“And you think this is easier for me? Leaving you tore my heart apart.”
Ryan snorted. “There are a billion reasons why this is easier for you. You’re getting everything you’ve ever dreamed of, and I’m the one left behind with nothing,” he said bitterly.
“You realize that they’re trying to take ballet away from me, right?” I asked him. “You know that ballet is the only thing I care about other than you.”
“Yeah, it sounds horrible to have your own ballet studio and a fancy school that’s designing a special curriculum just for you.”
I gritted my teeth. “Ryan, I love you, but you are making me so angry right now.”
“And you’re making me hate you.” I gasped at his harsh words, and he immediately backpedaled. “KitKat, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.”
“Is that why you talked to Maverik?” I asked quietly. “You know he hates me.” My heart sunk when he didn’t deny it. “What did you tell him?” I whispered.
There was silence on the other side of the line.
“I didn’t tell him anything that he didn’t already know. KitKat, he doesn’t hate you, and that’s part of the problem. You have a whole new family that doesn’t include me. It feels like you dropped me the moment that something better came along.”
“Ryan, that is not true,” I said harshly. “I would give anything to have you here with me.”
“I believe you,” Ryan said quietly. “But I can’t keep hearing about how amazing things are without me. I need to go out and start living my own life.” There was a moment of silence on the line, and he cleared his throat. “I’m going to ask my parents to transfer to public school.”
“What?” I gasped in shock. “Why would you give up on your future like that?” I could feel my hopes crumbling and my dreams shattering along with his.
“Because it was never my future,” Ryan said sharply. “Ballet was always yours, and I’ve just been following you,” he said bitterly.
“You’ve never felt like this before. What happened?” I could hear the desperation in my voice, but I didn’t care.
Ryan was the only link I had back to my old life, and if I were completely honest, Ryan was my old life. I had been clinging to the idea that everything would go back to normal if I could just get back to NY and back to him. I had been fighting and scheming for ways to keep Ryan and ballet in my life, and I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to either one. I couldn’t.
“I opened my eyes and started looking around. I’m mediocre at best, and everyone knows it. Even you have to admit that,” Ryan admitted quietly. “We were living in a crazy fantasy world thinking we would grow up and dance in the same company. It’s never going to happen, Katya. You need to let go.”
It felt like Ryan was giving up on me by stepping back from ballet. I had already lost so much that I couldn’t handle him letting go forever.
“Ryan, you just need more practice. Not everyone-”
“Not everyone has natural talent,” he snapped back at me. “Listen, Katya, I need some space to work through all of this, and I need some time away from you. Please respect that.”
Tears ran down my face. “I love you,” I whispered.
“I’ll always love you,” Ryan told me. “Goodbye, Katya.”
My phone clattered to the floor, and I burst into sobs, but it didn’t take long for my grief to turn to anger. I knew exactly who was responsible for this.
Chapter 30
Katya
My first impulse was to find Maverik and tear his smug face right off. How dare he manipulate my best friend into giving up on his dreams. I seethed in anger but tried to think rationally. Maverik was smart and manipulative, so he was probably expecting me to come after him. I angrily untied the ribbons to my pointe shoes and threw them across the room where they smacked into the glass wall. That did absolutely nothing to calm my rage, so I started pacing back and forth like a lion in a cage.
Richard might have trapped me here, but Maverik made a mistake by poking at me like this. I offered him a truce, and he went behind my back to hurt my best friend. I wanted to hurt him just as badly as he had hurt me; I wanted to take away what he cared about most in this world and see how that made him feel.
I closed my eyes to list what I knew about Maverik.
He was an asshole
He was evil, possibly the spawn of the devil himself
He played hockey along with his brother
My eyes snapped back open when I thought about Kingston, and I hesitated. Kingston was probably the only person in the world that Maverik cared about. But when I pictured the dejection I had seen in Kingston’s eyes when he found out about me spending time with Richard, I realized that I could never do anything to hurt him.
I sighed and slumped back down to the ground. Kingston might be an irritating perv most of the time, but I had caught glimpses of the little boy who had been abandoned by his dad and clung to his brother. Kingston had managed to somehow work his way into my heart to become the irritating little brother that I’d never wanted.
Goddammit.
Now what?
I needed to think like Maverik. What was his goal? To get me and Nina out of his life and away from his family. Why? Because he thought we were going to hurt the people he cared about. He was trying to protect the brother he loved, which in itself wasn’t bad, but he was willing to hurt anyone
