Page 86 of Crimson Promises
She held the jacket together.
We stood awkwardly by the door, neither of us sure of the suitable protocol for saying goodbye.Should I kiss her? Do I shake her hand? Fuck. Why am I agonizing over a simple goodbye?I gave her a quick hug.
“See you later, Ben.”
“Bye, Aurora.”
I closed the door behind her and leaned against it. Today had been a fucking typhoon of feelings. Without her in front of me, the haze of the bubble began to fade. Reminders of Jos kneeling in that sand. Of my brethren on the battlefield. I would never forgive myself if I let someone come in the way of that.
I pulled at my hair. Why was this all so fucking hard? Why did I have to start things up with the one girl I knew I couldn't have?
Pounding came from my front door, pulling me from my pity party.
I opened the door, surprise registering on my face to see Aurora facing me again.
“What are you doing with this?” Aurora demanded.
The “this” was a handmade beaded bracelet, evidently made by a child and with the name “Remy” strung through in the center. The bracelet was so old that the black letters had mostly faded.
Fuck. Shit. Fuck. Shit.
Deflect. Deflect. Deflect.
“What is that?” I asked.
“Ben, I am not in the mood for whatever angel mind games you are trying to play on me. Answer the question.”
“Where did you get that from?”
“From your fucking jacket pocket, Ben. There I was on my way to the elevator when I stuffed my hands into the pocket and felt some weird object. Initially, I was worried it was some random girl's piece of jewelry. But this, this is so much worse. I want to know how you got this and why you have it?”
“I don’t think you’re going to want to know the answer to that.”
ChapterNine
Aurora
My mind was whirling, connecting the dots that were so obviously in front of me. My gut had warned me that there was more going on. I had been too enamored and didn't want Ben to think I was crazy.Why do we women always feel like we have to censor our emotions to not provoke a reaction from a man? It’s absurd.
When Bennett confessed that he was an angel, I took him at his word, because I had seen the wings. He said he knew things because of his angel abilities.Yeah, fucking right.
“You’re Remy,” I accused. A small part of me clung to the shred of hope that I was wrong and that he wouldn’t betray me like this.
Bennett’s skin had turned paper white. Without him voicing his response, I already had my answer.
I jerked away from him, a person that I had opened up to, shared my body with, and trusted. It was lies. All of it was lies.
I didn’t even understand why or how. What I did know was that I wanted to be as far away from Bennett as possible.
It was one thing to learn about him withholding the truth about his nature—that I could bring myself to understand. Exposing that about himself could have been dangerous. But he sat there this afternoon and told me his life story, failing to mention that he had been witness to mine for years.
“After everything that happened today, how could you keep that from me?” I yelled. He was to blame for tearing through my heart like a wrecking ball.
“Trust me, I wanted to, but I couldn’t. There are things I can’t—" he pleaded.
I held up my hand in midair. “Just stop. I can never trust anything that comes out of your mouth. Everything you say is a web of well-spun lies. You are so caught up in that web that you can’t even recognize the truth anymore.”
“Aurora, let me explain.”
