Total pages in book: 24
Estimated words: 22495 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 112(@200wpm)___ 90(@250wpm)___ 75(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 22495 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 112(@200wpm)___ 90(@250wpm)___ 75(@300wpm)
"I'd appreciate it if you'd stay here at home in the meantime."
She knew she should just nod and say okay again, but...
"What about you?"
She knew it was crazy, being the first one to walk out on their marriage first—
"W-When will you be back?"
But she was just so, so scared of him walking out on her now. Because she could see it. His keys were on the nightstand. His coat was draped over the chair. And the way he was standing, angled toward the door, every muscle in his body pulled tight like he was holding himself in place by force of will alone—
"I'm not sure."
Laina dug her fingers into her palms the moment she heard him say that. The nails bit into skin, sharp and grounding, because if she didn't hold on to something she was going to fall apart right here in this bed they had just made love in.
"Okay."
She told herself not to cry.
But it was just too late.
No no no.
The tears came hot and fast, sliding down her cheeks before she could stop them, and she wiped them away with the back of her hand but more kept coming, and her shoulders were shaking, and she couldn't stop, she couldn't—
She hated herself for crying, and she hated herself even more when she heard him say her name—
"Laina, don't."
His voice cracked on the word, and that was worse. That was so much worse. Because he was hurting for her when she had been the one to—
"I'm sorry," she choked out.
And she found herself scrambling off the bed and wrapping the sheet around herself when he tried to approach her. Her feet hit the cold floor, and she stumbled backward, dragging the sheet with her, putting the bed between them like it could stop what was happening.
"Please don't."
Her husband froze. The look on his face — the way his hand was still outstretched, reaching for her across the mattress — made her chest cave in.
"Why?"
She looked at him, and pain had turned him into a blur. She had to hold the sheet with one hand while wiping the tears away with the other. She wanted to see him clearly. Because that was what she deserved — to see clearly just how much pain she had cost him so that she would never ever do something stupid again.
Troy Barrymore stood on the other side of their bed in an untucked shirt with his hair wrecked from her fingers, and his eyes...
His eyes were the eyes of a man whose wife had just told the entire world she loved someone else.
"Because I hurt you, Troy," she whispered.
"I've hurt you for seven years—"
"Not by choice."
And she...had always known that. It was why she had left him in the first place. Because she knew he was a good man, and she used to think she was a good person, too, until she lost her mind and found herself saying the craziest things, hurting him just because she was hurting, and that...
That wasn't love.
"I love you, Troy. Y-You know that, don't you?"
His face hardened. The softness she had seen moments ago — the tenderness, the vulnerability, the man who had touched her cheek like she was something sacred — vanished. In its place was the Troy Barrymore the rest of the world knew. The one with the locked jaw and the cold eyes and the voice that could cut through steel.
"Don't."
"D-Don't w-what—"
"Don't bother saying you love me," he snarled, "if you're only saying it because you're about to leave me again."
The words hit her like a physical blow. Her knees nearly buckled. Because he was right. He was right. Every time she had said she loved him, she had followed it with a goodbye. Every single time. And he had learned to hear the goodbye before the love.
"I don't want to," she choked out.
"Then stay!"
His voice broke on the word, and the sound of it — the raw, ragged edge of a man who had spent his entire life being unbreakable finally breaking—
"But after what I've done — Troy, no!"
She knew it was stupid, but she still found herself trying to run away the moment she saw him stalk toward her. His eyes had gone dark with something fierce and desperate, and every step he took was deliberate, closing the distance between them while she backed away with the sheet trailing behind her like a wedding train.
And just like so many times in the past, she ended up tripping over the edge of her sheet, her foot catching the trailing fabric, and she went down—
But it was Troy who caught her.
Troy, who always caught her from falling.
Troy, whom she loved so, so much—
He caught her in his arms, one hand gripping her waist, the other cradling the back of her head, and she was pressed against his chest with the sheet bunched between them and her bare feet dangling off the floor.