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Lexie huffed. “You’re unbelievable. For the record,” she said, roughly retrieving her purse and stomping to the front door where she paused, hand on the knob. “I never asked you to protect me. I never asked you for anything.”
And then she was gone.
The lamp was the first thing to go flying across the room, shattering against the wall with a satisfying crash. It didn’t help. Nico threw the decorative bowl from the sideboard next, his keys still resting within, then a framed print of the sunlit shoreline that hung on the wall above it. None of it made a difference. He ran both hands through his hair as he counted backward from ten and told himself to stop acting like a child having a temper tantrum.
Could he have been any more stupid? Any more cruel?
She’s gone.
The things he’d said to her . . .
The things he couldn’t say to her . . .
Nico paced in circles, registering the stinging pain in his foot when he encountered a shard sharp enough to penetrate his skin, too lost in thought to care. She probably never wanted to see him again. And he didn’t have anyone to blame but himself.
Chapter twenty-three
Lexie’s cheeks were wet with tears by the time she stormed into her house. She threw her purse to the floor and slammed the front door. To think, just a few hours ago, she’d been too scared to come here, too afraid of what might be waiting in the dark. Now, she felt sorry for anyone—psycho killer or not—who dared to take her on. Rage and adrenaline pumped wildly through her veins, hardening like cement around her heart, protecting her from the hurt she knew was a moment’s weakness away from engulfing her completely.
She screamed into a couch cushion. It helped. She then rummaged around her kitchen cupboards, coming up with the biggest wine glass she could find, and poured herself an enormous serving of Chardonnay from the bottle Annie had left in her refrigerator. It helped even more. Once she felt the light buzz take hold, she put on some music, ran herself a bubble bath, and spent the next forty or fifty minutes drowning out every thought of Nico, refusing to even let his name cross the chasm of her mind. It wasn’t until the water was getting cold and her glass was long empty that she let herself feel it—the pain. It cut so deep and burned so hot, she could hardly stand it. Her mother always said she was too softhearted, and that one day it would destroy her. The woman had been a train wreck—not someone you’d ever take advice from—but on that point, it seemed she’d been right. Like a fool, Lexie had let herself hope, let herself believe that Nico was a nice man, worlds apart from what she was used to. As it turned out, there were no nice men. They were all the same, telling you what you wanted to hear only while it was convenient for them. Then they chewed you up and spat you out like the animals they were. Only animals hunted for survival, not sport.
Lexie sighed. She knew she was spiraling now, feeding the narrative that all men were assholes simply because it suited her to feel that way. She knew it wasn’t true, and she didn’t believe that Nico had set out intending to hurt her, much as she was tempted to believe the worst of him right now. On the other hand, if he knew he wasn’t ready to meet her halfway in the vulnerability department, or at least let his walls down enough for her to get to know the real him, then he had no business getting so involved with her in the first place. He was lying through omission, that much she knew for certain. How deep and wide those lies went was something yet to be uncovered. And she wasn’t sure she wanted to do that.
After drying herself with a towel, Lexie threw on an old, comfortable t-shirt and some underwear. She found her purse still lying on the foyer floor and dug around in it until she located her phone, which she promptly switched off. She didn’t want to speak to anyone for a long while. Then she brushed her teeth and crawled into bed. She expected sleep to take her fast, but as the storm outside raged on, Lexie tossed and turned forever. She guessed it was somewhere close to midnight when she finally drifted off, so when the bright beam of headlights through her window startled her awake a little after two a.m., she felt groggy. Slow.
What the . . . ?
Darkness fell again. Maybe she’d dreamed it?
No. That was definitely the sound of footfalls on her front steps.
Lexie shot out of bed, creeping down the hall to investigate. The cold hardwood under her bare feet made her shiver as she crossed her arms under her breasts. Her breathing sped up. The storm had slowed enough that lightning no longer lit up the sky and the thunder had gone quiet. Rain still fell in a steady rhythm on the roof, a sound she usually loved, but right now she found frustrating as it muffled any other noise from the other side of the door.
Someone was out there.
Lexie reached out and switched on the porch light, blinking through the glare it created through the windows. “Who’s there?”
“It’s me.”
For a second, her whole body sagged with relief. Then she remembered the events of earlier that evening and stiffened in a whole new way. “What do you want?”
“Please open the door.” Nico’s deep voice rumbled through the wooden barrier between them. He sounded tormented.
Lexie bit her lip and considered. She would not allow herself to feel sorry for him, not after the hurtful things he’d said. If he was here to apologize, she would hear him out, but that’s all. If he wanted forgiveness, well, he had a lot of making up to do before that was even a remote possibility, and she would tell him exactly that if he had the gall to ask for it.
Mind made up, she confidently opened the door, all set to tear him a new one. That was until she saw him.
Nico was soaked from head to toe, his dark hairline leaking droplets of water down his face, catching in his eyelashes as he stared at her with a heat and hardness that made her gulp. His posture was meek, almost shameful, like he knew he had no right to look at her like that. His hands hung by his sides, nonthreatening but for the way his fingers kept sliding over and around his thumbs, as if he were barely holding onto control of his own body.
Lexie almost shut the door again.
Almost.
But some instinct inside her told her that he would not hurt her. She knew it. Trusted it.
Nico didn’t speak as he crossed the threshold. Lexie moved back, silently allowing him entry. In a manner that spoke volumes of what would come next, Nico pushed the door closed behind him. Locked it.
Lexie straightened her back as he approached her, refusing to shy away from this newfound menacing aura. When he was close enough for her to feel his warmth and smell his scent, he opened his mouth to speak.
