Oh fuck, I’m going to come again.
I feel the words bubbling up a second time, just as unforgivable as the last. Instead, I press my face to the mattress as I come so hard I scream into the mattress. Devan follows me over this edge this time, grinding deep and cursing as he comes inside me.
He rolls us onto our sides and wraps his arms around me, his cock still lodged deep in my pussy. I blink too rapidly, determined not to let the burning in my eyes become something more. Not again.
I wait for Devan to say something, to comment on the unforgivable words I let slip, but he seems content to merely hold me close and trail kisses over my shoulder and neck. I don’t know if that’s better than addressing it or worse. I’m too tired to figure it out.
Besides, it feels good be held by him. Almost as if he cares just as much as I do, as if his foolish heart has betrayed him the same way mine has. I know it’s a lie. Devan would never lose control enough to catch feelings for a woman he’s glad to finally be rid of. An albatross at his neck he’s finally putting down.
He’d have to be a fool to pick me back up again at this point.
I close my eyes and focus on getting myself under control. An impossible task. I’m one giant exposed nerve for this man. He might call me a liar, but I’m far too honest for both our sakes.
This time, when sleep takes me, I welcome it.
Chapter 17
I wake up to the light filtering through the hotel room window. I wish I had magic powers to banish the sun from existence, to reverse its path and keep the moon residing in the sky for another hundred hours. It wouldn’t be enough. I can recognize that now, even if I couldn’t a few days ago. I crave this man on a level I thought I understood. Silly, silly woman.
I knew nothing.
Devan looks so fucking peaceful when he sleeps. He’s stretched out on his back, one arm flung over his eyes. It’s the first time he’s stopped touching me since we got into bed, and that absence is what woke me. I reach out a hand, but stop before I make contact with his chest. What will it accomplish? I’m just going to prolong the moment of goodbye. Worse, he’s already proven that he’s very intuitive when it comes to my needs.
I want something he can’t give me, and that will hurt him and make him uncomfortable, which will just make this situation that much more unbearable. He’ll try to let me down gently. I know myself well enough to know that I’ll respond by striking out, and that will ruin all the good memories we just created.
No, there’s only one thing to do.
I slip out of bed and dress quickly, pulling on a pair of jeans and a top that I had packed for the morning after. Scraps of my lingerie are tossed around the room, but I don’t want to gather them all up; every moment I linger is one where Devan might wake and demand to know what I’m doing.
Instead, I detour into the bathroom, shove all my stuff into my bag and head for the bedroom door. I pause there and look back. Devan hasn’t moved, aside from the steady rise and fall of his chest.
He opens his eyes and looks at me.
I freeze.
There’s no denying exactly what I’m in the process of doing—sneaking out without saying a word to him. Being a coward of the highest order. I hold my breath, waiting for him to ask me where I’m going, or maybe tell me to get my ass back to bed. Devan does neither of those things.
He shuts his eyes.
Loss reaches up and slaps me in the face. I suspected my feelings were one-sided, but this just confirms it. He doesn’t want a messy ending, either. He’d rather I slip out of his life, never to be seen again, than to awkwardly let me down easy. That’s a good thing. That’s what I wanted.
So why does it feel like someone wrapped their fist around my throat and is squeezing for everything they’re worth?
Numb, I turn and stumble down the hallway. I stop in front of the desk with the hotel stationary on it, but what could I possibly write that wouldn’t come off as either begging him for more or shitting on what we’ve shared? Except… Did we really share anything at all if this is how it ends?
This is what I wanted.
Maybe, one day, I’ll actually believe it.
Besides, it’s better for both of us if Devan never knows that I feel like I left my heart back in that bedroom with him. He’s too strangely honorable; if he knew, he might try to make things work just to avoid hurting me. I don’t want that. I want to be with someone who chooses me. Not someone who is only in my life because they were thrust there by my parents’ death.