Page 59 of Heart of a Rebel

I swear she leans in the slightest bit because a hit of her floral shampoo strikes me.

“I see you as a good friend.” I rub my hands over my face, before gripping my thighs. “And I’m your manager. Anything I say beyond that would be selfish.”

“How?”

I’m not sure why she woke up intent on digging into old wounds, but Eloise has an ice pick out and seems intent on chipping.

I tip my head back and close my eyes, taking a deep breath through my nose before looking up at her again. “It’s selfish because we can’t be anything more than friends.”

“More, as in…” The way she drags that out without finishing might as well rake me through the coals.

I nod.

“So it’s true?” Her eyebrows pull together in confusion. “You still like me?”

“Of course I like you, El.”

She shakes her head, and her long sandy brown hair rustles around her shoulders. “Not like that. Not likefriends. I’m asking you if youlikeme, Adrian. Like you did back then.”

“Eloise.” Her name comes out like a warning as my brain backfires, becauselikedoesn’t begin to define what it is I feel for her, but I know better than to go there.

“Why won’t you answer? Is it because I’m broken?”

I can’t help but lean forward and plant my hand over hers at her question. “Of course not.”

“Then what is it?”

“I can’t get distracted again.” The words are barbs on my tongue, but it’s the truth. No matter how much she tries to convince me it isn’t my fault what happened to her, I wasn’t there. I was thinking about myself that night, and whatIwanted.

I can’t do that when it comes to Eloise. I’m her manager, she needs me to have a clear head.

“I can’t go halfway with you, Eloise.”

“What does that mean?”

“We can’t stop and start again. This isn’t six years ago when we barely knew each other and didn’t have any attachments.”

“So?” She faces off with me, not realizing the seed of hope in that one word, burrowing in the soil while my fingers try to dig it out before it starts to grow.

Eloise pulls back and runs her fingers through her hair, pulling it away from her face. “What are we doing?”

She stands up and starts pacing the room, spinning her hair around one of her hands and looking up at the ceiling as she does. Stirring up a feeling in my gut that something’s going to snap. And maybe that’s what I want right now. For both of us to be able to go back to that day we stood face to face, and for us to break instead of building walls.

“I know what they say about me, that I’m a hermit, or re-virginizing myself, or whatever.” Eloise frowns and it makes me want to punch the guys in the band for always picking on her for shit they knew nothing about. “But it’s not like I didn’t want to. I just couldn’t after everything.”

I stand up and walk over to her. “El, you don’t have to explain yourself.”

“I want to.” She stops abruptly, turning to face me, and her words plant me in place. “Because this is always where we end up, Adrian. Me, shutting you out and you accepting it. And I appreciate that you have in the past because I had a lot I had to work through. But I worked through it and at some point, we both need to face this.”

Her gaze falls to her feet.

“I know I messed it all up,” she says, with the faintest hint of defeat. “And I know I should probably leave the past in the past for both our sakes. But there have been too many things I’ve spent years not saying, and I’m not going to do that anymore, especially with you. What happened between us wasn’t a mistake. It was the only thing that ever really meant anything to me, and I was too scared to face that with everything else going on. If you’ve moved on, I’ll accept it. I will. But you deserve to know that I haven’t.”

Moved on?

The words hurt because nothing is further from the truth. As much as I wanted to, I’ve always known that’s not possible when it comes to her. All roads led back to Eloise Kane. She was it for me, and I’ve been torturing myself waiting for her to see it.

Eloise blinks and there might as well be fire in her eyes because they burn bright in the dim light of the room. She takes a step back, but without thinking, I move toward her.

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