Page 56 of Unmasked

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

LAINEYHADALWAYSthought the way people described time as standing still after an important moment was a bit of a wank. But now she understood. It was like God himself had planted a hand on the earth to stop its rotation, slowing things down so that each breath dragged into her lungs with agonising slowness.

Damian’s expression remained unchanged. His heavy brows crinkled slightly, and the hard set of his jaw was devastating as ever. The lack of reaction was telling.

She’d made a terrible mistake.

“You can’t love me.” He cringed as soon as the words shot out of his mouth because Lainey jumped, ready to flee. Clearing his throat as if trying to put his thoughts in order, he said, “Stay...please. Let’s talk this through.”

Oh, God, this was it. The “well, this has been fun but...” talk that she’d always avoided by being the first to cut and run. And now she was going to have to sit and pretend like her heart wasn’t shattering into a billion jagged pieces.

Why did you do this to yourself? You know a guy like him will find a picture-perfect wife, not some crazy woman who goes commando and does shooters and dresses up in disguise to seduce men.

Not men. Just him.

“You’re panicking.” He furled and unfurled his fists, and her hands twitched in response. “I can see it.”

“Well, nothing good ever comes after ‘we need to talk.’ That usually comes before ‘I’m not mad, I’m disappointed.’” She tried to muster a smile, but it felt like the bottom had fallen out of her world.

“I worry one of us will be saying that.” He frowned. “And it won’t be me.”

“I know you don’t want long term.” She couldn’t even look him in the eye. “But I thought...”

The weight of his silence pressed down on her heart.

“You’re right,” he said, eventually. “I don’t want long term.”

Her chest squeezed. “Then maybe we can skip to the part where I leave the country and we forget this ever happened.”

Dammit. How pathetic are you? Why don’t you drop your heart on the ground so he can stomp on it, already?

“I don’t want to forget.” His expression was deadly serious. “Lainey, I...fuck, I don’t know how to say this.”

“Do it. Like a Band-Aid.” Her heart stuttered in her chest, tears prickling the backs of her eyes so that she had to blink repeatedly to push them away. “You say, ‘Lainey, this has been fun, but you’re not the girl for me.’”

He shook his head. “It’s not like that.”

“Then what is it like? Because from where I’m sitting, it looks as though we want different things.” She knotted her hands in her lap, praying that the tears would hold off until she was alone.

Alone. It was an idea she had better get used to, because very soon she’d be a whole hemisphere away from her family, her friends. And the man she desperately loved.

“You’re supposed to be leaving,” he said.

The words were like a bullet ripping her insides to shreds. In his mind, there had always been an end date. She had a ticket and he’d banked on avoiding this conversation. He never had any intention of taking it further.

Did you? You hadn’t planned on more than one night. And he wasn’t even supposed to know.

But walking away had been so much harder than she’d anticipated. Going back to him without her disguise—being with him as herself—had been everything. The culmination of all her childish, heart-fluttering wishes, of all her lust and desire. Of all her secret dead-of-the-night prayers. And now he’d blown her wide-open. Taken a verbal shotgun to her heart.

“I am leaving,” she said. “And I shouldn’t have come here.”

“Lainey, please. Let’s not ruin what we had.”

“What the hell does that mean?” She stood and wrapped her arms around herself, taking a step back. But distance wasn’t going to save her. Not even when she left Australia. Hell, flying to Mars probably wouldn’t help at this point.

She was done. Broken.

Goddammit. Why had she let Corinna and Imogen get into her head? As if he was going to throw up his hands and say “I love you,” just like that. But she’d hoped for something...anything. A flicker of feeling. Not the excuse that he thought she was leaving.

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