Page 65 of Bourbon Truths
“I don’t have time for this,” she said, not giving me much time to gather my thoughts. Before she could entirely shut me out, I grasped her arm and made her face me. I slid my hand down her arm until our fingers linked together.
Her shoulders visibly deflated and the strong façade she’d erected around her heart came tumbling down with one squeeze from my hand.
“I’m sorry, Lyla.”
“For what?” she asked, searing me with her green eyes. “For treating me like a whore the other night, taking what you wanted, exposing me, and then leaving? Or are you sorry for not being man enough to be with me?”
My heart twisted in my chest. The last thing I wanted was to hurt Lyla. I needed more than anything to hold her in my arms, brand her as mine, live in her beauty. I’d never wanted to cause her pain, but that’s exactly what I’d done. I’d let her into my world temporarily and wound up hurting her because I wasn’t strong enough to say no.
“I didn’t mean to treat you like that,” I stated. “You’re the furthest thing from a whore, Lyla, so don’t ever call yourself that.”
“I’m just telling you how you made me feel, Kace. Did you think I would be okay with how you treated me? Do you think I enjoyed telling you my secrets and having you be repulsed?”
A lone tear ran down her cheek, but she pulled her hand out of my grasp and quickly wiped it away.
I gripped the back of my neck, a nervous tick of mine, as I tried to figure out how to fix this. No easy solution struck me, and that made me nervous. Even though I knew I couldn’t give her what she wanted, I still didn’t want to lose her.
There’d been a time in my life when I would have taken a woman like Lyla and never let her go. I would have instantly claimed her as mine and made sure every fucking penis in the locality knew it. It was a time in my life I would do anything to go back to. To just have a moment in time where I wasn’t wearing the weight of the world on my shoulders, where I could be the Kace I once was, the Kace who knew what it was like to live, to enjoy life.
I wasn’t that man anymore.
Taking a deep breath, I gave a little piece of my heart to her. “I wasn’t repulsed by you, Lyla. I was repulsed by myself.”
“Because you had sex with me?” she asked, getting in my face and ignoring the passing crowd.
I was about to answer when someone bumped my shoulder, sending my weight into Lyla. We both stumbled backward for a second before I was able to right our balance. I turned to see who’d bumped us and was greeted by an apologetic-looking man.
“Dude, sorry about that. This ‘gator jerky line is out of control.”
“No problem,” I said gruffly.
“Hey, you’re Kace Haywood.”
I prayed he would just move on, forget he’d ever seen me. I didn’t need this right now.
“Dude, you were the shit. You had the sickest uppercuts I’ve ever seen.” The man threw a couple of fake punches my way. Little did he know, I had an uppercut that could end a life.
“Thanks,” I said, trying to give the guy a hint that I wasn’t interested in talking about my boxing career.
“Did you hear the trainer you were using—Jono—was nailed for slipping his athletes supplements? You should look into that because honestly, I didn’t think you would ever do steroids. This just proves that.”
“Yup, I’ll check into that. Thanks, man.” I shook the guy’s hand and pulled Lyla behind a pillar so we could have an ounce of privacy.
“That was kind of rude,” Lyla said. “That guy was being nice to you.”
“I don’t want to talk about my boxing career.”
“But he was clearly a fan—”
“Of a has-been,” I interrupted her. “There is no need for me to save face with fans. That career is long gone.”
“Still, you could have been a little nicer. You walk around on this earth like people owe you something.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” I said, pinning her against the pillar. “I walk around on this earth owing everything to someone else.”
Lyla searched my eyes, and when I tried to turn away, she gripped my jaw tightly and forced me to look at her. “There’s more to it, isn’t there?”
“More to what?” I asked, loving the way her hand felt against my skin.
