Page 166 of Maddening Fixation

“I’ll return when I have a reason to.”

He was already turning away when I forced the words past my throat.

“Did you believe me?”

He stopped.

My voice trembled with sorrow. “Any of what I told you earlier?”

I had told him everything. Every truth I had carried alone, every secret I had been too afraid to reveal. I had finally laid it all bare before him, hoping—foolishly—that knowing the truth might change the way he looked at me.

But he had said nothing.

And now, looking at him, I realized why.

He still looked at me with the same cold hatred.

As though I hadn’t told him the truth at all.

As though nothing I had confessed had changed a single thing.

Romeo didn’t hesitate. “No.”

The word landed with such immediate certainty that for a moment, I forgot how to breathe.

He simply watched me absorb the answer as though my pain had nothing to do with him.

“I see a desperate woman trying to steal her sister’s man,” he said, his voice cold and measured. “And when she couldn’t have him, she invented whatever lies she thought might turn me against Yarina.”

My lips parted, but nothing came out.

“Stories so ridiculous they insult my intelligence.”

His gaze moved over my face with quiet contempt.

“And I don’t blame you for lying.” A faint, dismissive curve touched his mouth. “Desperate women will do desperate things. They’ll manipulate. They’ll deceive. They’ll destroy anyone standing between them and the thing they believe they deserve.”

His eyes hardened.

“And you are no different.”

I felt my throat tighten.

“I know exactly what you’re capable of. That’s why you will stay away from Yarina.”

He leaned down slightly, forcing me to meet his eyes.

“Yarina is gentle and kind. Everything you are not. And everything you’ll never be. If you ever cause trouble for her...”

His emerald eyes locked onto mine, burning with a hatred so deep it felt almost tangible.

“...if you ever hurt her in any way, I will never forgive you.”

My chest tightened until every breath felt like it was being dragged through a wound.

For a moment, I couldn’t breathe.

His words struck somewhere deeper than flesh.