I imagined what that might be like.
We could move into the small house Mom and Swiss used to live in. I’d work at the café part-time, maybe finish my degree online or at the local college thirty minutes away. We’d go riding on the weekends. We’d party, me nestled in his lap, his arm around me, claiming me.
Life would be simple and easy.
Of course, this was just a fantasy but one I wanted desperately, even though a few months ago I had much bigger plans for my future. I’d wanted to change the world. Wanted to experience new cultures, new cities. I’d wanted success. But those were my father’s dreams merged with my own.
College had always been my father’s dream. I didn’t even like the idea of elitist institutions that turned teenagers into rabid creatures, focused on grades, extracurriculars, and whatever was needed to gain them entrance into a school that made millions off them.
I just had to figure out a way to tell my mom I did not want to go to the Ivy League college she’d been so proud of me for getting into. I wouldn’t be living the life she literally went through hell to give me.
Then there was the news that I wanted to be with Elden. A man the same age as her. Yeah, that would not go down well. At all. I’d have to talk Swiss down. He would go crazy protective. But I’d convince them. Somehow.
But I needed to see Elden first. Needed to remind myself that this thing between us was real, that it wasn’t just a fantasy.
I’d finally found the time to go to him. It was early in the morning, before my shift at Oliver’s. Julian had finally decreed I could be trusted with the espresso machine, high praise coming from a man who took coffee as seriously as he did. I had never had a job before. My father had forbade such a thing.
I’d only worked a couple of days, and the work was hard, but ‘d enjoyed it. Julian had already planned on me working whenever I was home from college.
Everything was moving much too fast, my life returning to its regularly scheduled programming as if my life, my family and my entire world view hadn’t been dumped on its head.
And all I could think of was Elden.
Hence me walking toward his closed door. But I didn’t make it there. Because the door opened.
I stared at the women as she walked out of Elden’s room. Her mascara was smudged under her eyes, hair mussed. She smiled shyly at me as she pulled down her skirt, walking down the hall. Her heels dangled from her hands.
She wasn’t familiar. Not a club girl. Someone who had obviously attended a party last night while I had a quiet dinner with Mom and Swiss, listening to my mother make plans for the trip they were taking to drop me off at Brown.
My hands fisted at my sides as she walked past me, her shy smile dying as it became clear I wasn’t going to smile back.
I wanted to. I tried to make it a habit to smile at every woman I made eye contact with. Society had brainwashed us into thinking we instinctively must perceive every woman as a threat, as competition … so that we wouldn’t see each other as allies. We wouldn’t work together to topple the systems created to oppress us.
It was my main goal to topple the patriarchy. And even in this moment, I knew that scowling at this woman was me projecting my own anger and insecurity. That anger was best directed at Elden, and even then, I wasn’t completely entitled to it. We weren’t a couple. He could fuck whoever he wanted.
Still, I scowled at the woman walking past me. Still, fury simmered within me, strong enough to pump my legs and stomp all the way toward the door she just closed.
I didn’t feel like myself as the door slammed open. As it bounced off the wall, puncturing the drywall as it did so. All of this happened outside of me, as if I were possessed. I supposed I was. Possessed with jealousy. With a fury, a hurt I couldn’t breathe around.
Elden was shrugging on his cut when I walked in. I glared at the Sons of Templar insignia, even though it symbolized my mother getting everything she wanted, being protected for life. Even though without it, I wouldn’t be there.
Which was probably why I hated it so much. Because without the Sons of Templar, I would never have known Elden existed, and I never would’ve felt a pain, an obsession like I did with him.
He turned and stared at me with a measured coldness that sank somewhere deep, pulled out parts of me.
“You need to leave,” he commented, staring straight into my eyes.
I looked away because I couldn’t handle that expression, devoid of anything. My gaze landed on the bed, mussed and messy. My throat burned. They had just gotten out of it.
“No, I don’t,” I replied, my voice uneven and too wild for my liking. But I couldn’t control it. Not as I looked back at Elden. “This is obviously some kind of warped, fucked-up, alpha male move… You are trying to push me away because you think it’s what’s best for me. Because you don’t want to admit what’s between us.”
“There’s nothing between us,” he said flatly.
I flinched.
“That’s not true, and you know it,” I replied in a small voice.
His expression didn’t waver, but he flexed his fist at his side. I held on to that small reaction as proof of what I was saying.