Page 263 of Break Away
The words hit her hard. Her mouth fell open, but nothing came out, and that only made the rage burn hotter.
“You failed me, Charm.” My voice dropped low enough to shake. “Don’t pretty it up. Don’t cry at me like that changes what happened. Don’t hand me your fear and expect me to carry it after you left me standing in that room alone.”
“I didn’t mean to.”
“I don’t give a fuck what you meant.” My voice cracked across the driveway, sharp enough to cut through the quiet. “Intentions don’t mean shit when I’m the one bleeding from what you didn’t say.”
She shook her head fast, tears slipping down her cheeks. “Ryan, please, I wanted to say something. I wanted to defend you. I just didn’t know how.”
“You didn’t know how?” I stared at her, my laugh coming out mean because if I didn’t laugh, I was going to put my fist through the side of my truck. “Your father stood there and called me chaos. Said I didn’t belong with you. Said your future was too good to risk on me. He used your dreams like a leash and wrapped it around my throat, and you want me to understand you didn’t know how to say, ‘He’s mine’?”
She covered her mouth.
“No.” I caught her wrist before her hand could hide her face. Not rough enough to hurt. Hard enough to stop the escape. “Don’t hide from me.Mírame.”
Her eyes snapped to mine, wet and wrecked.
Let her see the fury. Let her see the insult. Let her see the offended disappointment sitting beneath my ribs like a loaded gun. Let her see I wasn’t some wounded boy waiting for her tokiss my scars and call that love. I was a grown man with pride, and tonight she’d let her father put his boot on it.
“Do you have any idea how mad I am at you?” I asked.
Her breath shook.
“No, I don’t think you do. I don’t think you understand what you did because you’re standing here asking me to stop like I’m the one who made this ugly.” I let go of her wrist and pointed back at the house glowing behind her. “Fuck them, Charm. Do you get that? Fuck their opinion. Fuck their money. Fuck their table, their silver, their perfect family pictures, their connections, their country-club bullshit, all of it. I only cared what they thought because you cared.”
Her face crumpled.
“That’s it,” I said. “That’s the only reason I sat there. That’s the only reason I walked into that study instead of telling Lance Harlen to go fuck himself in front of his expensive whiskey. I showed up because you asked me to. I behaved because you mattered to me. I let them look because I thought you were bringing me there as your man, not as some test you weren’t ready to pass.”
“I wasn’t testing you.”
“No, you were letting them test you, and you failed spectacularly.”
She flinched.
I leaned closer, and the cold air between us didn’t do a damn thing to cool me down. “That’s worse.”
Her tears came harder. “I’m scared of him.”
“I know,” I said, my voice sharpening.
She went still.
“Yeah.” I nodded once. “Both can be true. I can know he raised you in that house like love was something you had to earn with obedience, and I can still be furious that you let him use that shit on me. I can understand why you froze and still be standing here asking how the fuck you could treat me like that. Let them treat me like that.”
“Ryan,” she whispered.
“No.” I stepped back before the sound of my name in her mouth did what it always did. “No,princesa. You don’t get to soften me. I want to shake reality into your fucking skeleton.Pinche madre, you failed me, and now you’re asking me to be gentle with the explanation?”
She sobbed once, sharp and broken.
I didn’t cave. Not this time.
“I’m not him,” I said. “I’m not Lance. I’m not scared of losing some pretty seat at his table. They don’t like me with you? Then my line is there. Fuck that table. Fuck that house. Fuck every door he thinks he can close. I don’t need any of it.”
Her arms wrapped around her middle.
“My life is simple,” I said, my voice low and brutal now. “Cut and dry. I don’t beg people to keep me. I don’t stand in rooms where I’m not wanted and hope they learn to see me differently. I have never let myself believe I’m safe anywhere long enough to be surprised when I have to move on.”
