Damon making me feel.
Damon—
Enough.
I yanked open the drawer on my vanity, knowing that even if I wasn’t going to wear a bunch of makeup for him, that I’d still need moisturizer. The dry air in California demanded it. Except . . . the bottle wasn’t on my counter. My eyes searched the drawer’s contents, then the countertop. I didn’t appear to have slung it either place while washing my face half-asleep the night before.
“Damn,” I muttered, bending to pull open the cabinets. Not there. Not there. Not—
I spotted it on my dresser in the closet.
Right next to the hamper.
Thank God it hadn’t made it inside. That would have been a mess, not to mention a waste of a very expensive moisturizer if it had taken a ride through the washer-dryer.
Delirious. Clearly, I’d been delirious last night.
Glancing at my phone, I saw it was only a few minutes before Damon was due to arrive. I hurried to the closet, snagged the bottle, and whipped back around toward the bathroom—
“Ouch!”
I’d slammed my elbow into the shelves that were in one corner, knocking a small box off the top, where I’d stashed it.
Stashed it out of sight.
Because it was that box.
The small cardboard shoebox hit the carpet, its lid falling off, contents spewing everywhere—a bit of lace, a narrow gold band, a picture of me and Tim, my eyes bright and excited, Tim’s already lined with rage that would become physical pain for me. A dried rose and another picture, this one a smaller black and white image that had been beyond precious.
I stared at the picture and . . . the pieces in my mind shifted and realigned.
I’d already lost everything.
That little rectangle had once been critically important to me . . . and I’d lost it.
The doorbell rang.
Damon was here.
My lungs froze, breath locked inside. Then a sob escaped.
“F-fuck,” I stuttered. I didn’t want to lose him, too. I couldn’t. I didn’t want to be alone.
No.
I didn’t want to be alone if that meant I wouldn’t have Damon, if I just let the connection I had with him fade away. For him to find a future with someone else while I was left behind, still stuck in the same pattern I was now, living a half-life, wanting more but too scared to go for it.
Because Damon was different.
He’d always been soft where Tim had been sharp and brutal. He was supportive and kind, a thoughtful friend, a lover who was more focused on my pleasure than his own.
All that was without me giving him anything in return.
Patience when I’d only offered the opposite.
Damon wasn’t Tim, and I wasn’t the same woman with him as I’d been with Tim. I was more and stronger and healthier and, dammit, I deserved to find my only little slice of a happy future.
And I wanted to have that future to include Damon.
The fear gripping me for so long began to slowly disappear, replaced by tiny bubbles of hope, sneaking out from the seams of my armor. Maybe . . . I could have Damon without him having power over me? Maybe, we could build something where I didn’t need to constantly be picking up my shield and donning my armor? Maybe—
The doorbell rang again.
Maybe, I needed to stop musing about the past, open up the front door, and take a chance.
Could I?
I glanced down at the black and white picture and thought, How can I not?
I stowed the items back in the box, putting it on the shelf, though not shoving it onto the top one this time.
No more shame. No more of my past holding me back.
I walked out of the bathroom, pausing to glance at myself in the mirror again, half-expecting my face to have undergone a complete change after what I’d worked through in the past five minutes.
But I was still just me.
Green eyes, red hair, pale skin—
My cell buzzed and I glanced down, saw that Damon had sent me a selfie of him wearing a sad face and holding up a bag of food from my porch.
I grinned then sucked in and released a long, slow breath. I could do this.
Sorry. Was in the shower. The code to the garage is 6262 if you want to let yourself in.
A beat.
And now you’ll never get rid of me. *insert evil laughter here*
I sucked in another of those breaths. Just go for it.
Keep bribing me with sugary carbs and I’ll consider it.
I hit send before I really considered what I wrote, and when I saw those words on my cell’s screen, I couldn’t believe that my fingers had typed them. I’ll consider it? Holy fucking shit. My hands shook as I set my phone down, chest heaving, panic rising again—
Dammit.
“Just enough.”
Cold water splashed on my face, hair pulled back into a tight ponytail, clothes straightened and free of wrinkles.
And it was enough.
To snap out of this cycle, to accept Damon wasn’t my ex. That I was different with him than I’d been with Tim. That I was different now. I’d pushed through the nightmare, had let it lead me to a new life and a new future. That was great and showed I was strong, that I could persevere, but—
I sighed. But if I pulled back now, had I really moved beyond the past?
No, because if I didn’t do that with all parts of my life, then it didn’t mean anything. If I was too scared to even consider that I might be able to build a future with a loving partner, with someone like Damon, then I had no hope of doing it with anyone.
But . . . I had. I was already breaking through that wall, wanting more.
And I was starting to think that I’d put so much effort into pushing Damon away in the first place, specifically because I knew deep down that he was different, knew
