Chapter 4 Dominic
Dominic
Ryan paled. Whatever he’d been expecting to hear, it hadn’t been that. “You did what?”
“You heard me,” I grunted. “The night we broke up, Max and I got into it.”
“I don’t believe you.” Ryan sat back in his seat, stunned. “You and Max never fight.”
I laughed bitterly. “That might’ve been true once, but not now. Our friendship hasn’t been the same since we both lost something we cared about.”
Ryan’s throat bobbed. “Guess he’s not thrilled about you coming here to try and win me back.”
“He’s not, but not for the reason you think,” I said. Ryan’s eyes met mine at that, full of confusion. “Max tried to get me to stay away because he didn’t want you to get hurt again.”
“Sure.” The amount of sarcasm he managed to load into one syllable was honestly impressive.
“It’s true,” I insisted. “When I said we both lost something that night, I meant we lost the same thing. You. We both lost you.”
“Bullshit.”
“Max misses you. He regrets what happened almost as much as I do.”
Ryan gave a hollow laugh. “Christ, I can’t believe I almost bought it.”
My heart skipped a beat. “What do you mean?”
“I might be able to accept that you were acting out of a misguided sense of duty.” Ryan shoved his chair back. “I might even be able to accept the silence from you as needing to grow up. But what I can’t accept? That Max feels any sense of guilt.”
He got to his feet, glaring down at me witheringly. “Here you are, still fighting Max’s battles for him. Do us both a favour, Dom, and go after him. It’s clearly him you want. He’s all you’ve ever wanted. I’m not being a pawn in whatever fucked-up game you’ve got going on. Not again.”
With that, he turned on his heel and strode out of the restaurant. Shit.
Scrambling to my feet, I hastily threw a few notes on the table to cover our drinks before sprinting after him. “Shadow, wait.”
I caught up to him outside the restaurant, a few feet from his car. To my utter shock, he was holding a lighter up to a cigarette dangling from his lips.
Disbelief filled me as I strode over and snatched it from him. “What the fuck is this?”
“Fuck off, Dominic,” he snarled, taking it back.
“I can’t believe you’re smoking.” I watched in horror as he lit it and took a drag. “Seriously? I stopped smoking because you hated it.”
He took another drag, looking me dead in the eye. “Yeah? Well I started because you broke my heart.”
I closed my eyes and rubbed my chest. This was so much harder than I’d ever thought it would be. With anyone else, I’d turn and walk away.
But this was Ryan. My Shadow. I’d made him a promise.
And nothing was going to stop me seeing it through.
When I opened my eyes, Ryan was searching his pocket for his keys.
“I’m not done.”
“Well I am,” he said curtly. “You’ve said your piece. I’m done letting you hurt me, Dom.”
“That’s not what I’m trying to do.” I slid between him and the car, holding the door shut with my body. “Please, Ry. Just one more minute.”
His eyes flicked over my face before something seemed to fracture in them. “One minute. Then I’m gone.”
“I’m not in love with Max,” I said immediately. “I’ve never been in love with him. I’ve never wanted him. He’s my friend. That’s all he’s ever been. After how he interfered between us, he’s damned lucky to still have that title, and he knows it.”
Ryan exhaled slowly. “I want to believe you, but I can’t.”
“Why not?” Frustration spilled out of me. I might have been to blame for that night, but Ryan was also accountable. For this part, at least. “How could you just believe Max over me? I told you I loved you. I showed you, but you still believed him. How?”
My voice had risen to a shout by the end, ringing out over the empty car park.
Ryan’s gaze turned weary. Bleak. He dropped his cigarette and extinguished it with the toe of his shoe. “Because I could never understand how or why you loved me. What Max said gave me an explanation. It made it all make sense.”
“Shadow,” I murmured, cupping his face. “I wish you could see yourself how I do. Then you’d understand that you’re worth everything. That I’ll move heaven and earth to make you happy.”
He laughed bitterly. “If that was true then you wouldn’t have left.”
“I had no choice. I had to leave or I would’ve died in that house.” A sheen covered my eyes but I didn’t try to blink it away. “It was fucking selfish of me, I know, but I had to get out of there.”
Mine weren’t the only glassy eyes. “I can understand that, but leaving me behind? That, I can’t wrap my head around.”
“You asked me to,” I reminded him. “Demanded it, even. What was I meant to do, Shadow? Stay and fight when you’d explicitly asked me not to?”
“You left early,” he said, his voice cracking. “I thought we had two more weeks, and you took that from me too.”
A yawning pit opened in my stomach. “I thought…I thought that was best. What good would those two weeks have done? It was better that I just left. A clean break. That was what you wanted, right?”
Ryan pulled out of my hold and shook his head. “Doesn’t matter now, does it? You left. I’m getting married. That’s the end of it.”
His gaze turned cool. Polite. “Thank you. I’m glad we did this.”
“Glad we did this?” I repeated hollowly.
“Yes.” He nodded. “You were right. We needed to have this conversation. Thank you.”
I jerked my chin. “Don’t fucking thank me, Shadow. Not as you’re about to walk away.”
“There’s nothing to walk away from,” Ryan said flatly. “We’ve finally cleared the air. I’ve moved on, and now you should too.”
I raised a brow. “That’s what you want? To see me move on?”
“Yes.” Pain flickered through his eyes, so quick I could’ve blinked and missed it. “Move on, Dom. I mean it.”
Fucking bet. I gave him a saccharine smile. “If you say so.”
Stepping to the side, I opened his car door for him. He eyed me suspiciously as he slid inside. “Why do I feel like you’re plotting?”
“I’m just planning to do what you want me to do,” I said airily, leaning on his car door and grinning at him. “You want to see me move on? You fucking got it.”
Ryan’s nostrils flared, but he didn’t take the bait. Just slammed his car door shut and took off out of the car park like it was on fire.
I chuckled as I walked back into the restaurant.
Suddenly I was ravenous.
A familiar figure dropped into the seat opposite me. “When I got your message, I figured I’d find you half-cut and crying.”
I grunted at Max. “I won’t lie, it was fucking close. I thought I’d lost him, but there’s a chance. I know there is.”
Max signalled the waiter for a beer. “Given he abandoned you in a restaurant miles from both your work and home, I’m going to say you might be wrong there.”
“That’s because you don’t know what happened.
” I pointed my spoon at him. In the time it had taken Max to get his arse here, I’d had a full three courses.
I was currently smashing through a creme br?lée.
God, this was so much better than the MREs I was used to surviving on.
“Yes, he was pissed off, but that’s okay. ”
Max cocked a brow. “Remind me again, how is you pissing Ryan off a good thing?”
I scraped my spoon around the bottom of the dish, careful not to waste a delicious morsel. “Because it shows he cares. If he didn’t, he’d be ambivalent. I’m telling you, Max, he’s going to come around.”
“Or stab you.” Max smiled at the waiter in thanks as a bottle of beer was put before him. “If he does, I’ll have to help him dispose of the body. Figure I owe him that much.”
“About that…” I pushed my sadly empty bowl to the side. “Why haven’t you spoken to Ryan yet?”
“I spoke to him at his stag do,” he said carefully.
“Cut the bullshit,” I said bluntly. “You know what I mean. I’m not the only who needs to apologise. Nor am I the only one who wants to fix his relationship with Ryan. Don’t sit there and pretend otherwise.”
“I’m not.” Max rubbed at the back of his neck. “Honestly, I know I need to have a conversation with him, but I thought maybe it was best to let you have a shot first. It’s more important that shit gets sorted with you than me.”
“Your relationship with him is important too.”
“True, but I’m not going to burn down the entire world if he doesn’t let me back into his life.”
“I’m not that dramatic.”
Max gave me a pointed look. “Yeah. You are.”
I considered it. “Fair.”
“I get it though.” Max traced lines in the condensation of his bottle. “If I loved someone the way you love Ryan, I wouldn’t give it up either.”
“Your person’s out there,” I said. Max had had many girlfriends over the years, but none of them had ever lasted. “You just need to find them.”
“Nah.” Max shook his head ruefully. “They’re not, and that’s okay. I don’t think I fancy the kind of love you’ve found.”
“Why not?”
He tilted his head to the side. “Dominic, you’ve spent the last decade in agony. Desperately missing someone but too afraid to pick up the phone. Now you’ve finally made your move, and it’s too late. He’s marrying someone else. You think that’s something I want to subject myself to?”
I glowered at the mention of Ryan’s engagement. “He’s not married yet.”
“But he will be. You think it’s okay, what you’re doing?”
“I know it’s not,” I fired back hotly, running my hand through my hair.
“I know, okay? I’m behaving like a toxic fucking wanker.
But you know what? I don’t fucking care.
I don’t. Because I’ll debase myself over and over again if that’s what it takes.
I’ll ignore my moral compass, everything society tells me I should be doing, if it gives me even the slimmest chance of getting Ryan back in my life. ”
“And if he truly doesn’t want you back?”
I thought about the pain I’d glimpsed when he told me to move on. The jealous way he’d glared at Taff’s hand on my shoulder. “He doesn’t, but he will. He still loves me, and that’s enough.”
“Loves or hates you?”
“Loves.” I drummed my fingers on the table. “He got really upset when Taff told him I’d saved his life.”
Max snorted. “Trust Taff. One tiny heroic moment and he forgets all the bullshit you’ve pulled over the years.”
“Right?” I waved my hand in frustration. “Fucker keeps looking at me like I’m some kind of martyr, as if he wouldn’t have done the same thing in my situation.”
“It’s alright, it didn’t change my opinion of you. I still think you’re a prick.”
Max and I shared a brief smile. This was why he was in my life. Things weren’t the same between us, and they never would be again, but I loved the fucker.
Platonically, of course.
“Why d’you think Ryan got upset?” Max said. “Because you nearly died?”
“Maybe…” I said slowly, going over it in my mind. “But I got the impression it was more that I nearly died for someone else. Or that I was in that situation in the first place.”
“Hmm. As much as I hate to admit it…you’re probably right. If he’s upset, there are feelings there.”
“Exactly,” I said triumphantly. “That’s all I need. That and to do exactly what he asked me to.”
“What’s that?”
“He wants to see me moving on.”
“Fuck off.” Max laughed, but it died away as I continued to stare at him. “Wait, are you serious? Are you going to date someone just to fuck with Ryan?”
“Course I’m not. You know Ry’s the only person I’m interested in.”
“Then what are you going to do?”
“He wants to see me moving on. So I’m going to let him see that. Hopefully he’ll realise that’s the opposite of what he wants.”
“And how are you going to do that?”
“By seeing if Mimic fancies gatecrashing another party with us,” I said. “I’ve already messaged him.”
“So let me get this straight.” Max ran a hand over his face. “You’re going to take Mimic to a party you know Ryan will be at and make him think you’re together?”
I shrugged. “I’m just going to take Mimic as my friend. If Ryan thinks there’s more to it than that then that’s on him.”
“And the fact that you’ve chosen Mimic, who has zero concept of personal boundaries or space on a good day is…what, a coincidence?”
I smirked. “Call it what you like.”
“That’s insane. Do you think you’re being fair by doing this?”
“You know what they say—all’s fair in love and war.”
Max sighed. “As established, I can’t attest to whether or not that’s true. Not as far as love goes, at least. For everyone’s sake, let’s hope it stays that way.”
“It’s not all agony and heartache. I wouldn’t be pushing so hard for it if it was. The pay-off, being with the person you love, it makes everything worth it.”
“Problem is there’s no guarantee of that being the result.” Max gave me a tight smile. “And we both know that if I were in your position, my behaviour would match you in terms of toxicity and ruthlessness.”
I clinked my bottle against his. “Cut from the same cloth.”
Max nodded. “Poor Ryan. He doesn’t stand a chance.”
He didn’t. I was going to make that man happy, and I didn’t give a shit if that meant watching him marry someone else. I’d waited for him before. I could do it again.
Because I knew I was right.
Being with the one you loved in the end was worth everything.