Prologue #7
"But now your man's showing up at my restaurant," I continued, voice hardening again, "causing a whole damn scene 'cause he knows you're there with me.
I'm where you go when you need comfort. When he fucks up.
When you need someone who actually gives a damn.
And he's threatened by me 'cause he sees what's up.
Everybody sees that shit. Everybody but you. "
The light turned green, but I didn't move even when the cars behind us started honking, because I didn't care.
She dropped her head, crying harder now. Sobs racking through her chest like they were being torn out of her. And just like that, I knew I'd pushed too far. But I didn’t have it in me to hold it anymore.
I dropped my head forward onto the steering wheel, forehead pressed against the cold leather, eyes squeezed shut. My chest heaved with the effort of breathing. Of not breaking down myself.
"Je ne peux pas t'aimer, Dillion," she whimpered in French. Shoulders trembling under the weight of what she was trying to say. I can't love you, Dillion.
I picked my head up slowly, every movement feeling heavy, weighted. I reached out, fingers gently lifting her chin, forcing her to look at me even though I knew it would hurt us both.
"Pourquoi?" I whispered back, my thumb brushing softly along her cheek, catching tears as they fell. Why?
Her lips trembled, and the tears spilled more freely now, tracing delicate paths down her smooth, chocolate skin. Beautiful even in her pain, especially in her pain.
"Parce que t'aimer comme je le veux vraiment..." she choked out, voice cracking under the weight of the truth she'd been carrying. "?a veut dire risquer de tout perdre un jour si on se brise... et je ne peux pas perdre mon meilleur ami."
Because loving you the way I really want to... it means risking breaking up one day and losing you, and I can't lose my best friend.
I stared at her, chest so tight I could barely breathe.
The streetlights outside flickered softly, casting long shadows across her face, highlighting every tear, every tremble of her lips, every moment of vulnerability she was letting me see.
I wiped them away gently, even though I knew, deep down, I couldn't wipe away what she was feeling, or what I was feeling, couldn't fix this with tenderness alone.
She wasn't saying she didn't love me. She was saying she loved me too much to risk losing me. Somehow, that hurt worse than anything else she could've said.
My hands trembled slightly against her face as I let out a slow, shaky breath.
My mind was racing, trying to hold on to some thread of logic, some argument I could make, but all I could feel was her.
Her sadness pressing against my chest like a physical weight.
Her fear wrapping around both of us. Her love, so much love, love she was too scared to claim.
Without thinking, I threw the car in park, right there in the middle of the empty street. Headlights off, hazards dark, I didn't care anymore. Let the world wait. The world outside felt still, like even the night was holding its breath for us, waiting to see what we'd do.
I leaned back against the headrest, closing my eyes for a second, trying to breathe through the ache sitting heavy in my chest. Trying to find words that would make her understand.
"You could never lose me," I whispered.
"I could." Her bottom lip trembled. "I lose everybody, Dillion. Everybody I love leaves…or dies…or just... stops loving me back."
That confession shattered something in me, because I could feel how intensely she meant it.
"I’m not going anywhere, Aurelia." I promised her.
Her hands covered her face, fingers pressing against her cheeks like she could somehow stop the flood. But it was too late. The tears kept falling, shoulders shaking under the weight of emotions she'd been carrying for too damn long.
"Aurelia..." I whispered, reaching over to gently pull her hands away from her face. Her eyes met mine, red, glassy, and full of fear. Full of love too, even if she wasn't ready to say it out loud.
"Why can't you just let me love you?" I asked softly.
She shook her head slowly. "I can't lose my best friend. I'd rather stay in this... in between... aching for what could be but still having you close, than risk everything and lose you forever."
Her words hit me like a punch to the chest, knocked the air out of my lungs. She thought she was protecting us by holding back, but all she was doing was ripping me apart. Ripping us apart. Piece by piece, day by day.
I let out a slow breath, trying to find the right words. Trying not to break down completely.
"The in between is killing me, Aurelia." The confession came out so damn raw.
"This shit is literally eating me from the inside out.
We operate like a couple in so many ways.
You call me when something goes wrong. I'm the first person you think of when something goes right.
We finish each other's sentences. We know each other's orders.
We fall asleep on the phone together. But at the end of the night? You go home to him."
She shook her head, blinking rapidly, trying to hold back fresh tears that were already falling.
"Because I'm a cheater," she whispered, the shame so heavy in her voice it made my chest ache. "I crossed a line with you that I never should have. I betrayed him, Dillion... and I hurt you. I'm no good for you. I'm broken and I just... I break everything I touch."
"Aurelia... come on." I turned to face her fully, voice as calm and firm as I could make it even though everything in me wanted to shake her, make her see what I saw.
"We acted on impulse, yeah. But that? That had been brewing for a long time.
We both know it. We both been feeling this for years.
We both still fightin' it hard since that night, pretending like we don't want each other every time we're in the same room. "
She looked away, swallowing hard, but I wasn't letting her run from this. I'd let her run too many times before.
"It was one time," I reminded her, my voice softening, gentling.
"With me. You didn't do shit before me, and you didn't do shit after me.
" I reached out, turned her face back to mine.
"You're not a cheater, Aurelia. You're a woman who's been settling for scraps when she deserves a feast. You're a woman who finally got a taste of what love is supposed to feel like and it scared the hell out of you. "
Her glassy eyes flicked back to mine, vulnerable in a way that made me want to wrap her up and never let go. I reached over, brushing a tear from her cheek with my thumb, letting it linger there, letting her feel how much I meant every word.
"I'm not going anywhere," I promised. "I don't care what happened. I don't care that you got scared and ran. I don't care that it's messy. But you don't belong with him, Ru. You know that. Deep down, you've always known that."
I leaned in closer, close enough to see the flecks of gold in her brown eyes.
"You belong with me."
She closed her eyes tight, like she was trying to block out my words, another tear slipping down her face.
"What's a better foundation than being best friends? Huh? We already know each other's worst. We've seen each other at our lowest. We've held each other through heartbreak. We know each other's bodies, each other's minds, each other's souls. That's not a mistake, Ru."
I held her face in both hands now, a little tighter this time, eyes locked on hers. I wanted to say something that would make it better, something that would make her believe me, but the words felt too small for the weight of this moment.
My hands trembled against her face as the silence stretched between us.
So, I stopped thinking.
I leaned in, ready to do what I'd been aching to do since that night together. My lips were inches from hers, close enough to feel her breath on my skin, close enough to taste the promise of what could be.
But then I felt it, the trembling. The fear radiating off her in waves. I paused, frozen in that space between wanting and having, and really looked at her.
She was terrified. I could see it in the way her eyes darted everywhere but at me, like if she looked directly at what we were about to do, it would become too real.
The realization hit me like cold water. I pulled back slowly, reluctantly, and let out a long, deep sigh. Ran a hand down my face, trying to ground myself. Trying to let go of what I wanted so badly I could taste it.
She wasn't ready for me.
That realization settled over me like a weight.
The truth was, her fear was louder than her heart right now.
And no matter how much I wanted her with me, wanted to feel her warmth beside me, wanted to hear her soft voice fill the spaces of my penthouse, wanted to wake up to her face on my pillow, I couldn't be the reason she unraveled.
Not like this when choosing me meant destroying herself in the process.
I loved her too much for that.
I swallowed hard, the lump in my throat threatening to choke me. My fingers flexed as I put them back on the steering wheel. I shifted the car back into drive and without asking, I made a right turn. Her head snapped toward me, brows furrowed, voice tight with panic and confusion.
"Where are we going?”
"I'm taking you to your mama's." I said keeping my eyes on the road.
"What?" Her voice rose, confused, hurt. "No. Dillion, I was supposed to stay with you tonight. That was the plan. You said I could come over."
"I know what I said."
"Then why are you changing it?" She reached out, hand gripping my arm. "After everything that happened tonight?"
"Exactly. Things are different now, Ru," My voice strained.
"Different how? We're still friends, aren't we?"