Hold the Forevers

But I stopped him with a hand at his elbow. “Wait.”

He really looked at me. Not clouded with his own excitement. The real me. And all the anxiety and fear coating my body.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. He looked wary.

“When I was there, I ran into Cole.”

Ash went as still as a marble statue. Only his eyes narrowed. “How did that happen?”

I swallowed. Here we go. “He started a marketing company and has been going to football teams to pitch his services. He was in NOLA, talking to the Saints.”

“And you ran into him?”

“His college roommate lives there now, and they were meeting for drinks. They just happened to be at my hotel.”

“What a coincidence that he’d picked your hotel.”

“He was staying there.”

“He was staying at your hotel?”

I nodded.

He clenched his hands and then released them. “So, you had drinks with him?”

I nodded again.

Ash searched my face, waiting for me to say more but I had no idea where to even begin. There was so much I needed to say. I needed to decide what the hell to do, and I hadn’t figured it out on the flight or in the shower or on the drive over here. And now, I was tongue-tied in front of my boyfriend, who loved me very much.

“It’s fine,” he said finally.

“What?” I blurted out.

He put his hand on my shoulder. “I can tell you’re freaking out because you saw him, but it’s fine, Lila. You can’t control if you randomly run into him in a bar in New Orleans. All that matters is that, at the end of the day, you came home to me.”

“I thought you’d be mad.”

“I’m not happy. I don’t want you around him, but I’m not him,” he insisted. “I remember how he freaked out just when we saw each other. As if my presence alone meant that he couldn’t trust you. I don’t want you to feel that way with me. What we have isn’t flimsy. It’s not breakable. It’s not going to crumble because you saw your ex.”

His words were meant to be reassuring. Make me hate myself less for running into Cole. And maybe it would have worked if Cole and I had never gone out on Bourbon, never agreed to Café du Monde, never walked around the city and ended up in my bed. It might have made me feel better then, but it didn’t now.

I took a step backward. I needed the distance to think and breathe. But he didn’t like that. He didn’t like that he’d shown how oh-so generous he was and my response was to back away from him.

And he knew me too well not to know what that meant.

“Unless there’s more?”

I squeezed my eyes shut. I couldn’t say the words.

“What did you do?” His voice was low and menacing.

“I’m sorry,” I choked out. “I’m so sorry.”

“For what?”

I couldn’t keep the tears back this time. I saw his pained face, lined with anger, and knew that this was going to shatter everything.

“I didn’t mean to do it.”

“You didn’t mean to do it?” he said in disdain. “Did you fuck him?”

I strode away, pressing my hands to my eyes. “It wasn’t like that.”

Ash stared at me. I could feel his eyes boring into me. As he waited for me to say something that made sense to him.

“Tell me what happened.”

“I can’t,” I gasped out. “I can’t say it.”

Ash grasped my shoulders, digging his fingers into my skin. Not hard enough to hurt, but enough to make me stop and look at him. “I need you to tell me.”

“Why?” I demanded.

“Just fucking tell me, Lila.”

“Fine. Yes, we slept together.”

Ash’s grip tightened. His hands shook my body with his own fury.

“Stop,” I pleaded. “Let me go.”

He released me with more force than I’d expected, and I was pushed off-balance, stumbling into his desk. I caught myself hard against the hip. Another inexplicable bruise.

“Tell me everything. Tell me how it happened.”

“You don’t want to know.”

He glared at me. “Tell me,” he commanded with all the deathly calm of a man used to being in charge. It was the voice I’d heard his dad use. It made me freeze.

“It will just hurt you.”

“I can’t possibly hurt any more than I do right now.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Sorry isn’t good enough!” he yelled. “I need to know. I need to know everything. I have to understand why you’d do this. Did he force you? Did you ask for it? Did you come? How many times?”

“Stop, stop, stop,” I cried. Tears streaked my cheeks. I couldn’t stomach this. I couldn’t do it.

“Just tell me why!” he cried.

“I don’t know,” I gasped out. “I don’t know. I don’t know.”

“You know. You won’t tell me. You’re still protecting yourself.”

“Please, I don’t know.”

Ash shook his head, disgusted. “Tell me the truth, Lila. I deserve that much.”

I swiped at the tears on my cheeks and tried to control my body trembling. But it was impossible.