throat, so even if I wanted to speak, I couldn’t.
He stared me down. “Say it.”
My throat tightened around the words that were lodged there.
“I don’t want to put you in an uncomfortable situation,” he said. “I’ll say whatever you want me to say, do whatever you want me to do. Publicly. But privately… I need you to answer my question. I need you to be real with me.”
He was too close, too intoxicating, and I was too weak in such close proximity to him. I headed across the room, toward the hallway, so I could breathe.
He grabbed my arm and twisted me around so fast that I gasped.
Suddenly, Lamar had pinned me against the wall. His body was pressed against me, and his face was mere inches from mine. My eyes fell to his lips and lingered before traveling back to meet his gaze. He was so close. And despite wanting space, I burned in anticipation of his kiss.
“It hasn’t even been two weeks since you said you wanted to be withme, and then you said forget it. And now you’re saying you can’t do this, and you want me to tell the world that we’re not together.” He dipped his head so that his lips were right up against my ear. “Which is it?”
Taking a deep breath, I exhaled audibly as his breath tickled my neck.
He brought his forehead to mine and waited. His intense eye contact, his cologne, his touch, and his voice all worked together to ignite a fire inside me.
