Page 60 of Pieces of Us

Lazily sitting on the end of one of the couches, he has both hands stretched along the back as if he owns the place. I should sit on the Victorian armchair, but I make the decision to be a bit more friendly and sit on the other end of the couch, placing pillows between us and on my lap.

Turning towards each other, we can feel the crackle of sexual tension, despite the space between us. There’s something so familiar about him, but a matureness at the same time that I don’t recognise. His distinguishably handsome face has an angle to it that is covered in delicious stubble, and his eyes have fine crinkles around them. I still get lost in the depths of his honey-coloured orbs, but they’re not as playful as they once were. Apart from the physical changes in his body—well, the ones I can see, anyway—even his scent is different. He used to smell like boyish Lynx, but now he wears an aftershave that isn’t woodsy or any of those other vague descriptions. It’s sharp, crisp, fresh and tangy. It smells expensive and makes me heady.

We take a moment to really settle in, neither of us really knowing where to begin. While my gaze roams his features, he does the same, taking in my bare face, my cheeks flushed rosy from my recent high. I’ve scrambled to twirl my hair into a messy bun, but pieces fall around my neck. I know my nipples are still hardened by being near him, but I’m just hoping he can’t smell sex on me.

‘Amity. I don’t even know where to start.’ Leaning his head back on the couch, he continues. ‘I acted like an asshole this afternoon.’ He shakes his head and lets out a humorous laugh. ‘The truth is, I’m fucking seething with jealousy over your relationship with Jagger.’

‘I don’t have a relationship with him,’ I firmly remind him.

‘You might not have an intimate relationship, but he knows this version of you. He has a part of you. I know I have no right to feel this way, especially after what I’ve done to you, but for the sake of being honest and open, I couldn’t let it fester.’ He cracks his knuckles. ‘It is completely unfair of me to say this, but thinking of him touching you—or any other man, for that matter—makes me deranged. I want to kill them.’

I frown because of how totally hypocritical he is being.

‘Need I remind you of the countless sluts you’ve fucked over the past seven years, not to mention the one you knocked up?’ I cross my arms over my chest.

He nods, his expression sad and tortured. ‘That’s fair. I know it makes zero sense in my head, but it’s how I feel. I’m aggressively territorial over you. No, not aggressively. Obsessively.’

I knock my head back on the couch as well, exhausted from this merry go round we seem to find ourselves in.

‘Why did you keep going back to Billie?’ It’s the one lingering question I still have in my head.

‘It was a comfort thing. Please don’t think I’m defending her,’ he prefaces. ‘I’m so beyond mad at how she blurted all that stuff out the other day, but despite how much she can be a bitch, she does have some redeeming qualities. She was good to me. She loved me.’

If looks could kill, he’d be ten feet underground for admitting that to me.

Putting his hands up in defence, he knows he’s crossed a line.

‘Hey. Hey. I’m not saying the way she treated you was in any way acceptable. It’s part of the reason why I broke up with her. All I’m saying is, when it came to me and her, she was a good girlfriend. I think she has always felt extremely threatened by you, which is why she…acted the way she did.’ I’m not impressed. ‘Does,’ he corrects.

‘There was nothing to be threatened about. She got you. She won. She’s won for eight years.’

‘That’s the problem, though. You said the other day that you thought you were the other woman, but Hart, don’t you see there was never any other woman for me but you?’ He leans forward. ‘That is and has always been Billie’s greatest fear. She could never compete against you and what we have. That’s why it didn’t and would never work. I go back there, or I went back there because she was my consolation prize.’

The word ‘consolation’ blisters me.

I baulk. ‘So, what you’re saying is, you’re giving me pretty much an ultimatum that if we don’t stand a chance, then you’ll just pick her and spend your life with her?’ My mind reels at the revelation.

‘No. I’m definitely not going back. I knew I’ll never love anyone else other than you, but she was familiar, so it was better than being alone sometimes.’

My eyes widen in shock and my mouth drops open as his words penetrate through me.

‘I know I’m going all in here with my feelings, but I’ve been broken since the day you walked out of my life. I miss you so goddamn much and I want you back. I’ll do anything to prove to you that you’re it for me. In this life, and every life.’

I heave at his words, my eyes blinking rapidly as if I’m not sure I heard him correctly.

He quirks at my response. ‘I didn’t mean to just blurt it all out.’ He shrugs. ‘But I have nothing to lose when I’ve already lost you.’

‘Oh my God.’ I close my eyes to steady myself, feeling a shuffling movement on the couch.

When I reopen them, he’s slid over to me, his knee now touching mine. I swallow visibly at the contact, the pulse at the base of my neck thumping erratically. I press my hands to it, trying to will myself to calm down, but it comes off in a sexual way, causing Lincoln’s eyes to follow the movement and flare.

‘Okay.’

‘Okay, what?’

‘We can’t undo the past. You can’t undo the years of hurt and betrayal, but I do accept your apologies. While I don’t know how to understand all of your reasons, I’m grateful that you’ve tried to explain. The truth is, I don’t know where we go from here either. It’s like I know you…but I don’t. There is so much about my life you have no idea about.’ I stretch my neck, trying to release the tension I’ve been holding.

He looks sheepish, and I don’t know why.

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