Page 63 of Lovers in Lockdown

The sound of the front door closing wakes her with a start, her head snapping towards me, her eyes startled. She blinks at me. Once. Twice. Three times. Scrutinising me like she can’t work out whether it really is me or if I’m just a figment of her imagination.

‘Honey?’ I whisper gently and her face contorts in pain, like the sound of my voicehurtsher. I want to stride over to her, wrap her up in my arms and kiss her until all the sadness in her eyes disappears, the sadness thatI put there.But I don’t. Ican’t.

Because right now it looks like a kiss is the last thing she would want from me.

‘What areyoudoing here?’ she hisses, her voice dripping with pure venom that gives me half a mind to hide behind the kitchen island in cases daggers really do start firing from her eyes.

‘Honey, I -’ my voice shakes. I spent the entire fifteen-hour flight back rehearsing what I was going to say to her, but now she’s standing in front of me, looking at me like I’m the worst person in the whole world, with tears shining in her eyes and her forehead creased in anger, words have completely escaped me. ‘Please - please don’t be angry - I -’

‘Don’t be angry?Don’t be angry?’ she shoots up off the floor and storms towards me. I regret not taking cover in the kitchen. Honey may be small, but if I had to put money on who would win in a fight between her and the Hulk right now, I’d be going all in on the five-foot-nothing rocket who’s currently glaring up at me like the power in her gaze alone could make me shrivel up and die on the spot. ‘Youleft.’

I used to think her anger was adorable, but not now. There’s nothing adorable about this. This isn’t anger, this ispain.

I did this. I’m the one who’s made her feel like this and I don’t fucking know how to fix it.

‘For months, you fucked me, you slept beside me, you listened while I told you things that I’ve never told anyone. You made me feel like I wassomething. And then you left in the middle of the night with no word of goodbye, like I’m some cheap whore you fucked just to pass the time.’

Fuck, I’m such an asshole. I’m such a fucking asshole.

‘Honey, you were never -’

‘Never what?’ she seethes. ‘Never just a fuck to you? What about all that stuff about getting me to beg to sleep with you? That you’d turn me down the second I did anyway?’ I need to stop this. I need to make this better. I need to dosomething. ‘All I’ve ever been is a game to you,’ tears are welling in her eyes, out of sadness or anger, I don’t know, I just know that I need to do something to stop this, ‘or just a bit of fun to curb the lockdown boredom. You never cared about mereally.You’d have at least said goodbye if you -’

I can’t hear this anymore.

‘I love you.’

‘What?’ her eyes snap to mine. She’s still angry, the hatred in her eyes hasn’t disappeared at my words, but that’s okay becausefinallyshe’s listening.

‘I love you, Honey.’

‘But you -’

‘Stop talking.’

She blinks at me.

‘I’ve spent the last two weeks trying to find the words to say to you and I still don’t have the right ones. There arenoright words that could even begin to make up for hurting you the way I have. But,fuck, Honey, I never want to hear you say again that I never cared about you, because I fucking love you more than I know how to deal with.’

Her eyes glow with tears and she opens her mouth to speak, but I don’t let her.

‘The second I stepped on the plane, I missed you so much I couldn’t breathe. I haven’t stopped thinking about you since the moment I left. Haven’t stopped wondering what you were doing, if you’ve been okay, if you’ve been thinking about me too. And I was terrified. I was terrified that you hated me, which you do, evidently, and that kills me because you’ve never been just a whore, or a game, or a fuck to me. You’reeverythingto me. You’ve been fuckingeverythingto me since the moment I met you and you were standing there doing some kind of weird-ass karate to keep me away from you because you’re a fucking badass, even when you’re standing completely naked in front of a man you think has been sent to kill you.’

The corners of her lips twitch into an almost imperceptible smile. If you didn’t know her, you wouldn’t see it. But it’s there. It’s a real, tiny smile that sends relief coursing through my body and into my veins. Her armour is cracking.

There’shope.

‘When we went to bed that night, I was so happy. You were asleep on my chest with your arm resting on my stomach and every time you took a breath, your skin would brush over mine and it just made me feel so peaceful. And then my boss messaged to say he’d got me on a flight leaving within the next few hours, and please believe me that I thought Ihadto go. I thought I didn’t have a choice. My entire life was in China. I have no job over here, no money. Reid’s gonna want his flat back eventually and then I’ll have nowhere to live.’

Tears are leaking down her cheeks and I can’t take it anymore. I have to touch her. I cup her face in my hands and brush a smattering of flour off her cheek with my thumb.

‘Honey,’ I whisper. ‘I’m so sorry. I was a coward. I couldn’t face saying goodbye to you because I couldn’t bear to face the truth that I was really leaving. All my life, I haven’t belonged anywhere. Not in my parent’s house. Not at uni. Not even in China. It’s like my heart has always been searching for a home, even if I didn’t realise it. And it foundyou. You taught me that home is a person, not a place. You gave me somewhere that I finally belong. And I don’t give a single shit if I have no money and nowhere to live, because I’d rather sleep on the streets with you by my side, than live in a palace without you.’

Her bottom lip trembles as she tries to blink away her tears, but she says nothing. Just stares at me with wide, shiny eyes as she lets my words sink in.

My heart crumples like a scrunched-up piece of paper at the realisation that she isn’t going to say anything. I’ve fucked it. I’ve hurt her too badly.

I hang my head and I’m about to turn and leave, try and find somewhere I can sleep for the night and work out where to go from there, when suddenly Honey squeals and launches herself into my arms.

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