Blazed(51)

He reached for me and I stepped back further into the stockroom. "Emmeline..."

"You're the only person who's gotten real tears out of me in five years, Blaze. Please don't make me shed them here. We'll have this conversation when you admit that I did nothing wrong."

"But you—"

"My family is not the same! And even if it was, how is it worse that I didn't tell you my dad is a multibillionaire but I won't touch his business or his money because I abhor his attitude? Please, enlighten me because I am really struggling to understand why I'm a bad person in this case." My face bunched up tightly into an expression of torturous pain as the first burning tear slid down my cheek. "Just get out."

He advanced towards me, not stopping when I backed away. When I was pressed up against the wall, he cupped my face in his hands and kissed the tear, nuzzling me in a way I couldn't stand because it was so sweet and desperate, like he was savouring me for the last time. "I'm sorry."

"So am I. I'm sorry that you didn't respect me enough to tell me the damned truth and I had to find out from a sister who told only because she wanted to stick the f*cking knife in for all the attention, praise and love I get for being a victim of my neuroses." He winced, but ran a thumb across my lips, pulling the bottom lip down with a slight groan. I knew what he was planning, and if he did it, it would be too much for me to bear. "Please don't kiss me. I'll forgive you if you kiss me and you can't make this go away with sweet nothings."

"Emmy?" Mrs Reynolds appearing in the doorway gave me a much needed opportunity to push away from Blaze while he was distracted and put some distance between us. I couldn't forgive him— I didn't want to, but there was no way to fight him if he was right up close to me. It made me remember the other times he'd touched me like that and what else he'd been doing at the same time, all the times we'd had sex just to be closer to each other. God, when he was wrapped around me I wanted to scratch myself open so he had a way to crawl inside me for good.

"Y-You need to g-go." My chest started to shake, holding in what I knew would be a shameless storm of tears and wailing. Sending him away was better in the long term, but my god, was it killing me to find the strength to do it. The clean break would have been better. He could have just taken the hint.

"Emmy, love." Mrs Reynolds pulled me by the arm out into the shop, leaving Blaze inside the stockroom swearing to himself. She sucked on her teeth looking in on him and sighed sharply. "Go home. Talk this out with him."

"But—"

"It hurts like hell, I know. But he had to have a bloody good reason." Sure, because he wanted to have his cupcake and eat her. I didn't vocalise that acerbic notion, choosing instead to regress into miserable teenager mode in protest. If I took him home we'd end up in bed together and that was not the right direction to take from there. Nothing he said would change the fact that I'd essentially been an extra-curricular sex toy and he'd probably been double dipping. That's why he really went weird when I said he could stay overnight properly— shit! It was all starting to make sense. He needed that excuse to creep away so his wife wouldn't twig onto his affair. So why be seen so publicly with me? Why give me a ring? Why tell my friends and family he'd marry me? None of it made sense.

"Stop asking yourself questions he has the answers to, Emmy. If nothing else, go and get some closure so you don't waste your life on 'what if's'." I swallowed convulsively at the same words I'd heard from the mouth of the man in that room and hoped he did have a damn good explanation. She was right, the unanswered questions would drive me insane and I was too weak a person to not end up blaming myself. I didn't know that the penance I set for myself wouldn't be a cost too much.

"Thank you." I nodded stiffly through the open door at Blaze, who jumped into action as spritely as ever. He looked like he'd already won his forgiveness. He certainly hadn't.





WE WALKED THE distance to my flat in a wary silence, Blaze trying to match my slow pace while I trailed behind trying to plan out how the conversation would go. I could hold it together as long as he didn't touch me again, so I planned to position furniture between us, the biggest object possible with a clear run to the door. It felt more like making vigilant plans to go into a bull fight or a lion's den.

It amazed me how uncomfortable I could feel in my own home because he was there after all the other occasions he'd been in that space with me had been some of my best, and near impossible to fend off the feeling of relief that we were there again when I was certain that the previous Saturday had been the last time.

Before he could open his mouth, I pointed at the couch until he sat and remained standing. The kitchen was too much of a hazard to both of us because there were too many sharp objects. The couch was a hazard to me because it would be too easy for him to trap me there. I had to be standing with him in a position of inferiority, somewhere that would hinder his access to me.

"Before you say anything," I rasped hoarsely, so coughed to clear my throat, "I think you should know that this might have gone differently if you'd had the balls to tell me yourself, and it was pretty shitty of you to keep it secret after I spewed the finer details of my life. That said, I think you owe me some simple 'yes' or 'no' answers to some pretty reasonable questions. Yes?"

"Emmeline..." Blaze whined and made to stand up, but I shot him down with a look. "Yes, alright. I do owe you that."

"Okay, good." Sighing, I began to pace the hardwood floor, trying not to pay attention to the rhythmic clacking of my heels. It was too like me to find a reason to let my mind stray and let the delusion pretend there was no problem, but

I needed these answers. "Were you ever planning to tell me?"

"Yes. I promise, I was going to, I just—"

"It was a 'yes' or 'no' question!" I snapped at him, forcing myself not to grace him with a look in his direction. "Were you... have you been going home and... do you share a bed and..." My eyes narrowed at his raised eyebrow. "You know where this is going."

"You think you leave me with enough energy to go home and service a wife?" He rolled his eyes and slumped back into the couch with his arms crossed. "No, Emmeline. We share a house, nothing beyond that. We've never had sex."

"Oh." What? How the hell was that possible? How could he have been married to her for so long but never... I shook the question out of my head and jumped back onto my own track. "Were you really going to marry me?"

Blaze sucked in a quick breath. "Yes."

"So you were going to leave her for me?" Silence. "Blaze?"

"You want a simple answer and I don't have it." He shrugged, raising his hand to his mouth to brush his fingertips across his lips. It was distracting and he knew it. He couldn't lie so he was looking for a way out.

"Answer the damn question."

"I can't in accordance with your 'rules'." I gaped, fuming. It was a childish side of him I never imagined could possibly exist. Far from acting like a child, actually, he was being downright snotty about it.

"You're a smart man. You have a f*cking doctorate. It wasn't a problem before, so know when to make like Galileo and break the rules because either way, you're condemned." Stiffening, I waved a hand and sneered, waiting for a half decent answer. Not that I hadn't already made my assumptions based on his attitude.

He ignored my glare and stood, jaw clenched. "No, Emmeline. I wasn't leaving her for you. But it's not as simple as a man just cheating on his wife. She knows about you."

"What?!" Horrified, I stumbled back until I was against a wall. "Is she coming to break my legs?"

"What? No. It's complicated, but she encouraged me to be with you."

"Does she want me to join in or something?" My hands shot to my mouth, then my hair, then my neck, and kept moving while the worsening compendium of nightmarish possibilities gathered in my mind. Maybe she couldn't keep him satisfied and sleeping with me kept them somewhat functional. Maybe she was fixated on a fantasy. Maybe she was one of those crazies who liked to watch their partner f*ck other people and get her rocks off to it. Maybe it was all part of some sick scheme to lure me in and make me their slave. Shit! Maybe she was one of the people Henry had screwed over and they wanted to get back at him through the bad publicity that would come from his daughter openly screwing a married man.

The growing list made me feel physically sick. "What the hell have you dragged me in to?"

"Nothing! My god," Blaze rushed at me, stalling at the hand I raised to make him keep his distance. "There's nothing suspect about this, I swear. I just wanted to have all my ducks in a row before I told you. I never planned for this, I just let my heart think for me. I'm non compos mentis around you so I had to start thinking on my feet."