Chapter Twenty-Seven Declan #2
“And I take great pride in the fact that he’s mine,” he says, his voice lower and more menacing. “It’s sort of like having a nice car. Something really rare, maybe even a classic. And rather than keep it in your garage, you like to take it for drives and show it off a little bit.”
What the fuck is he getting at? Every muscle in my body is stiff and uneasy.
“I like lending out my car too. I want to show off how nice it drives. You get me?”
My blood turns molten with rage. I don’t respond as he leans in with a smarmy grin.
“Do you understand what I’m trying to say, Barclay?” he asks, and I tilt my head to the side, afraid that I know exactly what he’s trying to say.
“I’m saying that I’d like you to drive my car.”
Instantly, I feel sick. My molars grind. My eyes narrow. My fists clench. I want to punch him.
No, worse. I want to put him in the hospital. I want to make him bleed. Make him cry. I want to make him regret the day he ever walked into my house. No—the day he ever touched Colin.
I want to make him regret ever talking about him like this or even getting this sick idea in his head. Something violent and hateful courses through my veins as I stare at him, disbelieving that I’m actually hearing what he’s saying to me right now.
He shakes my shoulder, and I quickly pull it away. “Relax, Barclay. You know this is all completely consensual. He likes it.”
No, he doesn’t. Not my Colin. He wouldn’t.
“What are you talking about?” I mutter darkly.
“I think you know what I’m talking about,” he replies with a smirk. “I’ve watched you two together this week. I see the way you watch him. The way you want him.”
I struggle to move away, but he holds me tighter, keeping me at his side. This is all a show of strength. Of power.
“So you want me to…”
“Yes,” he replies, watching me with a villainous stare. “I want you to fuck my fiancé while I watch.”
“So you can reclaim him, right? You can prove you’re more powerful than me. That he really belongs to you.” My lip pulls into a sneer.
“Now, you’re getting it,” Pierce says, shaking my shoulders with a laugh. “Colin and I don’t want a regular bachelor party. We want something special, and we were hoping tomorrow night we could have that here.”
“Why the fuck would I agree to any of this?” I argue.
“Because you want him, don’t you? You can try to deny it, but we all know the truth. And if you want our wedding here…well, then you’ll be accommodating, won’t you?”
Something inside of me snaps. My hands collide with Pierce’s chest as I shove him away. I ball them into fists and somehow manage to hold myself back from pummeling them into his face.
“You don’t want to do that,” he says with confidence, glancing down at my fists. His casual, arrogant manner only heightens my rage. He seems to think this all means nothing. Like he didn’t just try to blackmail me into having a fucking sex party for him.
“Come on,” he says just above a whisper. “I was hoping you’d try to challenge me. Tell me you’ll win him over or make him pick you or some shit. This is really disappointing.”
“What the fuck is wrong with you?”
“Me? What’s wrong with you? I expected you to be into this.”
“He’s not a prize. He’s a person, and he doesn’t deserve to be fought over like this. It’s sick.”
Pierce laughs quietly, glancing behind him toward where Colin is still alone in the room. “You know he likes it. He wants it.”
“No, he doesn’t,” I mutter again.
“You think you know him, but you don’t.”
Something about that line has me feeling nauseous. Maybe he’s right. Maybe I don’t know Colin anymore.
I’d still like to punch him, but I don’t. Instead, I turn and march away, furious and indignant.
“Think about it!” he calls after me.
I don’t respond. I just march through the door to my wing of the house, outrage and anger coursing through my veins.
This can’t be happening. Colin can’t possibly let this happen. Not my Colin. He would never agree to be treated this way.
My stomach is rioting, clenching. My mind is whirling. I’m so furious. I feel as if I’m on the verge of tears.
I want to scream.
I want to break something.
If it wasn’t pouring out, I’d light that fucking gazebo on fire right now, so there’s no place to have a wedding in two days.
I march up the stairs to my studio, ready to tear the entire room to shreds. I pull a pack of cigarettes out of my back pocket and light one with shaking fingers. I’m a mess. I can’t think straight.
I just keep replaying that entire conversation, trying to find the part where I’m confused, because this can’t be real. Why is this happening? I’m being fucking tested, that’s what this is.
I couldn’t get a simple wedding to win a bet with. No, I had to get a wedding with the one man I’ve loved and his sleazy maniacal fucking arsehole of a fiancé, and I have to go through with this.
I have to make this wedding happen. I have to. That was my goal. That’s what I wanted.
Do the wedding. Win the bet. Get the house. Live in peace.
Because if I don’t do that, then what? Then I’m stuck forever facing the dark void of infinity alone for the rest of my life. Forever watching wedding after wedding in my own home, knowing that I’ll never have that.
I’ll never find love or companionship—the things everybody wants and searches for. It will never be in the cards for me. Any chances of that were stolen from me somewhere in my youth by an ever-evolving tempest of grief and trauma that went uncured and instead built a man incapable of attachment.
I can’t face that.
I can’t face anything.
The only place where it’s easy is when I’m alone, or I have my art and my demons, and we have no one to answer to. Where life isn’t cruel but quiet, and I’m not constantly reminded of the person I had and the love I threw away.
Rather than pick up any brushes or clay, I dig for the bottle of whisky that rolled under the table before this whole charade began. It’s only half full, but that will be enough for tonight.
Trading puffs off the cigarettes for pulls from the bottle, I drown myself until I can’t feel it anymore. Until the gnawing reminder that I’ve lost Colin forever doesn’t feel like the weight of an elephant on my chest.
Because this was the nail in the coffin. He’s not just marrying Pierce. He belongs to him—truly belongs to him.
The way he once belonged to me.
When the bottle is empty, and the liquor hits my bloodstream, the room grows fuzzy and dark. It muffles the pain and quiets the voices. When I crawl onto the mattress, all I know is that I can’t feel anything—except for a warm pair of arms wrapped around me as I drift off to darkness.