“Not exactly,” he says with a cringe. “You have to understand that I wasn't dealing with you being away and moving on very well… I’m still not. I want you home where you belong.”
“Oh,” I scoff. “So, you want to blame this bullshit on me wanting a better life for myself?”
“No. Fuck, Ocean. Just let me get it out,” Nic growls, stepping back and pacing the parking lot, trying to calm himself. “Is it too fucking hard for you to have a proper conversation without your bullshit sarcasm coming into everything?”
“Really? This is the way you want to play this right now? I’ve got one clue for you, Dominic. You’re in the fucking dog house right now. I’ll say whatever the fuck I want to say and you have no fucking choice but to deal with it, otherwise, you can fuck off. I'm not interested in wasting my time listening to your bullshit story if you’re going to continue throwing bullshit attitudes back at me.”
He clenches his jaw and takes a few more paces while pumping his fists. He visibly calms himself and finally turns back to me. “What I was trying to say was that I had a lot going on and I wasn’t coping very well. You’d just sealed the deal with that bastard, and I saw our future slipping further away, but he shouldn’t have touched you, especially so close after what happened with that fucking Carter kid.”
I silently fume, hating that he brought that shit into it. “If I wasn't ready to allow a man to touch me, I wouldn’t have. What happens between me and Colton is none of your damn business.”
“I know that,” he snaps back. “I wasn’t fucking thinking. I was just so … angry. A smarter man would have saved that favor for something else, something big. The DeCarlo’s have a huge pull and I could have benefited from that but as it is, I was too fucking selfish to see past my own needs.”
I cross my arms over my chest and desperately try to bite my tongue. The bell will go any minute now and despite how much I want to hate him right now, I really want to hear what he has to say. “Go on,” I tell him.
“Everybody knows about the bullshit between Carrington and DeCarlo. It’s been going on for twenty-odd years. All I had to do was call Vincent and tell him that I wanted Colton to hurt. That's all I said, and the rest was left up to him. He fucking jumped at the opportunity and when I saw what was going on, I knew instantly how badly I fucked up. I was never going to get there in time. They ignored my fucking calls when I tried calling it off. It was their fucking show. I thought they were just going to go in there and terrorize Carrington, make him shit his pants as a way to scare him into giving up the company, but what they did … I didn’t expect that at all, and that’s on me.
“I should have known that they’d take it too far. Vincent’s sons are … Ocean, they’re fucked up, twisted bastards and you have no fucking idea how sorry I am that I sent them to you like that. I saw the way they terrorized your friends and destroyed your home. I saw you running down the hall and then trying to go back for your mom when you realized what was going on, I saw Colton do everything he could to keep you safe, and I saw the fucking terror in your eyes babe. That is all on me. I will never forgive myself for sending that to your fucking doorstep.”
The bell sounds loudly through the school and I look back up at the campus, watching as the students begin moving around but I find myself rooted to the spot. “Please, O. Say something,” Nic says, reaching for my hand.
I hastily pull away from his reach and take a hesitant step back. “I have to go.”
“Babe, no. Just talk to me for a minute. I need to know that we’re alright.”
“Alright?” I cry. “We will never be alright. Maryne is dead. You sent murderers to my home because you were too fucking jealous over the fact that Colton means something to me. What kind of messed up shit is that, Nic?”
“I know it’s messed up. I didn’t know they were going to hurt anybody. I figured you’d be safe in a place like that.”
“You figured wrong,” I tell him, taking another step back. “I think you should go.”
“No,” he says, shaking his head. “We need to sort this out.”
“It’s not going to get sorted out today, Nic. I’m too upset and hurt. I’m still in shock that you could even do something like this, let alone process the hurt you caused with your misguided need to get me back. I just … I need time. I need time away from you to clear my head and if you want any chance at all of fixing what you broke, then you’re going to have to give me that.”