Page 31 of Poison Vows

“What?” she gasps.

I’ve kept a lot of shit buried deep inside because I didn’t want to hurt her further.

There’s nothing I can do about the thing in my chest, but I can, at the very least, try to leave this world having done less harm to this girl as I possibly can, including eliminating my cursed DNA.

“All these years you’ve claimed to have feelings for me, and yet you and your family have been planning to move against me, creating shit to implicate me, but now you still want to claim that I’m the one who hurt you? Then what about me?”

“Emmett…”

“What about the hurt you inflicted on me?” I ask coldly. “What about the trust I gave you, because, Angel, you already know, I'm not Noah who trusts after testing someone's drinking capacity. I'm not King or George who take their time with trust. For you and I, it was just a moment. You put your hand in mine that night we went over a cliff and I gave you something I've never given anyone after my mother. But what have you been doing? You’ve been trampling all over that shit since the day I first saved your pathetic life!”

Tears well up in her eyes all over again and in me, a spectacular battlefield of complex levels of pain is taking place.

I can feel myself getting weaker.

I need to leave, but not before I drive this home, so I close the gap between us so she can see everything.

“Don’t mistake this for a game. You’re enraged and feeling spiteful, hating me so much for this little act I’m asking you to put on. Even now, here you are, attempting to make foolish decisions?—”

“Desiring a family is not a foolish decision!” she snaps.

We both fall silent.

In a way, I know exactly what she deeply wants… and if I could, my God, I’d give anything to give her the universe and every desire she ever has now or in the future.

But I don’t have a future… nor do I deserve one.

“You know me, Angel, I’ve let you see everything,” I whisper, pressing my forehead against hers softly, as potent yearning for her swells up in me. “You know better than to threaten me with distancing yourself from me or this stupid demand. I won’t have it.”

She’s fighting to stay calm. So am I.

What Angel and I have… has never been about being playfully flirty or having cheap momentary thrills.

What we have is too overwhelming. An all-consuming feeling that’s too powerful to play with.

It’s not something we can test the waters with.

This is serious, before God and before us.

So we don’t get to tease each other. I found this out the hard way.

Each time we accidentally crossed the line, even with a damn hug, all hell broke loose.

For Angel and I, it’s either we stay the hell away from each other or we goallin.

There’s no room for anything else because the truth is, you only ever getonetrue love in this life.

“Everyone has someone, baby boy. One way or another, someday, you’ll meet them.”

My mother used to say that and for me, from the very beginning, it has always been Angel.

I never had to wonder who my God-given someone was, that’s the biggest blessing of my life.

But what do you do when your heart physically can’t support the one you love?

What do you do when you already have been blessed with the love of your life, but you know just being in their life when you can drop dead at any second would destroy them?

Do you selfishly make them love you anyway, knowing damn well that they have struggled with abandonment all their life, or do you try to protect them the best way you know how?

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