It felt just like that day when Theron’s friends had dumped a bucket of ice over my head only now, it was my heart taking the hit, freezing from the inside out. His embrace, once a sanctuary, now scorched like betrayal against my skin. I pressed both palms to his chest, shoving against him, desperate to free myself, but he only tightened his hold, wrapping his arms around me again.
“Ami, please… let me finish,” he murmured, voice barely above a whisper. “I don’t want to leave you. I never wanted to hurt you.”
“Then… what are you saying?” The words cracked in my throat.
He exhaled slowly, as if the truth were too heavy to carry. He dipped his head, burying his face in the curve of my neck.
“I’m a bastard for starting it like this,” he said, kissing a trail up to my jaw, then lifting his
