Chapter 34
Julian
Archer is staring at me, and rather than feel a damn thing like regret or pain, I force myself to feel nothing. It’s easier this way.
His anger is radiating off him, and honestly, I don’t blame him.
Near the door Freya just stormed through, there’s a mirror on the wall, the same mirror I check my reflection in every morning, but right now it’s reflecting an image I hate. A man too cold and afraid to be happy. My own worst enemy.
Archer takes a menacing step toward me. “So?”
I lift my eyes to meet his gaze. “So what?”
“You let her just leave. You didn’t fight for her. She needs reassurance, Julian. She needs us to remind her that we have her and love her no matter what, and you just…let her go.”
I swallow the knives gathering in my throat. “What do you want me to do, Archer? She wanted to leave. She wanted to enjoy having two rich boyfriends for as long as she could—”
“Stop it!” he barks.
“It’s true, isn’t it?”
He jabs a finger painfully into my chest. “You fucking know it’s not. That girl chased your ass into an elevator to stand up to you.”
“She chased after me to save her job. Let her go, Archer.”
Suddenly, his forearm is pressed against my throat, and my back is slammed violently against the wall. “What the fuck is wrong with you? Is this how you want to live? Alone and miserable? You were happy with us. Admit it, you stubborn prick!”
“Typical Archer, resorting to violence,” I spit back.
There is such vitriol in his eyes, not for me but for what I’m saying. For this role I’m playing, because if anyone could see through my bullshit, it’s Archer Wilde.
I shove him away, and he steps back with a look of desperation. When I hear the shake of the pill bottle she left on the table, I spin toward him.
“And what about these?”
He holds them out to me, and I’m suddenly too exposed, so I snatch them from his hand and throw them back into the drawer, slamming it shut.
“Julian, talk to me.”
“It’s nothing,” I bark. “I used to take them when I couldn’t handle it. But I can handle it.”
“You call this handling it?” he bellows. “Julian, you’re shaking. You’re talking nonsense. Freya was right. You’re letting your anxiety ruin everything.”
“What about you?” I shout. “We can’t just be your medicine because you don’t like therapy or drugs, Archer. We can’t fix you any more than you can fix us.”
His jaw hangs open with shock. “We were happy. This life was finally worth trying for.”
“Just get out, Archer,” I bellow.
“This is what you want?” he asks with tears in his eyes. “What you truly want?”
I run my hands through my hair, messing it up more than it already was. “It was going to end eventually, Archer. Stop pretending that any of us were cut out for forever. You were gonna bail eventually, and you know it. Freya is committed to her work, as she should be.”
“I was gonna bail? I’m the only one here fighting.”
“Yeah well…” My chest panting with heavy breaths, I lift my gaze to his face. “You abandoned your other family. What makes us any different?”
He shoves me one last time, gritting his teeth as tears fill his eyes. “Fuck you, you coward.”
Tearing my ring off his pinkie finger, he sneers in my face before tossing it to the floor. It clinks loudly against the wood before rolling under some furniture. The sound makes me flinch.
“She asked me to stay because she cares about you, you know,” he snarls. “But I think that’s the last thing you want, Julian. You hate the idea of someone caring about you, don’t you?”
I hate this vitriol on his face. I just want to wrap my arms around his neck and have him go back to being the warm, comforting Archer he always is, but then what? Then he knows how weak I am? My mind won’t let me see a future where I get over this hang-up and let them in.
It won’t let me be happy.
So with a tremble in my bottom lip, I stare into his eyes. “Just go, Archer. That’s what you do best.”
I watch the pain flash through his eyes. It’s brief and cutting, but it’s there. Then, with that, he throws me against the wall and storms out of my apartment.
As the door closes behind him, I stare blankly across my empty apartment. Onyx meows, as if she too is joining in the argument. Shouting at me for being so stubborn. So hopeless. So weak.
I glance sideways into the mirror again, lost in the sad blue eyes of the man looking back. I’ve taken such precautions against this. I have put up my walls and my armor, and I made the world hate me for so long to keep from feeling this excruciating pain.
And for what? I ended up here anyway. The one time I let love in, it ends like this.
The beverage cart in the corner calls my name, offering something to take the edge off, but I don’t want to take the edge off. I want to wallow in my self-pity.
Fully dressed, I walk into my bedroom. Shoes and all, I collapse into the mattress, hugging the pillow tight to my face, the one that still smells like them, and I wait for the world to swallow me whole.
Onyx crawls across my back before sitting directly between my shoulder blades and meowing loudly to wake me from my deep sleep. I let out a groan as my head pounds. As much as I want to swat her away, I know the poor thing is just hungry.
Lifting my arm, I peek at my watch to see it’s already late afternoon. I’ve been lying in this bed feeling bad for myself for nearly eighteen hours.
Delicately, I stand from the bed as the cat hops down to the floor, meowing again. I never even took my shoes off last night before I crashed, not finding sleep until hours later. Reliving the events of last night made for a long, torturous, sleepless evening.
The primary emotion is mostly regret. Then fear. Then anger at myself. Round and round and round we go. Not once in the events after Archer stormed out did I feel an ounce of relief. None of this was for my own good or protected me in any way, although that seems to be what I was so worried about.
I just miss them.
Not that it matters. Groveling and apologizing isn’t really one of my strengths. Because groveling and apologizing requires vulnerability and courage, two things I clearly lack.
As I enter the living room, the pill bottle practically glows in my periphery. It comes with another wave of shame and regret for letting it get this bad. Had I been taking care of myself the way Freya said, would I even be in this situation now?
I start on Onyx’s food first, setting her dish down and petting her head before slowly moving toward the coffee machine. For the most part, I hold it together. I have control of the situation…that is until I spot the three dirty mugs in the sink from yesterday morning.
Three dirty mugs I didn’t wash immediately because I was too distracted by how fucking happy I was. Picking one up, everything hits me at once, like a tidal wave of pain.
“Fuck!” I shout before hurling the mug violently across the room.
Onyx screeches and scurries away as the porcelain shatters.
Leaning over, I rest my forehead against the cool granite and try to catch my breath, but I can’t. My chest heaves and my skin tingles, and tears spring to my eyes.
It’s all too much. Way too far out of my control.
I’m helpless against it.
I fucked up. How could I lose them?
Did I ever have a chance of keeping them?
Did they even really love me?
No. They loved each other. Not me.
Am I so unlovable? Imperfect? Worthless? A lost cause?
“Julian!” a soft voice calls for me through the cacophony in my head. A warm hand strokes my back. “Breathe, Julian. Breathe.”
My sister’s familiar presence pulls me back to the real world, and the moment I look up to find her standing in my kitchen, fear and panic morphing her features, I am hit with a wave of humiliation.
Still gasping for breath, I cover my face with my arm and turn away from her.
“Get out of here, Mel,” I sob.
Of course, she doesn’t leave my side. She follows me into the living room, a comforting hand on my back the entire time.
“I’m here. Breathe, Jules.”
“I am breathing!” I snap. It’s not her fault. None of this is her fault.
It’s mine. All mine.
She has to all but drag me to the couch and wrestle me to sit, forcing my head between my legs as she rubs circles down my spine. When she starts to count, I am whisked away to the night in the elevator when Freya brought me back down from that attack.
How did I think I had it under control?
Tears drip from my eyes to the floor as the buzzing under my skin subsides. The crash after an attack is the worst. I am deflated and exhausted as I collapse on the couch and stare at the ceiling.
My sister sits silently by my side.
“What are you doing here?” I ask with a rasp in my voice.
“I came to check on you. Heard that little fit you threw and let myself in.”
“I did not throw a fit,” I argue, which we both know is a lie. The shards of porcelain scattered across the floor are all the proof we need.
“Freya told me what happened.”
I close my eyes and try to stave off the pain those words bring. “Is she okay?” I ask.
My sister scoffs. “No, she’s not okay, Julian. She’s heartbroken. A mess. Couldn’t even spend last night with her mom because she was so distraught. Cried on my couch until two in the morning.”
“I’m glad you were with her,” I say.
“Julian, knock it off!” Amelia shouts. “Stop acting like it’s over.”
“It is over, Mel. After the way I acted last night, there can’t be any doubt.”
“She loves you, you jerk. So does Archer.”
“The things I said to them,” I say with a wince.
“So apologize. They know you are imperfect, Julian, and they love you anyway. That’s literally what love is.”
Draping my arm over my face, I hide the tears that have begun to sprout again just from hearing her say that. I don’t want to even dare to hope that she’s right. Could I get them back? Could I really just apologize?
My sister stands from the couch and goes to the kitchen. I hear the sounds of her pouring water into a glass. Then I feel her hover over me.
Opening my eyes, I squint up at her.
“Come with me.”
“Where?”