Beautiful Bastard (Beautiful Bastard, #1)(36)

Joel? Fucking Cignoli.

She ended the call and slowly put the phone back into her purse. Looking down, she shook her head, a small laugh escaping before a wicked smile graced her mouth.

“Is there anything you’d like to tell me, Mr. Ryan?” she asked sweetly, and for some reason it made me even more anxious. I racked my brain but couldn’t think of anything. What was she talking about?

“That was the strangest conversation. It seems that when Joel checked his e-mail this morning, he had a delivery confirmation for my flowers. You’ll never guess what it said.”

She moved one step toward me, and instinctively I moved one step back. I didn’t like where this was going. “It turns out that someone signed for them.”

Oh, shit.

“The name on the slip said Bennett Ryan.”

Fuuuuuck. Why the hell did I sign my own name? I tried to think of a response but my mind was suddenly blank. Obviously, my silence told her everything she needed to know.

“You son of a bitch! You signed for them and then lied to me?” She landed a hard shove on my chest, and I had a sudden instinct to protect my balls. “Why did you do that?” My back was now against the wall and I was frantically searching for an alternative exit.

“I . . . what?” I babbled. My heart felt like it was going to claw its way out of my chest.

“Seriously! What the hell?”

I needed an answer and I needed it fast. Running my hands through my hair for the hundredth time in the last five minutes, I decided it was probably better to just come clean.

“I don’t know, okay?” I shouted back. “I just . . . f*ck!”

She took out her phone and appeared to be texting someone.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“Not that it’s any of your business, but I’m telling Julia to just go on without me. I’m not leaving here until you tell me the truth.” She glared at me and I could feel the anger coming off of her in waves. I briefly considered telling Emily what was going on, but she’d seen me follow Chloe; I was pretty sure she’d figured it out by now.

“Well?”

I met her eyes and let out a deep sigh. There was absolutely no way I could explain myself and not sound like I’d lost my mind. “Okay, yes, I signed for them.”

She stared at me, her chest heaving and her fists balled so tightly that her knuckles were white. “And?”

“And . . . I threw them away.” As I stood facing her, I realized that I deserved every bit of her anger. I was being unfair. I was offering her nothing but still standing in the way of someone who could possibly make her happy.

“You are f*cking unbelievable,” she growled through clenched teeth. I knew she was doing everything she could to keep from lunging across the room and pummeling me. “Explain to me why you would do that.”

Here was the part I didn’t know how to answer. “Because . . .” I scratched the back of my head. I hated that I’d let myself get into this situation. “Because I don’t want you to go out with Joel.”

“Of all the asinine, chauvinistic—who in the hell do you think you are? Just because we’ve had sex does not mean you get to make decisions in my life. We aren’t a couple, we aren’t dating. Hell, we don’t even like each other!” she yelled.

“You think I don’t know that? It doesn’t make any sense, okay? But when I saw those flowers . . . come on, they were f*cking roses!”

She looked as if she were ready to have me committed somewhere. “Are you on some sort of medication? What does the fact that they were roses have to do with anything?”

“You hate roses!” When I said this, her face fell, eyes soft and dark. I rambled on. “I just saw them and reacted. I didn’t stop and think about it. Just the thought of him touching you . . .” My fists clenched at my sides and my voice trailed off as I tried to regain my composure. I was getting angrier by the second: at myself for being weak and letting my emotions get out of hand, again, and at her for having this f*cking inexplicable hold on me.

“Okay, look,” she said, taking a calming breath. “I’m not saying I agree with what you did, but I understand . . . to a point.”

My eyes flew to her in shock.

“I would be lying if I said I haven’t been feeling similarly possessive,” she said reluctantly.

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Did she actually just admit to me that she felt this way too?

“But that doesn’t change the fact that you lied to me. You lied right to my face. I might think you’re an arrogant * most of the time, but you’ve always been someone I trusted to be honest with me.”

I flinched. She was right.

“I’m sorry.” My apology hung in the air, and I wasn’t sure which of us was more surprised by it.

“Prove it.” She looked at me so calmly, not an ounce of emotion visible in her features. What did she mean? Then, it hit me. Prove it. We couldn’t speak through words, because words only led to trouble. But this? This is what we were, and if she would give me this one chance to make up for what I’d done, I’d take it.

I hated her so much in that moment. I hated that she was right and I was wrong, and I hated that she was forcing me to make a choice. I hated how much I wanted her, most of all.