—Autumn—
“Julian.” I paused, wavering for a moment. “I can’t do this with you again. It almost killed me the last time. I’m here to say my piece because we leave tomorrow.”
He narrowed his eyes at me. “Do you honestly think I’m going to just let you leave?”
Taking a deep, solid breath, I willed myself to tell him the truth.
The one I’d been holding in for so damn long.
Opening my mouth, I confessed, “I wanted to get pregnant with your baby, Julian. It wasn’t an accident. I purposely stopped taking my birth control.”
His face paled, and it felt so fucking good to finally admit that out loud.
“You lied to me?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I knew you. I knew how you were, and it was only a matter of time before you pushed me away again. It was the only way I could ensure you wouldn’t anymore. You always wanted a family, so I gave you one.”
He immediately closed his eyes, the hurt evident all around him. It burned deep into my core. I hated knowing I was hurting him, but I needed to tell him the truth. He had to know.
As much as it killed me inside.
“How the fuck could you do this to me, Autumn?”
“I didn’t do it to you, I did it for you.”
“You did it for me? Are you fucking kidding me? What exactly did you do for me, kid? Get knocked up on purpose and then not tell me about it? What the hell kind of plan was that?”
“I didn’t know you were going to tell me you were leaving. I had no clue you were going to take it that far.”
“That’s your fucking excuse? How could you do this to me?”
“I thought we were going to be a family.”
“We still could have been! All you had to do was open your mouth and tell me you were pregnant!”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry? For fuck’s sake! I can’t even look at you right now!”
“I swear the last thing I want is for us to leave and for you to hate me.” Fresh tears streamed down my face, the ones I had been trying to keep at bay.
“We’ve both hurt one another so much, Julian!
How could we possibly come back from this?
I don’t trust you with my heart, and you resent me for not telling you the truth!
That’s our reality, not this made up happily ever after you’ve created in your head! ”
In three strides he was in my face, backing me into the wall. “You fucking betrayed me, and still—I want you!”
I couldn’t fucking breathe.
I hated myself for destroying him.
“We have to let each other go. It’s what’s best for our family.”
“You leaving is not what’s best for our family, and you know it!”
“Stop screaming at me! I’m hurting too! You broke me! Can’t you see that?”
“So this last month was what, Autumn? Fucking payback?”
“Of course not.”
“Bullshit!”
“You left me! After you fucked me over!”
—Julian—
My resolve broke like a chain that had been stretched to the max. I heard it snap, loud and clear. With wide eyes, I ran my hands through my hair, wanting to tear it out. Trying to remain calm but becoming defeated with each passing second.
I couldn’t keep up with the torment—it clasped onto me like a vice as I stormed around my office, my feet stomping everywhere I stepped, leaving a path of destruction in its wake. Throwing anything and everything I could find, I unleashed my fury on my office instead of her.
“Julian, stop!”
Hearing the desperation in Autumn’s voice halted the chaos coursing through my veins. Neither one of us said a word for I don’t know how long, facing each other, panting profusely. We didn’t need to, though. Our eyes spoke for themselves.
Our connection was present, and she wanted me to see it, giving me the hope I needed to go on. I growled out my frustration, releasing the craze, the wrath I no longer had any control over. It pounded into me as furiously as what she’d just admitted.
“I’m hanging on by a thread here. So unless you want to see a side of me you haven’t seen in years, I suggest you weigh your words before you come at me with more bullshit. We’re far from fucking over. Nothing will ever be done between us!”
“Just let me go!”
“I can’t! You belong to me! You always have, and you always will!”
My mind was spiraling with more thoughts and questions, trying to find some clarity. Some truth within the haze. I shut my eyes and bowed my head in between my hands. Needing a minute to process what the hell she’d just said.
She could see it.
Feel it.
She could feel me.
I never wanted to shake her and hold her as much as I did in that moment.
Showing my weaknesses wasn’t something I ever did, but it had always been different with Autumn, and she knew it too.
I couldn’t think about the future without contemplating the past, and for the first time it had me questioning how we would make it through this.
I stared up at her through the slits of my eyes, longing to feel some sort of connection through what I was about to say to her. “I fucked up! How many more times do I have to say it to you?”
“But that’s always been the problem between us, Julian. You fuck up, and I forgive you. It’s an endless cycle I want to put an end to. I don’t know what you expect from me because the woman you see standing in front of you—you made her this way.”
I jerked back. With each blow she delivered, I felt a little more of myself die inside. I didn’t know which one was worse—her lies or her truths.
“You’re so full of shit,” I confidently countered.
The thread I was hanging on to snapped. “You’ve loved me your entire life.
I’m embedded in your skin. I’m flowing in your blood.
I’m beating in your heart.” Before she knew it, I was standing directly in front of her, pulling her hair away from her face and grazing my knuckles against her rosy cheek.
“I’m a part of you, sweetheart, and you’re not going anywhere.
” I moved away, even though it was the last thing I wanted to do.
I wanted her to miss my touch before my resolve exploded.
With the way I was feeling right now, I was damn ready to throw her over my shoulder, kicking, screaming, putting up one hell of a fight, and lock her the fuck away until I proved my point and made her mine again.
“I can’t talk to you when you’re like this.”
She turned around to leave, but I gripped onto her arm. “Don’t you walk away from me.” Stepping right into her personal space, I backed her against the nearest wall. My six-foot-two muscular build loomed over her petite frame as I tugged her hard against my chest.
She didn’t cower—if anything she stood taller. I cocked my head to the side, sweeping her hair away from her eyes to stare deep into them as I locked her in place in front of me. Her chest rose and fell with each brush of my hand.
I held her tighter.
To look at me.
See me.
Feel me…
I switched my grip to the back of her neck in a possessive act, running my thumb up and down her windpipe. Her breathing hitched, and her lips parted when my other hand lightly grazed her inner thigh.
“Julian, stop,” she weakly let out as my fingers inched higher and higher up her leg.
“Stop what? I would’ve been there for you, taken care of both of you, like I still fucking ache to do. Please,” I begged. “Just give me a chance to make it right. I can’t live without you.”
Before I even realized what was happening, she was crying against my chest, and I wept with her.
“I’m sorry, baby. I’m so fucking sorry for everything I put you through.
I put us through. I ruined us when all you did was try to save us.
Losing you will be the biggest regret of my life.
I love you so much, and I need you to please never forget that,” I pleaded in a tone I’d never heard out of my own mouth.
“I love you too, Julian.”
She stayed there in my arms, both of us knowing this was our end.
This was goodbye.
I kissed her, she kissed me back, and for a moment we lost ourselves in each other. She pulled away first, and I wiped away all my tears, kissing along her face for the last time. She sucked in air that wasn’t available for the taking as my arms fell to my sides.
Empty.
Alone.
Broken.
She took one last look at me and left.
For the first time in our love story, I watched her walk away from me instead.