Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 79336 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 397(@200wpm)___ 317(@250wpm)___ 264(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 79336 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 397(@200wpm)___ 317(@250wpm)___ 264(@300wpm)
He was still livid, his face the color of lava.
“I’d feel the same way if I lost you. Whether it’s nine years or nineteen, I would never get over you. I would never move on. I have no ill will toward her at all, because I don’t blame her.”
He’d stopped yelling at me, so maybe that was a good sign.
“I’m sorry I eavesdropped on your conversation. That was wrong. I know.”
He continued to stare.
“And I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I just didn’t want to make a problem that didn’t exist in the first place. I’m not jealous . . . just empathetic.”
“You still could have told me. Could have told me you knew about Isabella and you felt bad for her. But you sat on it while I tried to find the right time to tell you about her.”
“The right time?” I asked. “You’ve mentioned her indirectly several times. That would have been the moment to tell me, but you didn’t. I walked into that party having no idea your ex-fiancée was there. So were you ever really going to tell me?”
He got fired up again. “You’re really going to try to flip this on me?”
“I’m not trying to flip anything, but I waited for you to tell me it was Isabella, so then I could tell you I already knew. Let’s not pretend we weren’t both keeping secrets for the preservation of this relationship. We’d only known each other for a few days the night of that party, so we didn’t know where it was going to go. We didn’t know I’d be living with you six weeks later. So let’s just . . . take a beat here.”
He was still pissed off. It was written all over his face.
“I said I was sorry, Constantine.”
He stepped away from me, like he was done with the conversation.
“Con.”
He moved for the door.
When I realized this conversation was over, I broke. “Please don’t leave me.” I was right back to the woman I used to be, weak and pathetic, begging him to stay the way I’d begged Enzo to stay. But this time, I was the one who’d fucked up. “I said I was sorry.” The tears were instantaneous because I’d lost Constantine once before, and that week nearly killed me. Now I was about to end up like Isabella, missing a man I could never have again, hoping for a dream that would never come true. “I’m really fucking sorry. Con, please don’t go.” I followed him into the hallway and burst into tears. “Please.”
He spun back around when he stepped into the corridor, eyes full of a rage that was even worse than it’d been a second ago. “I’m fucking mad as hell right now and I need some damn space—but I’m not leaving you.”
The relief was so strong I couldn’t hide it. My hands automatically cupped my mouth as I took a breath. My eyes closed, and rivers of tears ran down my cheeks. Gratitude of epic proportions struck me like a mound of bricks.
I looked at him again through my hazy vision. I probably looked like a fucking mess with the tears and blotchy skin and the breaths I couldn’t control.
“For the last nine years, I’ve wondered if I made the right decision about Isabella. If I was being too harsh on her, if I expected too much, if I could drop the resentment so we could move on and be happy. When she got married, it fucking hurt, and when we slept together again, it just ripped open old wounds. She haunted me like a fucking ghost, and I worried that I’d thrown away the person I was meant to be with. But then you know what happened?” He stepped closer to me, angry eyes locked on mine. “You.”
I swallowed, new tears springing to my eyes for a whole different reason.
He formed a fist and put it to his chest, right over his heart. “I met you, and all those doubts disappeared—because you’re the one. You’re the one I’ve been waiting nine years for. My mom told me that one day a woman would come and I wouldn’t be able to live without her. That I would burn my world to the ground just because she asked me to. And she was right—because I fucking love you—”
“I love you too,” I said breathlessly, more tears pouring down my cheeks. “I love you so fucking much.”
His eyes flicked back and forth between mine. “This is it for me. You’re it for me.”
“Constantine . . .” Even though I was an ugly mess, I moved into him, rose on my tiptoes, but I didn’t have enough height in my flats to reach his lips.
But he lifted me like I knew he would, scooped his big arms under my ass and pulled me to him.