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Finally, he peeled himself back.
I felt the movement like a loss.
A cold slick that slipped down my spine.
I swallowed down the urge to turn to him, to confess it all, to give him exactly what he’d demanded, and I opened the door, silently berating myself for even thinking of being so reckless.
I’d allowed myself to stumble. To become distracted. I started to duck through the door when the rumble of his words vibrated the air, stopping me in my tracks.
“Fine. Fuckin’ run because we both know that’s what you do best.”
I stalled for two beats before I hurried on my bare feet down the hall and to the room where he’d left my things. Frantic, I stuffed my feet into my shoes, shoved my scrubs that I’d left on the floor into the duffle, slung the strap over my shoulder, and grabbed my purse. I immediately turned and ran back out.
I could feel the heat of him blister down the hall. The energy crack.
Drawn, I could do nothing but look that way.
He stood in his doorway, seething and bent on wrath.
Mammoth shoulders nearly touching each side.
But it was what I saw in his expression that nearly made me falter. The hurt and the pain.
I dropped my gaze to the floor and forced myself to turn and run downstairs.
I didn’t even know where I was going when I hit the landing, but I crossed the rest of the way to the front door and fumbled through the locks and ran out into the cool air of the night.
I didn’t let the tears start falling until I made it up his drive and onto the street.
They burned, streaking fast, the heat of them clashing with the breeze that rustled through the branches of the colossal trees.
The thick, lush leaves blocked out the moon, and I hurried through the murky haze toward the road that followed along the lake.
What was I doing? What was I doing?
I tried to convince myself it was better to end it this way before it was too late.
Before I fell for the man and his little boy.
It was the hacking at my heart that warned it might already be too late.
I hurried down the narrow road in front of his house then made a left at Vista View.
The night surrounded on all sides, though the cover of the trees had opened here. Rays of moonlight slanted through the atmosphere and glittered across the surface of the lake.
Everything was still.
The quiet distinct.
It wasn’t until then that I realized I was alone.
Completely alone.
Again.
So alone that the fear crept in, rising up from the fringes to crowd in at the edges of my sight.
My heart thundered, and I quickened my pace as I fumbled around in my purse to get my phone. I went to thumb into a ride-share app. Frustration and a tremble of something deeper rolled through me when I saw that I had no service.
