Blasphemous (Torn #3)(20)

How dare he march in here like he hadn’t rejected me? How f*uking dare he!

When I heard him follow me out, I exploded. “God, please, give me space! What the hell do you want from me, Bass? Isn’t it enough that you’ve paraded it around that you’re all happy? Isn’t it enough to flirt around with women when I’m around? I get it. We. Are. Done! I’ve accepted it. You’re done and I’m so f*uking over this.”

“Well, f*uk, do you honestly think you’re the only one here that’s hurting? You f*uking threw everything in my face, Emma!” he blasted at me.

“You had the power to end this misery for the both of us, but you didn’t and because of that we’re unbearably hostile to each other. I’ve finally accepted it.” It seemed like all energy, all the life, just drained out of me. “I’m tired of fighting with you, Bass. Let’s end the spite right here.”

“It wasn’t that easy… I had doubts…” Bass trailed off.

“I know you did. I truly did. That’s why I don’t want to talk about it any longer.” With another defeated sigh, I went back inside my room and continued packing my things.

“If I give you another chance, will you promise to be honest with me?”

I stopped midway as his words set in. “You’ve rejected me, over and over again. What made you change your mind?”

“This.” He gestured at my haphazard things all over the room. “You’re packing and willing to move away from me.” He paused. “I’ve wanted to mend things with you, but I needed more time—more time to figure my feelings out. I feel that if I don’t fix this now, we’ll never get the chance to again.”

I shrugged, unconvinced by his admission. He was just getting paranoid because we were kaput. That was all. Men tend to do this. Heck, Carter did this, too.

“I’m not ready for us to end,” Bass choked out. He suddenly seemed vulnerable as he waited for me to say something.

“Yet you were and you pushed for it to happen.” I shoved my clothes on the floor, remembering what I went through the past two weeks. “Look at me, Bass. Didn’t you see that I was falling apart? You saw, I know you did. You saw me hurting for quite some time now, but did that ever change your mind? No, you were unyielding.” Pressing my lips together, I gathered more courage. “But it’s fine. These affairs usually end right about where reality checks in, so we’re right on schedule.”

Bass instantly tensed up with that admission. “Is that what we had? An affair?”

No. You were my love affair… my dream come to life. The thing about dreams, though, you inevitably wake up. Dimitris shook me, but it was Jacques who woke me up. “An affair, arrangement, friends with benefits, fling and the list goes on, but it all comes down to one thing, sex. So, yes, that’s what we had. Lot’s and lots of sex.”

“You make it sound like what we had was cheap, Emma.”

“Maybe it was.”

“Take that back!” Bass snapped like I just told him he was a poor actor.

As if. “f*uk off and leave me alone.”

“Take those words back, Emma!”

The hell I was. “I said. f*uk. Off!”

Bass yanked my arm when I was about to leave the room, holding me down. “Take. It. Back,” he bit out, determined to get his way.

“No.”

Cupping my jaw, he penetrated me with those vicious eyes. “Tell me one thing, Emma,” he murmured in such a succinct, deadly voice, it was all I could hear. “Did you love me at all?”

I could lie about other things, but never my love for him. “I meant every word.”

“If you love me, then why aren’t you happy that I’ve changed my mind?”

“Because you were cruel,” I said with sadness. It was the truth. He truly was cruel, much more so than Carter because he meant so much more to me. If he’d given me time, I would’ve been completely his, but he was too caught up with his own misery that he didn’t see what it was causing me.

“I’m deeply hurt, Emma. I just love you so much it completely changed me. I’m a reasonable man, but with you, I become this jealous, overprotective, insecure guy. I feel like you’re going to leave me for Carter because you chose him once and you could do it again.”

“If I wanted Carter back, then nothing could’ve stopped me from having sex with him. If I wanted him back, not even you could’ve stopped me from being with him, but I did none of those, Bass. I was completely enamored with you. I was so happy that I felt like I was floating most of the time. All good things come to an end, though.”

“Emma…”

I shook my head, stopping him from talking.

Bass slowly took his fingers from my arm, before letting it completely drop to my side. He dropped his gaze, parting his lips as if to say something, but changed his mind and closed it shut. He gave me a curt nod before leaving my bedroom and going into his.

E

I decided to stay in the cottage because I didn’t want to make more gossip about my relationship with Bass. I just had to endure this since it was my own fault for getting involved with him in the first place.

I was surprised to find Bass had stayed in the past two nights. He was mostly on the patio reading, watching movies or on his laptop. We barely spoke to each other, but at least we were civilized. It made it bearable. I could feel that all the anger was subsiding. Even his hate, it ebbed away as if never there. We co-existed in a pleasant manner. I was somehow okay with that. Anything was better than hostility.