He had a key. She’d given it to him several weeks earlier, when she’d thought, when she’d believed with all her heart, that he was some kind of hotter than hot knight in shining, heroic armour.
Chloe didn’t move when he walked into the lounge. Even if she had wanted to react, she couldn’t. Ellie was asleep on her lap, and Chloe wasn’t sure she had the strength to stand. Her eyes continued to pour their grief out of the window, as they had been for most of the afternoon.
Hendrix stared at the two people in the room. Chloe, steadfastly ignoring him, and Ellie, so sweet and trusting, curled up like a tiny bear on her mum’s stomach. It was as though a blade was slicing through his gut. He looked, and he looked, and he saw for the first time everything that he’d lost.
Because of the past.
He walked slowly, quietly, and crouched in front of Chloe. Still, she kept her gaze focussed out of the window.
Her face was set resolutely, her skin pale. Her hands were shaking slightly as they moved rhythmically over Ellie’s back.
He felt a physical ache to reach up and touch her. As though his arms were being controlled by something other than him. Only a massive burst of willpower kept him from engaging her physically. He looked at Chloe, and all he saw was the broken wings of a beautiful butterfly. Crumpled and damaged. He hoped against hope that her hurt would pass quickly.
Kneeling before her, he could only stare fixedly upon the betrayal that was cloaking her like a shroud. Minutes passed without either of them speaking. Finally, Chloe wrenched her eyes to meet his. And her heart lurched. Her blood thrummed. She looked away again.
“Chloe,” he needed, so desperately, to speak to her. “I was wrong. What I did today was wrong in every way.”
Chloe drew in a shuddering breath. Why bother replying? There was nothing she could say to argue the point. He was right. He had erred in a way that she would never forget. Nor forgive.
Mistaking her silence for a willingness to listen, he continued, “The idea to use you to hurt William came to me out of nowhere. I didn’t know you then. You were just a pawn to me. I told myself that I would still help you divorce him. That you would get what you wanted, and I would get what I wanted. It was a stupid, callous decision, to use you like that. And I will regret it forever.”
Still, Chloe didn’t look at him.
His voice was gravelly, rendered thick from desperation. “When it happened – the accident – I tried everything I could to make him pay. I was fixated for a long time on hurting him. And then, when I thought it was all in the past, and I’d moved on, you walked into my office. Provenance had handed revenge to me on a platter. I wish I had been a strong enough man to employ common sense. But instead, I listened to my heart. A heart long ago turned over to vengeance and grief.” His words were thick with emotion. “A heart you brought back to life, by making me love you, and Ellie.”
Pain was like acid just beneath her skin. “Don’t,” she whispered, finally dragging her wretched gaze back to his face. “Don’t talk to me of love. What you did …” She broke off, her throat too sore to continue the thought. She swallowed. “What you did was the act of a truly hateful, cruel person.”
He winced at the cold rejection in her tone. “I know,” he put a hand on her knee, but she glared at him as though he were burning her. So he released his touch, and felt himself falling through a crack in the earth’s surface. “My sister was …”
“Your sister wouldn’t have wanted this.” Chloe stroked Ellie’s head, loving her and taking love from her at the same time. “If she loved you, and was proud of you, as you’ve told me she was, then she would have been devastated to learn what you’re capable of.”
Hendrix was sinking, lower and lower, towards the earth’s molten core. He was hot and cold, fear and desperation.
“She would have been ashamed of you.”
“Yes,” he agreed, picturing his Ellie’s face for the first time since the whole debacle had begun.
“I’m ashamed of you.”
A muscle moved in his jaw as he absorbed the full force of her rage.
Chloe felt her daughter stir in her arms, and she stood, carrying her through to her room. She settled her in her bed, then gripped the door knob for strength before returning to the lounge.
Hendrix was leaning against the window, his dark gaze lingering on something beyond. Chloe paused across the room from him, not willing to move closer. She fidgeted with her fingers, her blue eyes unable to meet his. “I need you to leave.”
He noted that she didn’t say she wanted him to go, or that she’d like him to go. She needed him to go. And for the second time that day, he was willing to put her needs beneath his own.
“I can’t,” he responded, his voice a deep, throaty promise. He turned to look at her properly, but was at least wise enough to maintain a distance.
“You wanted to use me to hurt William. And you’ve done it. You can’t expect me to assuage your conscience, and make you feel better about being such a monumental asshole.”
“No. I know that’s not possible. But I needed you to know that it wasn’t make-believe. I started off wanting to seduce you to hurt William. I wanted to take someone valuable from him, as he did from me.”
Chloe closed her eyes but the words still hurt, as they soaked into her already desperate heart.
“I’ve had a lot of meaningless sex in the past, Chloe, and I didn’t expect this to be any different. But it was.”
“Because you ‘fell in love’ with me?” She retorted with fiery sarcasm.