Liar

I wasn’t being some petulant baby. This man had me every way he could, and I let him. I had every right to my questions. “Are we exclusive, or are you fucking other women?” I asked. My words snapped in the small space, along with any composure I pretended to have. And out came all the questions and desire to know him more from the box I’d refused to look at. “Hell, where do you even live? Do you have a family? Siblings?”

“I stay with my parents or here when I’m in the city.” For every bit of shrill, my voice was, his was equally calm, only spiking my irritation.

I threw my hands out and slapped my thighs when they fell. “See, I didn’t even know you had parents.”

“Everyone does.”

“But are you close? Do you hate them? I know nothing about your past, who you’re screwing. If you’re screwing others—nothing. For all I know, that could have been your wife. I don’t even know if you’ve ever been married.”

“I have been,” he said, calm like a placid lake. Like he hadn’t just dropped a bomb in the tiny elevator.

“What?!” I screeched as the elevator doors slid open.

He finally looked to me with a clenched jaw before grabbing my arm and dragging me to the room.

“When did you divorce? Do you still love her? Does she know about me? Are you still fucking her?” I pelted his back with questions.

When the door to the room opened, he jerked me inside and ground out, “I’m not fucking anyone but you.”

“Ugh.” I turned my back on him, storming further into the room. I almost laughed at the manic flood of need washing over me. Each wave hit me in the face, washing away any lie I had of wanting Kent to be just a fuck-toy like any other guy I’d known in college. Each wave grew bigger than the last, not letting me hold on to a single ounce of denial. I was raw and vulnerable, and it terrified me. “The thought of you with anyone makes me want to vomit.”

Apparently, privacy was all he’d been waiting for because the calm, cool man who’d stood in the elevator exploded. “And you think the thought of you sucking that pencil-dick’s cock fills me with fucking joy? Huh?” I turned, unprepared for the torrent of shouts, flushed face, and clenched fists. “I’m not fucking anyone, Olivia, because I can’t stomach the idea of being with anyone else. I can’t stomach you being with someone else. So, whether it’s been talked about or not, I’m exclusive to you.”

His rant stole all the wind from my sails. “Oh.”

“Yeah. Fucking, oh.”

I swallowed, trying to find what to say next. He’d calmed the storm, but I still stood there with no armor for whatever came next. Clasping my hands, I tried to calm the tremble spreading through my body. What did I do now? Had I ever been in a position like this? All at once, I felt very immature and without knowledge. I’d never had anything like this with Aaron, and he’s the last guy I’d opened myself up to. What was I supposed to say?

“I’m not messing around with him,” I said, settling on the most honest thing I could admit in that moment.

“Good.”

“I just…” The words bubbled inside me, and I didn’t know how to express them—the real reason behind my outburst. I think I surprised us both when I opened my mouth, and a truth I wasn’t sure I was ready to share came out. “Ugh! I just care about you, and I don’t care if that makes me sound immature and naive. I just hate that I know nothing about you.”

Oaklyn would be gloating right about now, letting me know she told me so.

He took a deep breath and kept his eyes on me, the dark chocolate depths holding a gold mine of answers I wanted to scavenge through. “What do you want to know?” he finally asked softly.

Everything.

I settled on, “You were married?”

His hand dove through his hair, and he expelled a small laugh. “For a little while. Less than a year. We were young and didn’t realize our differences until it was too late. We married our senior year, and she thought I would be more serious after graduation. She assumed a lot. She pushed me to be someone I wasn’t.” He looked away, and by the muscle ticking in his jaw, I assumed it wasn’t an easy break. “She almost came between Daniel and me, and I promised to never let anyone control me like that again.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. There wasn’t enough laughter anyway. I was too young to be so serious at twenty-two.”

I scoffed a laugh. “You’re not serious now at thirty-eight.”

The tension finally eased, only to be replaced with sexual tension when he slowly cocked his brow and tipped his lips. That look had me squeezing my legs. It made promises my body remembered all too well.