“I don’t want your apologies, little girl. The damage is done. The only satisfaction I have is knowing that every time Johnny fucks you, you’ll be thinking of me. Thinking of how good my cock felt gliding in and out of your tiny cunt. How delicious it burned when I stretched and filled you. How fucking hard I always made you come. And how pitiful it is that you settled to spend your whole life with a man who only wanted you for your grandpa’s land, when you could have lived the fucking fairy tale with me!”
When she dragged in a ragged breath, Austin crushed his mouth to hers. He didn’t want to hear her excuses or lies, he simply wanted to drown in her body and savor her lush lips one last time.
Shuttling faster, he nudged her fingers away from her clit, then took control of her mind, body, and soul, and dragged a mind-bending orgasm from her. He swallowed her screams as she convulsed around his cock, then followed her over for the very last time.
Paige’s silky cunt was still pulsating around him as the lights behind his eyes faded and finally blinked out. He realized then her body was shaking, not from ecstasy but from silent sobs. Steeling himself, he eased back to find tears streaming down her face.
The knife in his heart twisted deeper. Biting back a howl of anger, injustice, and pain, he pulled from her pussy and zipped up his jeans, then tugged her yoga pants up her thighs and over her hips.
Paige had made her choice.
As brutally crushing as it was to him, Paige was the one who had to live with her decision. Austin simply had to learn how to exist without her.
He clenched his jaw, struggling to keep from completely coming undone, and cupped her arm. Easing her away from the door, he opened it.
“There. You got what you came for, little girl. Don’t come back,” he said, pushing the hardest words he’d ever had to say past his lips.
“B-but y-you didn’t even listen,” she wailed.
“Because there’s nothing more to say. Go!” he barked, shoving down the bone-crushing agony searing through him.
Wrapping her arms around her waist, Paige bit back a sob, then turned and walked out the door, pulling it closed behind her.
Heart crumbling to rubble, Austin sank to the floor. Clenching his hands into fists, he bit his lips together, tasting his own blood, as he held down the scream burning the back of his throat.
Paige
There. You got what you came for, little girl. Don’t come back.
Austin’s words were still searing her soul as tears blinded her vision. Sobbing uncontrollably, Paige numbly stumbled through the grass, not even sure what direction she was going. She pressed a hand to her heart, the one Austin had just shattered, as the pieces slipped through her fingers, like grains of sand.
Suddenly, she tripped over something on the ground and started to fall when strong hands gripped her shoulders, keeping her from landing in the grass. Paige yelped, then instantly tensed as she frantically tried to blink the tears from her eyes.
“Easy, darlin’. It’s just me…Houston,” he calmly whispered. “What happened?”
“Nothing,” she lied on a whispered wail. “I’m fine.”
He scoffed. “You’re not fine. Are you hurt?”
“Physically? No.”
“Come on. Let’s go inside and get you calmed down.”
“No, I c-can’t. I-I just want to go home.”
“Darlin’, you’re crying so hard you can’t even see where you’re at. I can’t, in good conscious, let you go wandering off to fall in a ditch and break your neck. Austin would kill me.”
“Austin wouldn’t care. He doesn’t want me.”
“You’re way wrong. He wants you more than he wants his next breath. Just because you’re with Johnny doesn’t change—”
“I’m not with Johnny!”
“You’re not?”
“No. I fired him after he tried to hit me. Jasper…” She huffed. “Johnny’s gone.”
“Son of a bitch. Does Austin know about this?”
“No. That’s why I’m here. I came up to talk to him…to try and explain—”
“But my mule-headed brother didn’t let you, did he?” Paige shook her head. “Please. Come inside, explain it all to me.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s killing me seeing you two so damn miserable.” Houston sent her a sad smile. “And because maybe I can help.”
“You can’t. There’s nothing anyone can do. I-I’m leaving tomorrow…for San Antonio.”
“Austin doesn’t know that either, does he?” Paige shook her head. “Oh, no. Hell no.” Houston gently slung an arm over her shoulders, then slowly started leading her toward his house. “We gotta get this figured out fast. If you leave Austin without him knowing, he’s gonna lay almighty waste to everything on the planet.”
“It’s too late,” she insisted.
“No, it’s not. You’re still here.” Houston winked. “So, you’re leaving town to, what, escape the gossip to go off and have Johnny’s baby—”
“It’s not Johnny’s baby!” she barked. “He never even touched me…not that I’d ever let him.”
“If it’s not Johnny’s then—”
“It’s Austin’s.”
“Fuck me,” Houston muttered as he opened the door to his house and led her inside to his kitchen.
Paige instantly noticed Houston’s and Austin’s homes were the same floor plan.
“Do you want some wine or a shot of whisk—Sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I have water or lemon-lime soda.”
“Nothing. Thank you, I’m fine.”
After handing her a box of tissues, Houston held out a kitchen chair for her then eased onto the one beside her.
“Okay.” He exhaled. “Tell me everything.”
“It all started back in early March, the first time Grandpa was rushed to the hospital.”
As she explained how she and Austin had run into each other at the Hangover two weeks later, Paige worried she might be telling Houston too much but then realized it didn’t matter. This time tomorrow she’d be long gone. So, she told him everything.
When she finished, Houston scrubbed a hand over his face and heaved a heavy sigh.
“So…you’re not ever coming back to Haven…to live?”