Page 95 of Bene

She understood that.

A part of her still felt like she was betraying her father, his memory, and the promise she made to him. Vanna didn’t know what to do about that, or how to deal with it. So, she did the next best thing—and it was still the fucking coward’s way out of this situation.

She couldn’t tell Bene she loved him.

She also couldn’t hurt him or his family.

Instead, she slipped out from under his arm, doing her very best not to turn and look at him as she found her clothes scattered around the room. Pulling the items on as quickly as she could, with as little noise as possible, she let her heels dangle from her fingertips instead of slipping them on, too, knowing they would make too much noise as she left the room.

No doubt, she looked a mess.

Makeup ruined.

Hair all over the place.

Clothes crumpled.

The walk of shame.

Funnily enough, she felt every ounce of that shame, too, as she left the room without a look back over her shoulder. Not because of the man she’d fucked three times before they fell asleep, but the fact she was leaving him at all when her heart screamed for her to get back in that bed with him, and pretend like the rest of her life wasn’t falling apart.

Her heart kept whispering lies.

Tell him.

Tell him the truth.

He can help.

He’ll understand.

He’ll forgive you.

Maybe, maybe … maybe …

None of it was true, and she didn’t need to test the theory out to know it was fact. The one thing Bene loved the very most was his family—that much was clear. Just like the rest of them. Finding out she had been working to tear his family apart at the seams would only be the final nail in the coffin, and she doubted he would give a shit about what was happening to her in the clan after he knew what she did to him.

She didn’t need that pain.

Neither did he.

It wasn’t fair.

Vanna crossed the sitting room that connected the two bedrooms, noting the door on the other side had been closed. She couldn’t remember if that was open when they first came in—the door to his twin’s room—because everything happened so fast. They went from kissing against the door, to fucking like animals on the bed in a blink.

She couldn’t waste time wondering, either.

Leaving the sitting room, and coming out into the hallway, Vanna nearly ran into a form turning to come through the doorway. She almost lost the shoes in her hand as her eyes widened, and she came face to face with Bene’s twin.

For a second, she wished she was dead.

That would have been easier.

Beni blinked, a glass of water in his grip as he tried to make sense of what he was seeing in front of him. Goddamn, she understood that feeling far too well. “You’re leaving?”

Vanna swallowed hard. “I—”

“Bene didn’t say you were leaving at …” He checked the watch on his wrist, muttering, “Three in the morning—what?”