Page 119 of XOXO

The last sentence almost sounded like a plea.

I scoffed, “I don’t get you. Why come all this way for me when you have plenty of women who would die to be married to you?”

“You’re mine, Violeta,” he smirked. “You have always been mine. You just didn’t know it.”

“But why? If you were the man I knew before college, things would have been different, but this person you’ve become is sad,” I said, longing for the boy I once knew.

“I changed because that boy was delusional. I had to change or this world would have—” He looked upset. “I did what I had to do. You think my father would have believed in me if I didn’t man up?”

“Man up? You think this is being a man? I⁠—”

“Stop!” he yelled, as his phone rang.

He was taking deep breaths as he looked at his phone. What the hell had happened?

“Clean yourself up and be ready to leave tomorrow morning. We fly back and are getting married immediately,” he said, leaving me alone in the living room.

His door slammed shut, making me jump. My chest felt tight as I tried to get up. Every part of my body hurt from the fall, but my heart hurt the most. I was doing this for one reason; the guys didn’t need to pay for my chaotic life. We were a vacation fling that would be over the moment I went home.

Except why did it hurt so much and why had I been thinking about staying for days or, even longer?

Walking to the room was brutal, every step was a reminder of the worst day of my life. I shut the door, sliding down against it as I tried holding in my tears. It was futile when sobs erupted. I hugged my knees to my chest, crying into my thighs to lessen the noise I was making.

My ass fell asleep as the tears kept coming, my heart fighting against my fate, telling me to do something. I could walk out right now and maybe he would never know. Fuck, but how far would I get before he found me or worse, released those pictures?

Maybe I had to play this from a different angle. He seemed stressed at the end of our conversation; he said he had had to change. Was that all for his father? Was his father pulling all these strings?

Everything felt immediately suspicious. Would blaming his father make things easier for someone to hold accountable for the change in my childhood friend who I had loved dearly.

I got up carefully to take a shower, wishing I had my phone to call Mario or even Paola. My heart felt heavy, and the feeling of being utterly alone was more than I could handle. I set the shower as hot as I could handle it and I cried, sitting in the tub, hoping when I woke up tomorrow all of this had been a bad dream.

31. Matteo

No one should pay for the sins of another.

“I’m sorry,” Ru said, as Levi walked away.

I wanted to say it was fine. We had made the right decision, but it didn’t feel right at all.

“Her asshole of an ex put us in a bad position, and unless we want to blow up your career, there was no other way,” I said, turning around to look at him.

“I feel like no answer was the right one,” he said softly, looking towards the door longingly.

“One of us was going to have to sacrifice something for this to work out and it might not have even worked out,” I said, feeling that last part was untrue.

Things had been feeling right with Violeta. We could have made it work, but at what expense? I took a deep breath to calm the rage I was feeling at her ex-fiancée and how much I would have liked to pummel his smug face.

“She’s going to pay the ultimate price,” he sighed.

A knock on the door had us rushing to it. I opened it, hoping it was Vi, but Ru’s agent stood there looking angry.

He spoke Korean fast, glaring at Ru. They argued while I closed the door. My Korean wasn’t the best, only catching a few words here and there with how fast they were speaking. Ru was getting more upset when I heard Vi’s name from his agent.

“Hey, maybe we need to cool the yelling,” I said, coming in between them.

Ru pointed to the door, telling him he would speak to him tomorrow and to fix his attitude. They glared at each other, the tension becoming so thick I was wondering what else had been said.

“Make sure you're never seen with her again or everything we have worked so hard for will disappear,” his agent snapped. “And a thank you would be nice since I decided not to drop you. Remember, you’d be nothing without me.”