Dream Chaser (Dream Team, #2)(17)

However.

“That’s not much detail.”

“That’s my way of saying you don’t wanna know, and you’re not gonna know, Ryn.”

I heard his tone, saw his face, and thus mumbled, “Gotcha.”

Honestly, I didn’t feel too badly about Laszlo catching Boone’s bad mood. Trust was paramount between Dom and sub. He didn’t break a rule ignoring my safe word. He broke the rule.

And he was probably still doing it to other unsuspecting girls like me.

Though I reckoned he wouldn’t after Boone got done with him.

“Can we be finished now?” I requested.

“No. Do you dance tonight?”

“Yes.”

“Do you dance tomorrow night?”

“No.”

“We’re going out to dinner tomorrow night.”

At this declaration, Brett’s words came to me, I’d start with saying yes when he asks you to go out with him.

But, I just…

Couldn’t.

“I can’t,” I told him.

“You got plans?”

“No, but—”

“Then we’re going out to dinner.”

“We’re not, Boone.”

“This dance is over, Kathryn.” He took his hand from my hair to curve his fingers around mine at his neck in order to make his point. “Are you not seein’ that?”

I tried to pull my hand free.

Boone didn’t let me.

“Let me go, Boone.”

“Ryn, baby—”

“I can’t do this,” I said.

“We’ll talk at dinner.”

“No, we won’t because we’re not having dinner.”

“Kathryn—”

“I can’t do this.”

He snapped his mouth shut so fast, I thought I heard his teeth clack.

I knew why.

I heard my tone.

It was like it was when I got Brett’s attention.

Small.

Defeated.

But worse.

A lot worse.

Because this wasn’t Brett I really needed to listen to me.

It was Boone.

“I liked those guys,” I whispered. “I wouldn’t have given them chunks of my life if I didn’t. And in the end, they treated me like trash.”

His fingers still around mine squeezed.

“My own father stood me up for the Kiwanis club father-daughter dance.”

His face softened.

Man.

Seriously.

That face?

I was totally at my end.

“Sweetheart,” he murmured.

“Or whatever club it was, I don’t even know because I didn’t really know my father because he wasn’t around often enough to get to know and that was his choice.”

“Ryn.”

“Bad Dom thought he could do whatever he wanted to me.”

“Ryn.”

“My brother’s an alcoholic. I lost him years ago. He let his wife go, his kids. He let me go, Boone. He didn’t just slip away. He let us go.”

“Christ, baby,” he whispered.

“I can’t with you,” I whispered back. “I just can’t with you. Because you’re beautiful.”

He stilled.

“You’re so beautiful, sometimes I look at you and I can’t believe my eyes.”

Closing his own eyes, he turned his head to the side, lifting my hand and pressing it to his mouth so I could feel his lips against my palm.

Really he did not get that I could take no more.

And he needed to get it.

“I need to be wanted,” I told him. “I need to be loved. I need to be won. You have another woman. I’m already second runner-up. A man like you…with a man like you, I can’t, Boone. I can’t have and not have a man like you. It would tear me apart. I can’t have and maybe win and then maybe lose a man like you. That would destroy me. So I just can’t.”

His fingers closed around mine tight and he put my hand to the base of his throat, turning back to face me, and God.

I could live forever in the green of his eyes.

But I couldn’t.

Because I wouldn’t.

If I started this with him, he wouldn’t even be mine.

But I simply couldn’t start, because I wouldn’t be able to take the end.

I was winding up to the finish, which I hoped would lead to him leaving so I could shave my head or shove needles under my fingernails or something infinitely more enjoyable than getting it through Boone’s handsome but thick head that we were not gonna happen.

So I said, “I’m good with what I’ve got. I’d rather have nothing than take a risk at losing everything.”

“All right, Kathryn.”

And there you go.

He was just giving up.

And I got it.

I wasn’t worth it.

Dad had taught me that a long time ago.

And since Dad, the hits kept coming.

So it was just going to be me.

The stripper in the shitty apartment with a rotting house she never had time to fix up.

But I was going to find the time.

I was going to make something of myself.

Just for me.