26. Emily
The birds sing their songs, and the butterflies and bees travel from flower to flower around me. The smell of the wildflowers flows through my nose, but they don’t bring me the comfort they used to. Instead, they make me angry. Liam has ruined the only place that gave me a sense of peace.
After I told him that I would be leaving for Ireland, he hasn’t spoken to me. He still watches me whenever we’re in the same room, his eyes fill with longing when I meet them, and it hurts.
He wants to be friends. How could I be friends with the one person who brings my soul to life while also killing me? How could he possibly ask that of me?
I need to leave this place. I need to leave Liam behind and move on. I can’t be around him without feeling physical pain from it. As much as I have tried avoiding him, he’s fucking everywhere.
“You’re so stupid,” I whisper to myself and shake my head slowly. “You fell so hard and so fast without any thought of whether he loved you back and look where that got you.”
I rub my chest as the ache increases.
Back at the mansion, the staff are collecting my belongings and loading them into the SUVs to be taken with us to Ireland. I’ve opted to sit out here until it’s time to go. I don’t want Liam to try and talk me out of this.
My ma has been giving me looks of sympathy over the last few months. She sees my heartbreak all over my face and can’t do anything to help just as I can’t help the grief she’s hiding.
Ever since Declan took over, he’s been hunting for Vladimir. According to some spies that were planted in Russia, Vladimir denies having anything to do with my dad’s assassination.
I call bullshit.
My father was the only thing standing in Vladimir’s way and controlling the docks for his sex trading. When my father denied Vladimir the chance to transport his women from those docks, he was angry and had been working to dismantle the warehouses in the area.
If he thinks Declan will consider mercy or any future allegiance, he’s sorely mistaken. Declan is out for blood, and I don’t see Vladimir having any chance of surviving him.
The sound of muffled footsteps comes from behind me, and I tense. I know it’s Liam without turning around, just like I know he’s not going to leave until he’s said what he needs to.
I turn around from where I am seated on the grass, and he stops short.
“Hi,” he whispers.
I don’t respond. I simply stare at him with a brow raised.
He sighs and runs his fingers through his hair. My fingers tingle with the need to reach for him.
“Are you really going to leave without saying goodbye?” he searches my eyes from where he stands.
I shrug, “I have nothing to say to you.” I move to stand, and he steps closer. I clench my fists at my sides when I stand to my full height.
“Emily, you don’t understand. I had to let you go despite how much I want you.”
My hands tremble and I feel the burn behind my eyes.
“Do you expect me to believe you? You had no problem telling me how I was nothing to you, had no problem watching me fall apart when you told me I was just something to pass the time. I gave you everything, all of me, and you... you left me in the rain crying, breaking for you .” I close my eyes as the first tear falls. “You don’t get to tell me that you want me, Liam when I begged you to fight for me and you did nothing.”
His eyes search mine for a moment and then he nods, pulling his bottom lip into his teeth.
“You’re right. I don’t. You goin’ to Ireland is the best option. I can’t be anythin’ more than a friend to you and you don’t want that, so…” he shrugs.
I let out a humorless chuckle and shake my head at him in disbelief.
“Even now, you give me up so easily.”
“What do you want me to do, Emily?!” He yells and holds out his arms.
“Nothing! I want nothing from you anymore! You’re free to fuck whoever you want, whenever you want, and I will do the same in Ireland. Find someone to pass the time with ,” I say in quotations. “You didn’t fight for me then and you’re clearly not going to fight for me now. And that’s okay because I’ll find someone who will.”
I move to stomp past him, but he wraps his hand around my bicep, stopping me.
“Let. Me. Go,” I growl and try to pry away from him.
He tightens his grasp. His eyes moving over every inch of my face as though memorizing the details.
“I’m sorry.”
“Fuck you, Liam. Fuck you.”
He releases my arm and I storm down the path to the mansion.