Page 140 of The Bad Boy Prince in Love
Chapter 77: Cinnamon Rolls 2
Hallie shook her head.She was determined not to fall into flirty mode with him.“You seem to have a handle on it.”
“I’ll let you sprinkle the cinnamon as freely as you like.”He smiled at her sincerely, like someone who could be sweet and caring.
For a moment, she wondered if it was possible.If she could just forgive him, and they would pick up where they left off, with more fun conversations and heart-stopping kisses to come...
But she would have to be a fool to trust him again after what happened.
She shook the cinnamon container over the flattened dough, giving it a very precise, measured spread without going overboard.
“Okay, I see how you want to play this,” Luke said, his mouth curving into a crooked smile.Those same lips that had kissed her worst enemy were as cruelly tempting as ever.
“Don’t forget the sugar,” Hallie said, keeping her tone as unemotional as possible, “I know you like to spread it very freely indeed.”
He chuckled, following her advice and heaping a liberal dose of sugar all over the doughy surface.“I guess you’ll never forgive me, no matter how hard I try?”he asked, and for the first time she noticed something other than teasing humor in his expression.Did he actually look hurt?Well, he didn’t have much of a right to be.
She was the one who was hurt, maybe more than she wanted to admit.All the anger and loneliness of the past week suddenly threatened to overwhelm her, and she fought back tears.“Why did it have to be Terry?What the fuck did you expect was going to happen?”
“I didn’t expect anything.I wasn’t thinking.”
“Yeah, clearly, you weren’t.”
“How many times do I have to apologize?”Luke asked, agitation showing in his face as he paced back and forth.“It was a selfish thing to do.But I can’t take it back.Don’t you see I have feelings for you?”
“Did you ever stop to think that I have feelings?”she asked, “No, you were too busy having fun and amusing yourself because that’s all you ever do.”
“I’m trying to be better, for you,” he argued.“I went back to work, didn’t I?”
“Oh, look who did the world a favor and went back to work.All you do is play darts in your office.”
“That’s not true.I provide leadership.”
“A leader should set a good example,” Hallie said bitterly, “not throw away on a whim something that could have been good.”
“Look, I don’t even know what I’m doing here,” Luke said wearily, his hand trailing through a desert of flour.“Do you want to keep up our ‘relationship’ or not?”
“No.”It was finally time to stop this silly pretense.Luke was only clinging onto it because he thought he could get their real relationship back, but in reality it wasn’t helping anybody, only causing problems.
“I thought things were going well with your family,” he said, “Why am I going through all this effort to be your boyfriend if you don’t even care?”
“It’s probably because you feel guilty,” Hallie said, “as you should.But I’ve decided not to see you outside of work.”
She felt the starkness of the statement and almost wanted to take it back.
“You won’t give me the slightest chance to make up for what I’ve done,” he shouted, “I’m here, and I’m really trying...I don’t know if I should be on your side when Terry unleashes her vengeance.”
Hallie was about to call for him to come back as he stormed out of the kitchen, but the words didn’t make it out of her mouth.
She pulled herself together.She had never needed a man before, even when battling Terry; she should be able to handle this now.
