Page 10 of Endgame

As soon as they leave, Dominic locks and bolts the door behind them, then sits beside me on the bed. It dawns on methat this is the second time in so many months that I have allowed someone to prevent me from going home.

‘You look exhausted,’ he states softly.

‘I am a little,’ I agree.

‘I shouldn’t have let you jump so many times for those frikkin’ apples.’ His light laugh makes me smile. ‘I’m so sorry, Aari,’ he continues. ‘I shouldn’t have asked you to leave Mack and me, or requested that you go to the party by yourself. I forgot how much you hate crowds.’

I turn to face him. ‘You needed closure and you may not want to admit it, but you’re still in love with her.’

‘Maybe, but I made a ton of wrong decisions last night. I shouldn’t have kept her all night. I knew it would piss him off.’

‘Did anything happen between you and her?’

‘No. She wanted to talk, so I let her. I kept us in the drawing room though, because she has a way of getting whatever she wants when we are alone. We were there all night putting each other through one emotional wringer after another. I’d had enough by four a.m., so I went to bed. I don’t know where she was the rest of the night.’

‘I’m sorry that it happened and you’re having to deal with this.’

‘I’m not. If I was still married to her then I wouldn’t have met you.’ He strokes my face.

When our eyes meet, I know what’s coming. I watch as Dominic closes in but, just before his lips meet mine, I find the strength to stop it. It comes out as a whisper.

‘Dom, I can’t.’

He stops silently, frozen in space with his lips millimetres from mine. He is so close; his breath warms my Cupid’s bow. When his eyes flick up from my lips to meet mine, I watch him struggle to restrain himself. I recognise the feeling. I am charmed by Dominic and my attraction to him only seems tobe intensifying, but I don’t trust my feelings for him. Dominic’s friendship is important to me, but we often seem to be caught in tight spaces that force me to navigate around him. What I do know for sure is, no matter how annoyed I am with Caleb, I’m still in love with him.

‘It’s still him, isn’t it?’ Dominic asks quietly, keeping his eyes on mine as frustration radiates from him. ‘But you haven’t been together in a while.’

He’s too close and feeling his breath on my mouth as he speaks is eroding my ability to resist him. I break eye contact to give his hand a squeeze, create some space between us and escape from the intensity of his gaze. He may be my friend, but he’s also now my boss, which makes this a little bit more perilous to navigate.

‘No, we haven’t.’

‘But you’re still in love with him?’ he presses.

‘I am. I’m sorry, Dom.’ I can’t find the courage to look at him again.

‘Then what’s happening between us?’

‘I don’t know but it’s…’ I try to find the words.

‘Painful.’

I nod in agreement.

‘You feel it too?’ he asks.

‘I do,’ I admit.

‘I really wish our hearts weren’t being held hostage by other people, Aari – because I am so ready to fall in love with you.’

I don’t have a response for Dominic, so I reach for him and pour all my feelings into a hug, more grateful than ever for the plane I have to catch tomorrow. That’ll put the distance I need between us.

TWO

CALEB

To say that I am sick and tired of Ariella’s shit is a colossal fucking understatement. I accept the fact that I messed up and that I’m mostly responsible for the way things went down. But she messed up too. Yes, I told her she could do whatever she liked and I’d still be here – but happily hopping on Dominic’s private jet to leave the country, knowing that he’s going to have at least twenty uninterrupted hours to execute whatever he has planned to seduce her, is just bang out of order.

It’s been six weeks and I’m still dealing with the emotional hiatus I asked her to put us in. It doesn’t help that moments that inspire real annoyance keep popping up. The latest is a video captioned ‘Throw-by fruiting in progress’ posted on social media by none other than Dominic. He’s not even original. Ariella is laughing while jumping with a big stick to get an apple from a tree. When she doesn’t succeed after a few tries, she throws the stick at the apple in frustration and runs for cover. Still no apple. I have to remind myself not to laugh when I catch myself doing exactly that. Fuck Dominic. I don’t care that he is now going to be our boss’s boss.

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