Total pages in book: 60
Estimated words: 56653 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 283(@200wpm)___ 227(@250wpm)___ 189(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 56653 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 283(@200wpm)___ 227(@250wpm)___ 189(@300wpm)
Leandro inhaled.
For one moment, he thought she would take the ring.
Then her hands urged his fingers to close over the ring.
And he knew it had been all planned. That she had wanted him to believe he had a chance just so she could take that chance away and crush his heart with it.
He snatched his hand from her hold, and throwing the ring away, he slammed out of the room. He was done. He was just fucking done.
The silence Leandro’s departure left behind him was heavy with tension. And guilt, Bobby thought numbly. She knew that what she had done was cruel and unforgivable, but it had to be done. Leandro had to accept that they were not for each other.
She choked on a sob.
“You’re free now,” Sabastian said flatly. “Does your freedom please you?”
She couldn’t answer.
He watched Bobby struggle to hold back her sobs, but every time she did, her shoulders would shake harder as more tears fell from her eyes. He had been completely against pretending they were engaged but he knew that if he had not agreed to it, Bobby would have been desperate enough to find someone else to play along with her. And that wouldn’t do. There were already too many fake roles in Bobby and Leandro’s love affair. One more player added to the mix might have ruined it for good.
When Bobby started to cry, no longer trying to hold her sobs back, Sabastian said quietly, “You can’t eliminate fear by running away from it, moro mou. You’re just enlarging your cage when you do. If you want to get rid of your fears, you have to face it head on.”
“I almost died back then. I wanted to die. I was in so much pain there were times I just wanted to end my life because I loved him so much.”
“But you didn’t. If you could refuse the urge in the past, you can refuse it again.” He took her hand and gently pulled his ring from her finger. “You need to stop hiding, Bobby. Leandro hurt you in the past...and now you’ve hurt him back. It has to stop here if you really love him.” He paused, giving it time for the words to sink in. “Do you love him, Bobby? Do you have the courage to love him?”
For a long moment, Bobby didn’t speak.
And then she was pulling away to bend down, picking up Leandro’s ring from the floor.
She started to run.
Chapter Thirteen
The race was about to start when Bobby finally managed to push her way past the throng of reporters and VIP fans that had formed in front of the dugout. The bleachers were filled to the rafters, and everyone was cheering wildly for their favorite biker. Behind each biker was his token girl, and Bobby bit her lip hard when she saw it was Erica Norwood standing behind Leandro, once again wearing a bikini even though there was no freaking beach around. Was the girl insane? Maybe she wore jeans to the beach?
Erica was saying something to Leandro with a laugh, and when Leandro looked over his shoulder to answer her, Bobby watched in greater dismay as Erica deliberately bent forward, the new position revealing more of her breasts to Leandro.
Leandro might not have a thing for Erica, but Erica did. And after being such a bitch to him, Bobby knew that she might as well have pushed him into the other girl’s arms.
The thought of having Leandro entering a relationship with Erica – or any other girl for that matter, even if it was on rebound – was too frightening and painful to contemplate. She broke into a run and bumped into Erica from behind as she skidded to a stop.
“Ow!” The other girl whirled around, and upon seeing Bobby, Erica’s face took on an indignant expression. “You!”
Unable to think of a proper way to answer that, Bobby lifted her chin and said, “Me.” Then she snatched the token girl’s sash from Erica.
The sound of Erica’s shrill scream jerked Leandro out of his thoughts, and when he turned to look over his shoulder, he was stunned to see Bobby trying to wrestle the sash from Erica’s hold. What the fuck was she doing? Was this another one of her fucking games to make him pay over and over for hurting her in the past?
Stalking towards the two girls, Leandro easily tore the sash from their hands. “What are you doing here, Bobby?” he snapped without looking at her. He smoothed the yellow silk sash and handed it back to Erica. “Sorry about that.” He wondered furiously what this was all about. Had Bobby forgotten there were cameras all around them?
Erica sniffed. “It’s okay. It’s not your fault she’s a crazy bitch.” She arranged the sash on her body and fluttered her lashes at Leandro. “But I think she scratched me on my shoulder.”