Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
Bobby
The car was quiet, the kind of quiet that sat thick and heavy between two people who had just crossed a line they weren’t supposed to cross.
The kind that made it impossible to ignore the heat still clinging to my skin, the scent of her still lingering in the air, the sound of her breathing still uneven beside me.
The streetlights flickered through the windshield as I drove, casting long shadows across the dashboard, illuminating the tension stretched between us like a rubber band ready to snap.
I could feel her watching me, her presence burning into my side, waiting.
Gabbi hadn’t said a word since I put the car back in drive, and neither had I.
But I knew she was waiting for something.
A sign. A single thread to hold onto, to make sense of whatever the hell had just happened.
I gripped the steering wheel tighter, my knuckles aching from the pressure, my jaw clenched so hard it felt like my teeth might crack.
She shifted in her seat, the movement barely there, but I felt it. "Bobby," she finally said, her voice softer than I expected.
I didn’t answer.
She hesitated, like she was carefully choosing her next words, but I already knew what she was going to ask. I could hear the unspoken question in the way she exhaled, in the way she was bracing herself for whatever bullshit I was about to feed her.
"Are we just going to pretend that didn’t happen?"
I inhaled sharply through my nose, staring at the empty road ahead, at the nothingness waiting for us on the other side of this night.
She needed an answer. She needed something. And for a brief second, I wanted to give it to her. I wanted to reach across the console, take her hand, tell her that it wasn’t just old habits, that I wasn’t going to let her walk away thinking it hadn’t meant anything.
But I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
Instead, I kept my hands on the wheel, my grip like a goddamn vice, and let the words that had been circling my head fall out of my mouth before I could stop them.
"I’ll take you home."
I felt the shift before I saw it. The way she sat up a little straighter, her body going rigid like I had just smacked her across the face. I didn’t have to look at her to know she was staring at me, searching for some kind of explanation, some kind of excuse for why I was already shutting down.
"Bobby."
I swallowed, my fingers flexing over the leather, hating myself for this, hating myself for knowing exactly how much I was about to hurt her.
I turned onto her street, my stomach twisting, my head pounding. She sat beside me, too still, too quiet, and I knew the second I stopped the car, the second she reached for the door handle, it would be over.
I pulled up in front of her apartment, put the car in park, but I didn’t cut the engine.
She didn’t move either.
The tension sat between us like a ticking bomb. I could hear the faint sound of her breathing, could feel the weight of everything unsaid pressing against the walls of this damn car.
She turned to me, and this time, I had to look.
Her eyes searched mine, her lips still swollen, her face still flushed, and for a moment, I thought maybe she was going to say something that would force me to stay.
Maybe she would tell me to stop being a coward, to stop pushing her away, to stop pretending like tonight hadn’t just ripped me apart from the inside out.
Instead, she did what she always did.
She gave me a chance.
A chance to fix it.
A chance to not fuck it all up.
But I was already too far gone.
I forced myself to speak, even though I already knew the words would taste like poison on my tongue. "Don’t think this changes anything."
The second it left my mouth, I regretted it.
I felt the impact before I saw it. The way her face fell, the way her lips parted slightly like she had just had the wind knocked out of her, the way her eyes flickered with something that looked a hell of a lot like heartbreak.
She inhaled slowly, pressing her lips together, and then nodded once. "Right."
The silence after that was deafening.
She reached for the door handle, her movements carefully controlled, like she was keeping herself from reacting, from showing me how much I had just fucking hurt her.
She stepped out of the car, gripping her bag too tightly, her shoulders too stiff.
She didn’t slam the door. She didn’t turn back. She just walked.
And I sat there, watching her go, watching her slip through my fingers like she had six years ago.
She reached her door, pulled out her keys, pushed inside. But just before the door closed, she hesitated.
My chest clenched.
For a second, I thought maybe she would turn around. Maybe she would come back, tell me off, demand that I stop being a coward, make me say what I really meant.
But she didn’t.
She just let out a slow breath, pushed the door shut, and locked it behind her.
I exhaled, gripping the wheel so tight my fingers went numb.
I should’ve gotten out of the car. I should’ve chased after her, fixed this, fixed everything.
But I didn’t.
Instead, I sat there, staring at her closed door, my jaw clenched, my chest feeling like it was about to cave in.
Because I had just hurt her.
Again.
And I fucking hated myself for it.