Page 83 of My Sweetest Obsession
I shake my head. “Don’t say it.”
She tightens her jaw. “Not going to back down.”
Because she never does.
“I know you don’t want to hear it, Ivy, and I believe that saying it will probably piss you the fuck off even more, but you need to hear it. You’re in love with Cam. You’ve been in love with Cam this entire time. What he did, what happened, hasn’t changed that, and that’s why it hurts so much. If you actually hated him, if you actually blamed him for everything and truly deep down believed that it was all his fault, this would be easy. You could walk away. You could end whatever this is with him instead of needing him as much as you do and doing backward somersaults trying to make excuses for why you’re doing it.”
I open my mouth to object, but she holds up a hand.
“No. You’re going to listen, and then you can tell me off when I’m done.”
I snort, fully prepared to do just that.
Because this version of Marlo is the scary one.
The one that usually makes sense when nothing and no one else does.
She somehow breaks things down to what lies at the core—that thing you have to see.
And it usually hurts.
“When Cam showed up, it was a jolt to your system, a shock to see someone who looked so much like Drew, who shared so many of the things with the man you loved so much, and you did your best to shut him out from your life. You were mad about their falling out, even before you knew what caused it, and you were holding it against him. That made it easy for you to keep him at arm’s length, but the moment you started getting to know him? The moment he became more than just Drew’s brother?” She shakes her head, offering a half-smile. “I saw you start to forgive him before you even knew what had caused their rift because he was helping you. You were coming back to life. You told me yourself that being with him made things easier, and that’s clearly the case now, too, or you wouldn’t keep going back to him. So, I don’t understand why you keep lying to yourself about why any of this is happening. Why can’t you just admit that you love him?”
I slap my hand over my mouth before the sob that crawls up my throat can rip out. The tears that well finally spill out, running hot down my cheeks, and I shake my head. “I can’t be in love with him, Marlo. I just can’t.”
She holds my gaze, unwavering. “Why not?”
Why not?
What the hell kind of a question is that?
“Because. There’s too much history. There’s too much…” I throw my hands up because words escape me to describe everything that’s been welling up inside me since Cam appeared on my doorstep. “This is all his fault, Marlo. All of it.”
“Is it?”
The silence that fills the air after her simple question weighs down on me, threatening to crush my chest, and I protectively press my hands over my belly. “How can you even ask that?”
My voice wavers, but she doesn’t bend.
She continues to stare me down with a brow raised. “Because I think you know as well as I do that it isn’t his fault. What happened in the garden that night—yes, he lied to you. He pretended to be Drew, and that was a really fucking shitty thing to do, but Ivy? You knew something was different about him that night. That the person sitting with you on that bench was not the Drew that you had been dating, and you can’t deny that. You’ve told me as much. You have wanted Cam since the moment you met him, plain and simple. And that doesn’t take anything away from what you had with Drew. You two…” A little laugh falls from her lips, and she sighs. “God, it was disgusting how much in love you were, and I’ve never been more jealous of anything in my life than I was of your relationship.”
I sniffle. “Really?”
Her head bobs.
“How come you never told me that?”
“Because I was also ludicrously happy for you. I’ve never seen you like that with anyone until Drew.” She dips down slightly to catch my gaze. “And now, Cam. He does something to you, Ivy. I didn’t think anything would pull you out of the depression you were in when you lost Drew?—”
“I wasn’t depressed.”
She snorts and shakes her head. “Oh, honey. You were, most definitely, depressed. And Nancy, Trina, and I did everything we could think of to help you out of it, but you didn’t want to come out of it. That changed when Cam showed up. When he started telling you those stories about Drew. When he cried with you. When he pushed you to let go of his ashes and attempt to find your way back to your life again.”
I wince. “I can’t love him.”
I repeat the words I’ve already said as if saying them more will somehow make everything I’m feeling go away.
But I know they won’t.
