Page 59 of For the Love of Lily

I screwed my face up. “Sort of… it was a bit tense. I need to hear what he has to say, and I need to tell him about this.”

Luke concentrated on my feet, not looking at me as he spoke. “This? Are we not an ‘us’?”

“We’re more than that. Let me talk to him. Until I know the full story, nothing can move on.” I stroked his face with my finger, his eyes met mine at last.

“I wouldn’t stop you. That’s his thing, not mine.” I knew Luke had a point. “Why don’t you go have a nice bath, then call him. I’ll cook dinner. Then see how we can figure all of this out?”

I nodded, pulling him into a long kiss, petrified in case these kisses were on borrowed time. “Thank you.”

Luke laughed as I picked my shoes up to take with me. “What? I love them, they come everywhere with me.” I grinned.

I ended up out of the bath again within half an hour. Sickness rolled over me when I thought of this phone call. It was time to face up to what I’d done, what Zack had done.

Nice pyjamas and wet hair, I sat in Luke’s office, ready to make the call. I rested the phone on a stand as my fingers trembled with nerves.

I gulped as Zack answered the video call. He was in our kitchen, still dressed in work clothes, his face unreadable.

“Where are you?” he asked. I could see him looking behind me for clues.

“Luke’s house.” A look of resignation swooped over Zack’s handsome features.

The silence was deafening. “You told me to call if I wanted to talk.”

He nodded, taking a drink from a glass beer bottle. “Right. I wish I’d never said I wanted a break. I’ve never been that angry in my entire life, and I couldn’t think straight. It didn’t lift for days. I don’t understand how you think it’s inappropriate of me to want you to stop seeing him.”

“You didn’t even try to stop me leaving. You wouldn’t answer any of my calls. Then I saw that picture. It seemed a pretty clear message, Zack.” I don’t know if being on the phone made this easier or harder than being in person, but I was about to confirm his worst suspicions. “So, after that, I came to Luke’s. I’ve been… with Luke since.”

Zack sat down on one of the bar stools, our bar stools. “I didn’t sleep with the girl from the photograph. I did sleep with a girl in Iceland though. For stupid reasons, I was still in that angry rage, and I wanted to hurt you. Because I knew you’d be with him.”

Our eyes stared into each other. I didn’t know what to say anymore. This felt like my fault. I hated what he’d done, but I was the one going on and on at him about Luke beforehand.

“I meant what I said at work,” Zack blew out a long breath. “This last week has been screwed up. We can put it behind us though, we can have that life we talked about together.”

“With the one condition?” I asked, already knowing the answer.

He nodded. “It’s the only way. I’d give up anything or anyone if it was hurting you, Lily. I need to see the same loyalty in return. If you can’t…” There was no need for him to finish the sentence.

“Zack, I love you. This situation with me and Luke is so complicated. Can you give me a couple of days?”

“Knowing you’re in bed with him every night? No.” He ran his hand though his hair again.

“What if I go to Cassie’s? Have a couple of days away from both of you.”

“I don’t know what’s so hard about this. I’ve apologised, I’ve admitted what I did. I’ve said I’ll forgive what you did…”

“I need to be sure. I need to know I forgive you in return. I have pretty crappy feelings about myself right now that I need to come to terms with. I’ll have eight thousand questions about what you did.” I felt salty tears hit my lips as I realised that I was crying. My heart felt like it had been cracked in two when I thought of him with another woman. Yet I had carried out the same betrayal. Multiple times over.

“I’ll answer anything for you. But I don’t want to know a single detail about you and him. I can’t have it in my head.”

“Tell me about what happened then.”

He cleared his throat before he began. “You know what those clients are like. Worked us crazy hard in the day, but wanted to party all night. We were in this amazing hotel and everything was on their expenses account. I’d managed to hide what was going on pretty well, but I got to the point I couldn’t.”

The beer sloshed against the bottle as he took another drink. “I was sat at the side of the bar, moping, while the others carried on. The girl working there asked me what was wrong. I ended up telling her our whole story. I decided to head to bed, drunk by this point. She asked me for my room number as she was finishing her shift in an hour – and I gave it to her.”

My lip felt fat under my teeth as I chewed on it, knowing I had no right to be mad at him, but it still hurt to hear this. “Was she blonde?” I asked.

“Of all the questions…” He shook his head at me. “Yes, does that make a difference?”

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