Page 66 of Dirty Like Zane
I knew I sounded like a scared, stupid little girl. But it was nothing but thetruth.
The terribletruth.
Mytruth.
“Likewho? Like fucking Dizzy?” He moved to sit on the side of the bed and took the condom off. “Is that really what this is all about?” He tossed the condom and scrubbed his hand over his face. “Your fucking daddy issues?Really,Maggie?”
Fuckme.
He just didn’t getit.
No matter how many times we circled around it, he just didn’t get it. I sat up, clutching the blanket aroundme.
“You know who I love, Zane?My mom.She was all I ever had growing up, and we were a joke to him. When he was pissed at us, Mom and me, we were a nuisance, a regret and an inconvenience. We were barely an afterthought. He used my mom and tossed her off when it got old and he never, ever looked back until she wasdead.”
“I know all that, Maggie,” he said,gently.
He did know. Zane was one of the few friends I’d ever really talked to about mydad.
“Yeah? Well, nothing ever got serious for him until it was far too late, and I see you going down that exact same road, Zane. The partying and the easy pussy and your sweet Maggie May, your number one superfan who’s always there for you. Until ‘always’ turns out to be a fucking drag. My mom didn’t get her heart broken, because she wasn’t in love with my dad. She got a baby at eighteen and a crash course in life as a single parent and a lot of regrets she never thought I knew about, but I knew. If I’m with you, I get all those things, except the baby part, which is the only good thing he ever really gave her anyway,andI lose the job that I get out of bed in the morning for,andI get a broken heart, because I do love you, Zane. I am in love with you. But I’m smart enough, living the life I live, to know not to give you my heart because a man like you doesn’t have the first fucking clue what to do withit.”
Zane stared atme.
I stared right back. “You think you love me because you threw down and married me in Vegas to screw with my dad?” I asked him. “You don’t know what love is. I have worked my fucking ass off loving you and I know what it is to lovesomeone.”
He just stared at me, and for all the things I’d just said to him, he didn’t look angry and he didn’t lookhurt.
“You love me,” he said softly, like he was in awe of it orsomething.
Really?
Out of everything I just said, that was the one thing he reallyheard?
I got up and started gettingdressed.
I just admitted to Zane that I lovehim.
And I felt raw about it. My heart fucking hurt. It was like the world’s worst case ofheartburn.
Having him stare at me like that was not helping. That terrible hope on his face. That softness in his blueeyes…
“Maggie…”
“Don’t.”
“You don’t have to runaway.”
I kept gettingdressed.
“You don’t have to put up your fuckingwall.”
“I just have to… I need a minute. I just… Just leave me alone for aminute.”
Then I ran out of theroom.
But I was gone for much longer than aminute.
Chapter Ten
