Page 156 of From Best Friend to Bride
“Deli!”
“Just leave me alone.” I stormed out of the kitchen and headed for the stairs, then ran up them as quickly as I could.
Fred’s voice echoed, mingling with the sound of his footsteps beating against the floor as he chased after me. I swept past one of the housekeepers as I turned into our private wing, barely able to choke out an apology for almost running into her as tears filled my eyes
“My lady!” she gasped, reaching for me. “Are you all right?”
I just about nodded and ran into my room, slamming the door shut behind me. I leant against it, squeezed my eyes shut, and quickly turned the key in the lock so he couldn’t follow me in.
“Delilah!” Fred’s voice came through the door, and the soft lilt of the housekeeper’s tone followed it. “You can all finish,” Fredsaid, his voice a bit softer. “Please make sure nobody comes to this area of the house until tomorrow.”
Why?
So, he could stand there begging me to let him in without an audience?
“Delilah.” He tried the handle before he knocked on the door. “Let me in. Let’s talk about this.”
“I don’t want to talk to you right now.” My voice was thick. Heavy. Like I was barely holding it together.
And I was.
I was hanging on by a thread.
If we talked, I was going to explode with my real feelings before I knew it. There was a very real chance I’d destroy everything between us.
“Come on,” Fred sighed out, followed by a gentle thump about where his head would be. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know last night bothered you that much. I was just joking like we always do.”
Yeah.
Like we always did.
Wasthatwhat was hurting me so much right now?
That I was here, painfully in love with him, excruciatingly aware we could never go back to what we once were, while he was just joking like we always did.
I pressed my lips together and tilted my head back, staring up at the ornate moulding around the top of the wall.
Yes,a little voice inside me whispered.Yes, this is what hurts so much.
Ha.
I closed my eyes, trying to wipe away the picture of his face that was burned into my eyelids. “Fred?”
“What is it?”
“Let’s end this.”
32
DELILAH
Let’s end this. Let’s end this. Let’s end this.
My own words echoed seemingly infinitely around me, and I reached up to wipe away a stray tear that was making its way down my cheek.
There was no sound from the other side of the door. Just silence.
“This marriage was only ever supposed to be a short-term thing,” I continued, swallowing back the lump in my throat. “Nana’s gone now. It’s time to go back to normal. I’ll move out, and we’ll tell everyone it was a mistake. That we rushed into it, but we were only ever meant to be friends, and—”
