Secret Heir (Dynasty #1)(64)

I wrench myself out of his arms, hating myself for feeling the loss of his warmth. When I turn to face him, my face is like stone, because I’m made of stone.

“What are you even doing here?” I ask, with a deathly calm that scares even me.

Those impossibly blue eyes lock onto mine and I see the anguish in them, but it doesn’t matter, because he still can’t answer the question.

“I don’t know,” he says finally.

I take a deep breath and I feel the stillness settle inside me as we look at each other in silence for what seems like an eternity. Because he doesn’t seem able to say the words to make the silence go away.

Fuck this. I can’t bear to stand there a moment longer. I turn on my heel to walk away. He speaks then. But his words make me wish that he hadn’t.

“Dammit, Jaz—it’s complicated. There’s so much you don’t understand.”

“You keep saying that,” I reply flatly.

“I didn’t ask for any of this. Everything was fine before you came along.”

He runs a hand through his hair, in a gesture of frustration.

“But then you show up here, mess things up, turn the world upside down.”

He steps closer to me, so close that we’re sharing breath. It reminds me of that day in the forest, the feeling of his lips brushing against mine and I want to scream.

“I don’t want you, Jaz.”

I don’t think he could’ve hurt me more if he’d slapped me in the face just then. I need to walk away. Right now. But I stand rooted to the spot and let him dig the knife in deeper.

“I can’t want you—I can’t give you what you need. None of this can ever matter.”

And just in case those words aren’t painfully clear enough, he stabs me in the chest one more time.

“This—it can never happen.”

I feel like the wind has been knocked out of my lungs for a moment. But I don’t allow myself to feel the loss. I’ve had too much of that in my life already. So I let the anger in instead.

“So, what the hell are you doing here?” I demand, because it makes no sense. He’s looking at me like’s he’s the one who’s being torn to pieces, when it’s him doing the tearing.

“I don’t know,” he repeats those words and I force myself to look him in the eye, although the sight of him makes me feel like my insides are being shredded apart.

“Then why don’t you just leave me the hell alone.” I fill my words with venom and ice because ice can’t feel.

Raph looks like I’ve just slapped him in the face, which again makes no sense, because he’s just made it painfully clear that he wants nothing to do with me. But I’m glad to see the hurt. Good, because I want both of us to hurt.

Something seems to snaps inside him then.

“Because I can’t leave you alone!” He’s almost shouting now.

“I’m not blind—I see the way the guys at school look at you. From the first moment you stepped on campus, they all wanted you. I have no right or claim to you. But the thought of another asshole touching or so much as looking at you, makes me want to set something on fire.”

I stare at him in utter shock. When that fades, I’m left only with anger. Not the red hot anger that cares, but a deathly cold anger that numbs every fiber in my being. The whole thing is so twisted, that it makes me sick. He makes me sick.

“So, let me get this straight,” I say with a voice as cold as the stone that I’m made from and his eyes darken until they are almost the color of the night sky.

“You don’t want me. You can’t want me. None of this matters. But you don’t want anyone else to be with me either?”

Raph looks stricken, but I force myself not to care.

“Is that right?” I demand.

He doesn’t answer. His silence is answer enough. The look in those now midnight blue eyes tells me that he can’t stand to let me go, but his silence tells me that he can’t say the words to make me stay either.

“Well, you’re right about one thing—you have no right or claim to me.” My words are harsh, but I want to hurt him.

“Jaz—” He walks towards me but I hold my hand up to stop him because I can’t stand it. I can’t stand to be near him, to even look at him.

“Don’t. Please, just don’t come near me. I swear to God, I don’t ever want you to come near me again.”

The plea stops him in his tracks, and this time as I walk away, he doesn’t stop me.





21





Raph respects my wishes and keeps his distance, although the stupid part of me wishes that I had never asked him to stay away, which is utterly pathetic, given that he was clear when he told me that he didn’t want me.

It’s not like the thing between us, whatever it was, lasted for very long. It was only a couple of months, for god’s sake. But it feels like I can’t even remember a time when Raph wasn’t part of my daily routine—whether it was hating him or … otherwise. It feels like my life hadn’t really started before him and now going back to that time when Raph wasn’t a part of my daily life, feels like I’m trying to be someone that I no longer am. I’ve experienced too much loss in my life not to recognize the familiar feeling.