Page 148 of Devil Mine

If he really wants me for the long run, then he needs to tell me. I’m desperate to hear him admit that he feels even one tenth of the feelings I have for him.

To know that I’m not alone putting my heart on the line.

Instead, his whole body shakes with the force of his anger. He looks like he’s holding on by a thread, only seconds away from completely losing it. But that’s all I want. That total abandonment of his senses that’ll lead him to say the words I want to hear.

“You’re mywife. Deny it again and you won’t sit for a month,” he snarls. “I knew I wanted you from the moment I saw you and I stand by that. I never wavered from it. You judged me the second you found out who I was. Fine. I own who I am, I’m not ashamed of it, but you would never have given me a chance because of it. So I took you. I can’t apologize for that. You want me to tell you I regret forcing you to marry me? I don’t. I never fucking will.”

Emotion forms a mass that blocks my airway, making it hard to breathe. I look off to the side, blinking away the tears in the corners of my eyes.

I need more from him.

More than just his possessiveness and territoriality over me.

Real emotion. Realfeeling.

I deserve that.

“You’re right,” I admit. “I would never have let myself get anywhere near you if given the choice.” I stare up at him. “And maybe there was a very good reason for that.”

Anger flashes in his eyes. Instead of forcing me to bend to his will like I expected, he takes a step back. I feel the loss of his body immediately, like a ship becoming unmoored and drifting away in the ocean towards an uncertain future.

“You’re pissing me off.” His voice is flinty, his eyes hard as steel.

I snap. My bitterness and resentment overflow and make me fling careless words I don’t mean. Words I regret the second they leave my lips.

“You should give Claudia another look then, she might be a better match for you than me.”

Thiago cuts me a lethal look that would wither any other living organism down to ash. His jaw snaps shut so violently that I hear it. His lip curls up into a furious sneer before flattening into an emotionless line.

Distance takes over his gaze and he looks at me like I’m a stranger, like he doesn’t know me at all.

“I’m done.” The muscle underneath his eye twitches volatilely. “I won’t do this with you.”

Without another look in my direction, he storms out of the kitchen. I assume he’s gone up to his study or our bedroom for some space. Then I hear the front door open and slam shut so violently that the walls shake.

I slide down the side of the kitchen island and fall to the ground like I’ve been cut off at the knees.

He walked away from me.

We’ve argued before, but he’s never walked away. Not once. This is the man who chased me across the continent and today he… left.

He just left.

No, he didn’t just leave.

I pushed him away.

And now, with him gone and nothing remaining with me except the silence of his absence and the cold sinking into my bones from the loss of his warmth, all I feel is fear.

Did I push him into another woman’s arms?

The thought eats at the lining of my stomach, causing physical pain. It’s like he pulled on a loose thread when he walked out, but it was a catastrophic one that unravels the entire piece with one tug. He unknowingly pulls and takes the whole fabric of my heart with him when he walks out that door.

When he’s still not back hours later, I pace and I pace and I pace. My phone is gripped tightly in my hand and I look down at the screen for the thousandth time, hoping to see a message from him.

There’s nothing.

I want to call him, but I’ve already caused enough damage. What if I make it worse?

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