Only You (Adair Family #5)(50)

“Sunset?”

I flinched at the nickname. “Don’t,” I seethed. “Don’t you dare.”

“Roe …” Brodan got to his feet, towering over me again. He wore nothing but a T-shirt and joggers, the T-shirt stretching over his impressive shoulders, making me feel small in his shadow. “What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“Is it …” Something like fear flickered across his face. “Is this about us?”

I scoffed, “No. It has nothing to do with you. When you left on Sunday night, I showered and scrubbed my body until my skin was raw.”

He winced.

“And vowed to never give a damn about you again. So … this has nothing to do with you, and I definitely don’t need you, of all people, comforting me right now.” I turned to leave, but then Brodan was in front of me. He held up his hands in a gesture to stop me.

“Please. Roe, let’s talk. I have so much to say.”

“I think you made yourself very clear. It was a revenge fuck, right?”

Horror slackened his expression, and I faltered a little. “No,” he said hoarsely, taking a step toward me, but he stopped when I retreated. “No, it wasn’t that. I don’t know why I said that to you, and I’m not even angry about you sleeping with Arran. I know you were both wasted that night … it was what came after. You abandoned me, Monroe. That’s what I’m angry about.”

Disbelief renewed the rage I had only seconds ago been determined not to feel toward him. “I abandoned you?” I stared at him incredulously. “I was humiliated, and you made me feel guilty, as if I’d cheated on you when you’d made it perfectly clear that you were in a serious relationship with someone else. A relationship, I might add, you told me you’d never be in, which was a lie. You just didn’t want to be in a relationship with me!

“You messed with my emotions for years. But I was made to feel like the bad guy. And you never came after me. You threw me away at my first mistake after thirteen years of friendship. You were the one who was supposed to come after me. But you didn’t. You were all I had. I wasn’t all you had.” Tears, stupid, frustrating tears, stung my eyes. “You weren’t the one who was abandoned, Brodan.”

He opened his mouth to argue, but I cut him off.

“I was so in love with you, it almost killed me.”

Despair, genuine or manufactured, tightened his expression.

I sneered at myself. “I even thought of ending it once.”

Brodan looked as if I’d stuck a knife in him. “Roe.”

“Don’t worry. It was just the melodramatic musings of a young woman who realized that almost everyone I’d ever loved couldn’t love me back. I wanted to blame myself, which was why I contemplated jumping off the top of a college building. But as I stood there on the edge, I searched and searched for reasons, for actions so horrible they’d make the people I loved treat me like shit, and I couldn’t find anything that warranted the cruelty. I was mad at my parents for not loving me, but I wasn’t mad at you for not loving me the way I wanted. I was mad at you for messing with my head and for just not loving me, even as a friend.

“But I know I’m not a bad person. That I’m worth something. That the fault laid with my parents and with you. So I decided in that moment to step back from the ledge and promised myself that even if it took a lifetime, I wouldn’t let bitterness consume me. I wouldn’t stop searching until I found someone who loved me the way everyone deserves to be loved. Someone kind and protective and loving.

“Here’s the sad thing, and this might even make you laugh at the absurdity of it, but I don’t think I realized until these last few months that part of me still hoped that person could be you. And this occurred to me because I finally realized on Sunday night that the person I’m looking for will never be you.”

Tears brightened Brodan’s eyes. Real? Who knew?

Everything I’d bottled up inside was set free. Recklessly free. “I had an ex, someone I tried to love. He beat the shit out of me, just like Dad.”

Shock, fury, passed over his face. Was that real too?

“What is it about me that makes the people who are supposed to love me want to hurt me?”

“Monroe,” he whispered, as if in agony. “I’m so sorry.”

I shrugged, brittle, cold, almost numb from what had transpired. That Dad was gone and I’d never get closure with him. That Mum had stolen that from me. That the only man I’d ever loved my whole fucking life was as bitter a disappointment as the people who raised me.

“You never lifted your hands to me, but I’m your punching bag all the same.”

“Monroe, no—” He stepped toward me, but I raised my hands, my expression a stark warning for him to stay back.

“It doesn’t matter. I’m leaving Ardnoch. For good. Once the year is up, I’m taking a job in the Lowlands. There’s too much pain here.” I looked at him, gesturing between us. “Even this place that was once so safe … it’s all pain now. You have no idea how it feels to live your life with no one who truly loves you, Brodan. No idea how lonely that is. But I refuse to give up on finding someone. To give up hope, because without it, what’s the point? So I need to let this place go. I need to let you go. Or I’m afraid I’ll just disappear.”