A flash pan of rage quickly flared through my system. How dare he break my heart into a million pieces and then seek to comfort me! He told me he would always love me . . . always fight for me . . . lies . . . all lies. “Don’t touch me!” I croaked, even as my body craved nothing but more of his touches. “You don’t get to comfort me when I’m this way because of you.”
“Peej,” Bryn whispered, as if it pained him to say my name. “It’s what’s best for you. We were kidding ourselves before to think we could truly be together.”
I sat up and whirled around to face him, my dragon fire magic rousing just under the surface, luckily I was too weak to actually access it. “And who said you get to decide what’s best for me? You don’t get—” My anger fizzled out as I took in his dejected face and slumped shoulders. “I love you, Bryn. How can I live without you?” I said as I reached out to touch him. He snagged my fingers with his large hand and met my gaze. His eyes seemed to be a much darker blue than normal, as if the light from the room couldn’t be reflected in them, as if he had lost a little bit of his life essence somehow.
“You won’t have to live without me, Peej.” His eyes moved over me and came to rest somewhere over my right shoulder. “I’m still your best friend. And that’s never going to change.”
A weird strangled noise escaped from the back of my throat that I seemingly had no control over. “
Bryn remained silent as the seconds ticked by, probably trying to think of something good to say in response to my question. But what could he say? No matter what words he used to try and sooth me, to try and make things easier on me, we both would know they would be a lie. “You almost died . . . again.” He muttered as he turned his whole body away from me. “And I didn’t have the power to save you.”
“You’re the one who’s killing me now!” I exclaimed with anguish as I crumpled back down on the bed, darkness pushing around the edges of my vision. My breath caught in my throat the moment Bryn loomed over me and cupped the side of my face in his warm palm. I studied the familiar face of the man who I’d come to think of as home . . . a home that I had currently been dislodged from. His black eyebrows were furrowed as if in pain, and they stood out in stark contrast against his pale smooth skin. The planes of his face seemed harsher than I remembered them, as if some hardship had eroded away what was left of the carefree Bryn I used to know. He had changed so much over the last year . . .
“You can’t stop me,” he said, even as his thumb circled my cheek tenderly.
I focused on his full supple lips as I pursed mine, noticing his eyes follow the movement. With an abruptness that he hadn’t been prepared for, as evidenced by the grunt that escaped him, I wound my fingers around the back of his neck and pulled him down to me. I arched my head up so that I could slant my lips over his as I aggressively slipped my tongue into his mouth. He only resisted me for a moment before I felt the stiffness in his body melt away and make room for another kind of tension between us. His hands slid down to explore my body in the heated way a lover does who knows exactly what his partner enjoys. I sucked on his tongue and drank down the flavor of him with a desperation I’d never felt before. Back when we had just crossed the line in our relationship, I wouldn’t have really known what I was missing if he had walked away, but now . . . now I would mourn the loss of his touch with every breath I took for the rest of my life. I couldn’t bear the thought.
“Don’t leave me, Bryn,” I choked out on a moan as I slid my hands under his shirt to slide over the smooth expanse of his muscled chest.
“I have to . . .” Bryn started to say as I plunged my tongue into his mouth again. I would kiss him until he had no rational thought left and he could no longer resist giving me what I wanted.
I somehow managed to maneuver Bryn onto his back so that I sat on top of him with my thighs astride his. I dipped down to continue kissing him as I worked on getting the both of us out of our clothes. He wrapped his hands around my waist, both trying to stop me from grinding against him and to press me harder into him at the same time.
It was then that my stomach decided to do a weird little flip flop and I suddenly felt like I was going to throw up. I lurched sideways so that I would miss Bryn, and proceeded to revisit the very little bit of food that I had eaten that day. When I finished, I rolled off him and groaned in utter mortification. Talk about a mood killer. It was just as well that Bryn was planning on leaving me because I doubted now if I could ever look him in the face again. I rolled onto my side facing away from him and silently pleaded for any deity that might be listening to open up the floor so it could swallow me whole.
Bryn stroked one of hands down my back in a soothing motion. “You okay?” His voice was still gruffer than normal, which made my stomach do another little flip flop but for a completely different reason this time. I guess throwing up didn’t necessarily kill
“Fine,” I said in a clipped tone, not really sure how to react to Bryn in that moment.
“Hey,” I heard Jeremy’s familiar voice call through the slightly ajar door. “I was just coming to get you guys for a meeting. Khol wants to catch P.J. up on everything she’s missed . . .” His voice trailed off, probably because he was taking in the scene of Bryn’s and my half-undressed state and the evidence of my upset stomach. “But I guess I could tell him you guys are busy right now.”
“No,” Bryn said, the bed moving as he got up and out of it. “Just give us a few minutes.” I remained silenced by my complete and utter humiliation.
“Yeah, okay,” Jeremy replied with uncertainty.
Silence enveloped the room after I heard the retreating footsteps of Jeremy. For a few moments I actually wondered if Bryn had gone too and I just hadn’t heard him. “Do you need anything?” His voice cut through the silence and let me know that he hadn’t left after all.
“It’s for the best, you know?” I fought the urge to stick my fingers in my ears to keep from hearing what else he had to say to me. Mature, I know. “We need to both try and move on.”
The pain of his words sliced into my heart like an arrow hitting its mark, but from that pain stemmed fresh anger intermingled with jealously. Was there someone that he planned on moving on with? Was that what this was all about, and he was just trying to cushion the blow for me? I whipped my head around to face him, sure that my green eyes were glowing with rage, my embarrassment burned away by my hostility directed at him. “Who do you want to move on with, Bryn?” I hissed sounding somewhat less than human. “Has that buyer’s remorse finally set in? Or did you figure out when you were away that there were better options out there?” Bryn’s face showed surprise at my reaction, but my doubt at the authenticity of it spurred me on. Although I had no doubt that Bryn loved me . . . maybe he wanted someone else more.
“No,” he said as his jaw turned to stone. “It’s not like that. I don’t want her. You know you’re the only one for me.” He locked gazes with me and I felt my anger fold up into itself. Maybe I just wanted an explanation that I could get angry at, and a reason to hate Bryn for leaving me, because surely he couldn’t just walk away if he still felt the same way as he did before about me.
“Then, why?” I asked while searching his face. “No one ever said it would be easy, no one ever said—”
“No one ever said it would kill you.”
I crawled toward him on my knees across the bed, stopping just short of touching him. “None of that is your fault, but if you leave me”—I reached up and caressed his face; his eyes slid shut on contact—“that will be your fault. And that will be what kills me.”
I felt his jaw tick with tension under my palm just before he pulled away; leaving me to feel the cold emptiness, the loss of his skin from under my hand offered me. “I’ve made up my mind and nothing you can do or say will change it.” He turned and walked toward the door, pausing to look at me over his shoulder. His eyes
