Page 87 of Vow

She hated it.

His banging continued.

So did his voice.

“Just go away!”

“Please, Haven … please. Let me in; let me talk—something.”

Go, she wanted to scream. Go, go, just fucking go. That awful, horrible part of her screamed, stay, please, stay.

“Haven, just open the fucking door!”

“Go away.”

“Open the door!”

“Go.”

“You think I won’t break this fucking thing down, baby? You think I won’t move heaven and hell for you? You think you know what I did? You don’t know anything—you can’t because I couldn’t let you. Let me explain, please.”

Maybe it was his whole you don’t know anything that pushed her over the edge. Maybe that was what made her so fucking angry that her vision blackened, and her breaths stopped altogether.

She didn’t know?

She was living it.

“Haven, just—”

She pushed away from the door fast, and spun around to throw it open. Andino’s hand was already raised to knock again when the door flew wide. He looked wild. Probably a hell of a lot like she looked in those moments.

Messy, and crazed.

Pissed.

“I don’t know?” she all but screamed at him. “I fucking know!”

Haven threw the invitation at him. It bounced off his still-as-stone chest, and fell to the threshold of the doorway keeping the only distance between them.

She’d been holding the invitation ever since a man knocked on her door, and handed it over with a sadistic smile after he introduced himself as Darren Calabrese. The last name rung a bad bell for Haven, but the first name … she didn’t know it at all.

It didn’t matter.

The invitation had been enough.

On the ground, the invitation stayed where it had fallen, untouched and unwanted. By her, anyway. It being there—and too close—was enough to taunt her.

Andino still hadn’t said anything. He didn’t move, or even glance away from her. Certainly not to look down at the invitation on the ground. That was enough to tell her he didn’t actually have to look at it.

He knew exactly what was on it. He knew the words she had read again and again while willing them to disappear, or be some kind of cruel joke. He didn’t have to pick up the invitation to know anything about it at all.

Haven didn’t give a single shit how she looked standing there in nothing but an over-sized T-shirt, and very little else. She hadn’t been expecting anyone to show up, but least of all this man. He always was a little too goddamn cocky for his own good.

Finally, he spoke.

A second too late, and dollar short.

“It’s not what you think.”