Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 71911 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 360(@200wpm)___ 288(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71911 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 360(@200wpm)___ 288(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
“I’m not gaslighting you—”
“You just said all of this was my fault. That I should have said no. That I shouldn’t have slept with the same man more than once. That all of this is happening because of my wrongdoing—when you’re the one who started all this bullshit. You know what I think?”
His anger started to rise. It was visible in his face.
“I think you assumed I was so stupidly in love with you that I would stay committed to you while you fucked half the town. That you could have your cake and eat it too. Well, joke’s on you, Bolton. You saw a rock, but someone else saw the Hope Diamond.” I moved into him, prepared to push him away if I had to, and I shoved him in the shoulder to force him aside.
He blocked my path and grabbed both of my arms to lock me in place. “Astrid—”
“Let me go.”
“No.” His hold tightened.
“You fight for me now?” The tears came out of nowhere, springing from my eyes like the water from the Alps in spring. “This is what I wanted, for you to fight for me, and now you do it when it’s all said and done?”
His anger dimmed at the sight of my tears. His grip loosened too.
“I wanted you to love me, to want only me, and now you’re trying to stop me from walking out that door. Bolton, I loved you…loved you so fucking much, and you knew that. You took advantage of that love, pushed me further than I could go. Why am I the one who loved so fiercely but also the one getting smashed into pieces?”
“Astrid—”
“I pestered you to have a family because I wanted a son who wears your face. I cooked you dinner every night because I wanted to make a home for you, to make you happy. I’d buy lingerie and do special things for you to keep you satisfied in the hope you’d never want to look anywhere else. I gave this relationship all of me all of the time because I never wanted to lose you. But it didn’t matter. It didn’t fucking matter.”
His eyes developed a sheen, one so subtle, it was barely noticeable.
“I deserve better.” I finally pulled free of his grasp because he let me go.
I walked around him, expecting him to grab me again when his senses came back to him.
But he didn’t.
I walked down the stairs and reached the foyer. My keys were in the bowl, and my clutch was on the dresser below the mirror. I grabbed everything and stepped into the garage where my car was tucked away, still covered in raindrops because it had rained that morning on my way to work.
I stared at it and hesitated, knowing there was no going back now.
I got in the car…and left.
I booked a suite at a hotel and sat on the edge of the bed, my bag beside me. I didn’t realize how long I’d been sitting there until sunlight came through the window and stretched across the floor. Then my boss called me and asked why I hadn’t shown up.
I told him I was sick, so sick I wouldn’t be in for the next few days.
At some point, I got so tired I couldn’t keep my head up, so I lay across the bed and pulled the duvet over me, pulling it back away from the pillows so I was basically using the bed upside down. There was a crick in my neck from lying without a pillow, but I continued to lie there, dead on the inside, thankful that Bolton didn’t try to call.
At some point, I fell asleep, my pain paused as I drifted away into nothingness.
Hours later, a text vibrated my phone, the movement so slight but enough to stir me.
I stared at it where I’d left it on the corner of the bed. I was afraid it was Bolton asking where I was so he could come get me. But it could also be Theo…maybe. He never texted me first, but maybe he’d stopped by the gallery and realized I wasn’t there. Maybe he was worried.
I lay there a moment longer before I had the strength to grab the phone.
Are you alright, sweetheart?
My eyes crinkled when I heard his voice in my head. The moisture came a moment later, the crack in my voice because he’d been the ice pack on my bruises for months now. It had started on a rainy night when he’d changed my tire, and now we’d become something else. No.
He called me right away.
My eyes watered further when I realized how quickly he called me, like hearing my voice was what he desperately needed. They said the grass was always greener on the other side, but his grass really was a deep green from the spring rain and thick from the summer heat. It was an oasis, a pond with floating lilies, flowers in bloom, and birds full of song. I answered. “Hey…” I kept my voice steady because I didn’t want to sob my heart out to him, not because another man had broken my heart.