Page 29 of The Last Time You Break Me

“That’s the thing about choice, Reg. They say it’s never too late and that everything can be fixed. But betrayal is almost as permanent as if it was set in stone.”

He shook his head as he turned his troubled gazed skyward while he heaved a deep breath and tried to center himself. He looked back down at me and gritted his jaw, “ I deserve your anger. Butwedon’t deserve you throwing away what we could be. Not now. Not after everything.”

“And why now? Why only after I get given a seat at the table?”

“I wanted you, Lara. That day I walked away from you in your bedroom, I wanted you. You were never just Dom’s daughter but alwaysmygirl. I protect what’s mine, no matter the cost. I wanted to save you from this life but you ran right into it anyway. So why are we still fighting this?” He flexed his grip, his frustrated hold turned bruising around my nape and it sent trembles down my spine.

“You never had the right to make that choice for me. No man ever has the right to take away a woman’s choice,” I declared with venom in my tone. “If you loved me, if you knew me and I was ever reallyyourgirl, you would have known. I never fought for the seat out of spite, Reg. My life has and never will be dependent onanydamn man. I fought for this seat because it’s my birthright. Because at a nine-to-fucking-five, I can’t let the crazy out and do that.” I pointed to the mutilated corpse who had somehow begun to look like it was rotting. I don’t know if that is due to how bad the tissue damage was or just the low lights, deep in the thicket of tonight’s abyss. “I needed it. I was drowning without it and you didn’t even notice.”

Reggie’s nostrils flared as he gulped harshly. “I noticed it, baby,” he whispered sadly. “I just didn’t want to believe it. I saw the darkness in you, and I knew it was the same darkness inside of me. I could always accept you, it was accepting myself that I couldn’t do. I love you, Lara. I love you.” He grew more insistent and pulled me close as he plastered my body to his. “Can’t that be enough to rewrite our history? To rewrite every mistake I’llforever have to live with. It’s my burden and I have no right to ask you to forgive it. But right here, right now, I’m giving you my all. I love you, Lara!”

I gasped, the bite of cold air rushed down my throat at the startled intake. I had dreamed about those words. The words coated in sin and carried with a forbidden secret that would forever beoursand ours alone. I stepped into him, those wicked tears back, gathered like deep pools of anguish in my shore-crashing emeralds.

I allowed my chest to press into his more firmly. I allowed myself to feel every hard plane and rough edge to his physique. As I brought a soft hand to his stubbled jaw, it trembled and forced me to tense every aching and tired muscle within my body to hide the weakness. Slowed and controlled, I brought my lips to his in the first kiss I have ever before initiated.

He never pressed for more, happy with the soft, emotion-filled contact of our satin smooth lips. I sank my heart, body and soul into him and he held me like he would never let me go. It made what came next almost impossible.

Our bodies fused together like they belonged and for the first time in a long time, my demons quietened.

I could breathe. The riot within my mind slowed and I submerged within the depths of something that felt akin to home. Tohope.

It took everything I had to pull back, to break the kiss, look him in the eye and utter the words that once upon a time broke me, spoken from his very lips. “Absolutely nothing.”

And then I turned my back on him, just like he had turned his back on me.

Chapter Eleven

Reggie

If You Want Love - NF

Lara walked away from me without so much as looking back. She had taken my beaten and withered heart with her. Torn from my chest and held within her vicious grip.

I couldn’t blame her for her rage. She deserved it just as much as I deserved that harsh lash back with the bitter words I had once spoken to her. I had been a foolish man, lost more to the desire to keep her safe than I was to the fact that she needed so much more from me.

But that was the thing about desire wasn’t it? It was an emotion strong enough to blind a man when the need became too much to explore than the strength we had to deny.

Desire was an addiction.

One worse than any drug when it claimed you.

I had let her down, became the coward I swore I would never become and I ran and hid instead of fighting for the one girl a war was worth waging for.

So that is what I would do now.

I would wage a fucking war.

Even if it cost me my best friend, the man that I loved and the family I’d die for.

Lara and I walked into Dom’s office not even an hour later, ready to give the report. As we entered, he was already walking toward the door. “I’ve called a meeting, follow me.”

As we walked into the room where all the meetings are held, everyone was already seated around the table. I brushed my hand against Lara’s as she walked past me, but she never even batted an eye at the contact. Well and truly in crime daughter mode.

And locked into full gear of hating Reggie mode.

I took my seat beside Dom and watched as his children filled the chairs opposite me. My heart panged with self-reproach as I looked at each one. I had seen them all grow; treated those boys like my own. Now, I was at risk of losing them too with the unconventional love I held for their baby sister. But as I gazed upon Lara, my heart and soul knew everything would be worth it. She gave me something I’d never truly felt before. Purpose. More so than a purpose I had created as I carved myself a life here, but one that was birthed from one’s soul finding its match.

I couldn’t explain why one person loved another.

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