Actual Stop (Agent O’Connor #1)(51)

Lucia sighed. “I was hurt, and I guess I wanted you to hurt, too. When I thought about it the next day, I felt awful. I accused you of some pretty horrible things.”

“It’s okay.” It wasn’t. Not really. But I didn’t know what else to say just then. This whole conversation was confusing. I needed time to think.

“It’s not even remotely okay. I’m sorry.”

I nodded, even though we were on the phone and she couldn’t see me. I tried to wrap my mind around the exchange and get a handle on all my conflicting feelings.

“I mean, it’s not as if you went out of your way to seek her out, right?” she went on when I didn’t reply.

“No. I didn’t.”

“So she came to you. What, did she want you back or something? Because I wouldn’t blame her.”

Her halfhearted stabs at teasing or flattery went right through me without making a ripple. “No. She came here for work. We were partnered up for the visit. That’s all.”

“And you guys didn’t fool around or anything?” Her voice was oddly strained.

“No.” My answers were flying out of my mouth automatically at this point. My mind was a complete blank, and I was numb.

The silence stretched taut between us, and as I considered what she’d just asked me, something clicked in the back of my mind. Loudly. Unwilling to accept it, I replayed the words against memories of the expressions on her face the night we’d broken up, seeing the situation with new eyes.

Over the past day or so, a little voice had been telling me something hadn’t exactly been on the level about the conversation Lucia and I’d had. Now I knew why. I’d assumed the anguish I’d seen on her face had been pure. I’d thought it was because I’d hurt her by failing to live up to her expectations. It hadn’t seemed particularly rational, but I’d been unable to come up with a better explanation. I only just now realized that something else had tainted her accusations.

Guilt.

“Ryan?”

“Huh?” My head was spinning, and I was pretty sure I was about to vomit. I sat down hard onto the corner of a cement flower box. It was either that or risk my legs going out from under me.

“Okay, you’re right. I totally deserve this. After the way I treated you, I don’t blame you for wanting me to grovel a little. And you know what? I’m fine with it. I miss you terribly, and there’s nothing I wouldn’t do to earn your forgiveness. Just tell me how I can make it up to you, and it’s done.”

“Oh, Luce,” I whispered, unable to draw the necessary breath to speak louder. “Tell me you didn’t.” I bent over and rested my elbows on my knees, dropping my head as low as I could. Wasn’t that what you were supposed to do when you felt like you were going to pass out? Or was it the crash position for a plane during an emergency landing? I couldn’t remember.

Lucia hesitated. “Tell you I didn’t what?” But the self-reproach lacing her tone confirmed what I already knew.

My heart shattered, spewing painful emotional shrapnel every which way as I finally understood exactly where Lucia’s fears about Allison and me had come from. It was the oldest story in the world. Human projection.

“It was Jessie, wasn’t it?” My voice was quiet, and for a long moment, I wasn’t sure she’d even heard me.

“Ryan, you don’t understand—”

“What, Luce? What don’t I understand? That you came over to my house the other night to accuse me of cheating on you, when it was you who’d been unfaithful? Tell me what I’m not getting. Because it seems pretty clear from where I’m standing.”

I clenched my jaw, and tears welled in my eyes as a razor-sharp whip of pain wrapped itself around my middle. I trembled and opened my eyes wide in an attempt to dry the drops before they fell. How the hell could she do this to me? And how could she claim I was the heartless one afterward?

“Listen, Ryan, when I came to see you, I was upset. I’d seen you looking at that woman in the diner, and I was hurt so I—”

“So you spent the afternoon f*cking Jessie?!”

“No, that’s not it at all.” Lucia’s voice shook, and she sounded near the edge of desperation. “I was devastated to see the way you looked at her. I mean, seriously just sick over it. You have no idea how painful it was to see your tender expression. So, Jessie took me out after requals to have a drink, you know, to help calm me down, so I could decide what to do.”

“And you guys got drunk and had sex. I get it. Thanks for sharing.” I will not throw up; I will not throw up; I will not—

“Ryan, please.”

“Please what?”

“Please don’t be angry with me. It was an accident. I didn’t mean for it to happen, but I was just in so much pain, and when she touched me—”

“Ugh. Spare me the details. I can work out for myself exactly what went down.” The words tasted bitter on the back of my tongue, and the irony of the phrase I’d just used definitely wasn’t lost on me.

“No, Ryan. I didn’t mean that. I just meant that for a few precious minutes, I forgot how bad you’d hurt me, that’s all.”

“So this is my fault? I pushed you to f*ck her with my—what was it?—oh, my emotional bankruptcy. Is that it?”