“But there’s the chance you could be,” I finished for him.
“Yeah,” he agreed with a pained groan. Tears filled his eyes, and for all of two seconds, I wanted to comfort him. But that thought quickly crumbled to dust. He didn’t deserve my comfort or sympathy.
“What do you want me to say, Luca?” I asked.
“Nothing. You don’t owe me anything. But I feel like I owe it to you to tell you what’s going on.” He held out his left hand, his eyes pleading with me to take it.
I took a step back from him. “You don’t owe me anything,” I told him in a toneless voice. “You stopped owing me anything the instant you decided to put your dick in someone else. That was the moment we ended. Whatever goes on in your life from now on, I don’t want to know about it.”
He inhaled raggedly, and he was quiet for a long moment. We stood there, letting the wind blow against us and the waves punish us as I absorbed my new reality. I didn’t know how much time passed before he spoke again. “Even before you were born, we belonged to each other, Vi. You were in your mom’s belly, but I still felt you in my heart. It was as if there was this invisible cord connecting your heart to mine. I can’t see it, but I feel it. Every damn day. You are mine.”
A painful knot filled my throat, but I quickly pushed it down, my anger rising higher and higher with each passing second, and I turned to face him once again. “You’re right. I’ve always felt it too. I am yours.” Why else would I have protected him for months from my father’s wrath for cheating on me? “And you were supposed to be mine. We were supposed to be each other’s firsts, Luca. First kiss. First touch. First everything. We promised. ‘First and lasts,’ that was what you said. I remember it as clear as if it were yesterday. You swore that you would wait. That I was worth it. But you didn’t wait, did you, Luca? You gave all your firsts away to someone else!”
“I…” He stopped, seemingly unable to breathe for a moment.
“You stole that from me, Luca,” I cried, and it felt like the pain was tearing me apart inside. “You gave away everything that was supposed to be mine. And you just expect me to be okay with that? I’ve waited my entire life to give you my firsts, but you have none to give me. And now you drop this on me and expect, what?”
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, his voice shaking.
“Sorry? You’re sorry?” I repeated, a humorless laugh bursting from me. He flinched, but I felt no thrill of happiness at the sight of his pain. “Yeah. So am I.”
“What does that mean?” he demanded, his eyes flaring with emotion. I knew every shade of brown his eyes could turn. Knew what each color meant he was feeling. He was like a human mood ring. And right then, I saw fear and pain in those dark depths.
I looked out at the ocean, at the huge waves headed toward us, and I wished they would pull me out with them. Slowly, I lifted my eyes and met his gaze. “It means I’m done. You tossed away your firsts like they meant nothing. So, mine? They are no longer yours.”
“Violet, please.”
“Please what?” I screamed, unable to hold on to my control a moment more. “Please what, Luca?”
“Please don’t leave me. Give me another chance. I’ll fix this.” He fell to his knees in front of me, right there on the beach with the waves pushing against him punishingly. “Baby, I’m so sorry. I know there’s nothing I can say to make this better, but please give me the chance to try.”
“You can’t fucking make this better. You cheated on me! You had sex with someone else—and not just any someone. Megan Hawthorn. Of all the people on the planet, you had to go and screw her.” Tears spilled unchecked down my face, freezing my cheeks in the chilly early evening air. “And now you tell me you’re going to be a father with that slut?”
“I’m not. I swear I’m not!” He reached out blindly, having lost his own fight with his tears. But if he touched me, I knew I would do something stupid. I would hit him or find a jagged seashell and slit his fucking throat.
I loved him so much, but at that moment, I hated him more.
“You don’t even know that for sure,” I shouted. “You don’t know if you’re going to be a father. But there’s a chance, and you can’t deny it. You stole this from me too, Luca. I was supposed to come to you one day with a pregnancy test and tell you that you were going to be a daddy. I was the one who was supposed to give you a houseful of babies. Me. Not her. And you…stole…that…from me!” A broken sob ripped from me, tearing my heart from my chest.
It fell between us, and the furious ocean water washed it away.
It was gone.
My heart had never really belonged to me anyway. It had always been Luca’s. But now, it was no one’s.
Not even mine.
Chapter 25
Luca
I was fooling myself when I thought confessing to my parents about Megan would be the hardest thing I ever did. I’d done some stupid shit in the past nineteen years, but nothing compared this fuckup.
I’d texted Aunt Emmie, asking her to go to my parents’ house for a conference call so I could tell all three of them at the same time, knowing I was too much of a chickenshit to be able to retell the same story three different times. I’d sweat bullets when I’d made the call.
The silence on their end after I told them everything had made me want to vomit. I didn’t know what to say or do to make it end, but after a few drawn-out moments, Aunt Emmie was the one to break the silence.
“What do you want me to do, Luca?” she asked calmly. I could hear the resignation in her voice, along with the banked anger and disappointment in me. But she was in cleanup mode, which was why I’d needed her there to begin with. That, and I was sure Mom would be too pissed to keep Dad from literally exploding. My aunt was the only other person who could deal with him when he was like that, other than my sister, and there was no way I wanted to tell Lucy until I absolutely had to.