Chapter 11 #2
“What the hell is that?” I ask as he opens the door for me, making sure I’m seated before shutting it behind me and running around to the other side to get in. The inside is all smooth, sleek, sporty, and smells of leather and him.
“It’s my new Aston Martin DBX,” he answers, starting it up. “I had to preorder it over a year ago and I finally got it about two months ago.”
“ Diary of a Rich Kid .”
He chuckles, the sound warm across my skin. “Maybe, but you’re the first girl I’ve had in here. What do you think?”
“I think that you’re wasting it on the wrong girl. I’m far from impressed.”
“That tells me I’m wasting it on the right girl. The ones who swoon over a car are the ones to stay away from. Come on, Little Bird. I know you like fast, hot, sexy rides. Tell me what you think.”
He turns up the heat, pointing the vents straight at me. A welcome blast of warm air hits me and I hold out my hands, trying to capture more of it. He hits another button, and my ass starts to warm up too. Still, I don’t think I’ve been this wet, cold, and miserable in a long time.
“It’s…” The coolest, sexiest car I’ve ever been in. “Something,” I go with instead.
He smirks, catching my eye as he runs his thumb across his bottom lip before licking it. Jerk. He knows how sexy I find his mouth. “It most definitely is something.”
“We’re getting all this expensive leather wet. Aren’t you worried we’ll ruin your precious new car?”
“I’d ruin every inch of this car if it meant I had you wet.”
I grunt, folding my arms. “I said no talking. And definitely no innuendo. Especially in that low, seductive voice you like to use. And no calling me Little Bird. That’s off-limits.”
“You’ll always be my little bird, so I will have to respectfully ignore your demand.
And my voice is my voice and if it seduces you, again I’ll have to respectfully decline stopping.
But you started talking to me first, so it’s too late now.
Besides, you’re my captive unless you plan to jump out of a moving car onto the street. ”
I purse my lips, twisting to glance out the window, and he laughs.
“I’m contemplating it.”
“I know. But do me a favor and stick it out. I’d hate to have to jump out of the car after you and save your life tonight.”
His hand meets my thigh and I pinch the skin over his knuckle as hard as I can until he jerks his hand away, shaking it out and returning it to the wheel. “Devious woman, that hurt.”
“Then you shouldn’t have touched. Be thankful I didn’t punch your dick. Lucky for you, you’re driving.”
“But it would mean you’d be touching my dick.”
“Christ, Luca. Just. Stop. Talking!”
Mercifully, he falls quiet for a few moments as we stop at the light on Huntington between the Prudential and Copley. My face goes back to the window, watching as people rush in and out of the mall, trying to avoid the rain.
“If I could turn back time—”
“Who are you? Cher?” I interrupt, my head whipping back around to glare at him. “I don’t care, and I don’t want to hear it.”
“Fine. No Cher. How about this then? I’m sorry, Raven.”
I shake my head, twisting and staring hard out the passenger window like it will save me from the man beside me. “I don’t care.”
“Yes, you do. You care a lot and I know that apology is long overdue.”
It is. Long freaking overdue and so useless it’s almost laughable. What good does I’m sorry do for me now? But the legit question is, why do I still care?
Why can’t there be an off button or a fuck-you switch when you need to cut someone permanently out of your head and heart?
Maybe we hold on to pain like this as a form of learning from our past mistakes, but in truth, there should be a statute of limitations on that sort of punishment.
I paid the fine and served the time and now I deserve to be done with it.
I’ve learned the hard way that I can be both strong and vulnerable. That it’s okay to be both. But right now, I need to be the former and not the latter.
“What are you sorry for?” I ask because I have to know. I need to hear him say the words or I’ll never be free of him. I knot my fingers together on my lap, squeezing them as hard as I can to stop their trembling. Same thing I’m doing by clamping my teeth down on my bottom lip.
The car starts to move again, heading deeper into downtown Boston and taking me toward the South End.
“For ending it the way I did. For taking the cowardly way out when I should have manned up and talked to you more about it. I tried, Raven. I swear to Christ I tried, but you wouldn’t listen. But maybe I didn’t do enough.”
Manned up. Meaning he’s not sorry he ended it. Just sorry for the way he did it.
I blow out a silent breath, my chest clenching so tight, I have to press a palm to it to alleviate the pressure. It hurts. Everything inside does and at this point, it shouldn’t. Four years. I should be long since over it by now.
My mind is appalled I’m reacting this way while my heart is flipping it off, demanding it let us grieve.
But I did grieve.
I mourned and ached and rioted longer than I should have. Until I told myself I was done with it. With him. That I had to move on. Then the bastard shows up tonight and it’s like starting from day one all over again.
Yet, hearing him admit this… it’s the slap to the face I needed.
For too long I had been ridiculously clinging to nonsense.
The flowers. The randomly showing up all over the world at my performances.
I couldn’t help my toxic thoughts. The ones that hoped maybe he regretted ending it.
Maybe he missed me and ached for me the way I missed and ached for him.
But no. That was his guilt for hurting me and nothing else.
So dumb. So young. So naive.
“Thank you for the apology,” I tell him once I’m able to speak without my voice betraying me.
“But you don’t forgive me,” he muses, a slight quirk to his lips.
“Nope. Not even a bit. But you said it and it’s done, and I heard you. Now you can stop with the flowers and the randomly showing up.”
The car slows as we approach the restaurant. “That’s not why I was doing those things. And not sorry to tell you, but I don’t plan to stop.”
I growl. “I have no idea what I ever saw in you. You’re aggravating as hell.”
He chuckles, the sound unfortunately dragging a small, reluctant smile to my lips.
“Wanna have hate sex with me then? Work out some of this aggravation you have? The back seat may appear small for a man my size, but I have no doubt we can make it work. Or… you know… go on a real date with me? The kind where I take you out and show you off and hold your hand and stare into your eyes and beg you to let me have a second date.”
“The kind you have with your other girls?”
“Raven, they’re not my girls. None of them are because none of them are you. Most of the ones you hear about online are bullshit and I never make it past their front door. I go home with them to get them there safely, but I never ever seal the deal.”
“Uh-huh.”
He audibly sighs, his hand back on my thigh forcing my gaze over to his as he stares intently into my eyes. “I tried. I tried like hell for four years to let you go. Nothing worked. Nothing was you. You showed me sunshine when all I could see was the clouds.”
“The sun was always there, Luca. It was just hidden from you behind those clouds.”
“No, Raven. It wasn’t always there. I only saw it after I saw you.”