Page 151 of Mason

My throat tightens. “You didn’t have to?—”

“I know,” he cuts in, voice rough. “But maybe… maybe I’m not the best person for you to be around right now.”

The words land like a blade to the chest.

They don’t just sting—theybreaksomething.

Because it means he’s not just carrying his own guilt—he’s carrying mine, too.

And itgutsme.

Because I know Mason would never intentionally hurt me. I know he’d lay his life down before he’d let anyone else touch me again.

But that doesn’t stop the hurt.

It doesn’t stop the grief that lives beneath my skin like a bruise that’ll never heal.

He thinks he’s the problem.

He thinkshe’sthe thing I need to be protected from.

And the part that shatters me?

I don’t know how to convince him otherwise.

There’s so much pain inside me right now, it’s eating everything.

The light.

The warmth.

The parts of me that used to smile without flinching.

I watch him linger in the doorway like he’s balancing on the edge of some invisible cliff.

Like he wants to step back toward me. Say something that might fix this.

But he doesn’t.

He just nods once—tight, silent—and turns away.

And I don’t say goodbye.

Because I can’t.

Because my throat’s thick with the ache of wanting to reach for him andnotknowing if I deserve to.

Because deep down, in the quiet, broken corners of my heart, I’m still wondering what the hell he sees in me at all?—

—when all I see is wreckage.

I’m dozingon the sofa when there’s a knock on the door.

I almost don’t answer it.

I assume Mason forgot something. But when I open the door, it’s not him.

A pretty strawberry blonde with mesmerizing blue eyes stands on my doorstep. Her hair is plaited in a messy French braid, and she doesn’t look a day over twenty.

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