Page 114 of Mile High Ex's Dad
“Sienna.”
His voice is lower this time, closer. He must have stepped right up to the door. I can picture him there too easily. One hand braced against the frame, jaw tight, that look on his face when he’s already decided patience is a courtesy and not a limit.
“Open the door.”
I close my eyes. “No.”
Silence.
Not much of it. Just enough to tell me he heard something in my voice.
Then, very calmly, “Why?”
Because I’m weak where you’re concerned.
Because I can still taste you.
Because if I let you in, I’ll end up in your bed again with your hands all over me and your mouth saying things I’m not strong enough to resist.
Because there’s a baby inside me, and whatever this is, however much I want it, it is not safe.
I lean my forehead against the wood. “Please go away.”
He doesn’t.
Of course he doesn’t.
“I’m not leaving while you sound like that.”
A laugh almost comes out of me, but it dies before it becomes anything real. “That’s not your choice.”
His hand lands flat against the other side of the door. I can hear it more than feel it. A dull touch of skin to painted wood.
“I want to make sure you’re okay,” he says.
That almost breaks me. Not because it’s tender, but because it’s so ordinary. So unfairly ordinary after everything else. As if hecan stand outside my door and speak in that low, steady voice and not know what it does to me.
I know if I opened it, he would look at my face once and know. He would see I’ve been crying again. He would see I’m shaken. He would come in anyway. He would put his hands on me, and I would let him, because wanting him has stopped feeling like a choice and started feeling like a condition of my body.
I press one hand low over my stomach. The baby shifts, slow and heavy.
That steadies me more than anything else has tonight.
No. This has to stop somewhere.
“I’m fine,” I say, and hate myself for using those words again when they mean nothing at all.
“No, you’re not.” His answer comes without hesitation.
I bite the inside of my cheek and keep my voice level with effort. “I mean it, Viktor.”
“So do I.”
He tries the handle again, not hard, just enough to remind me how thin the barrier is between us. A lock. A door. A decision I’m making with my whole body fighting me on it.
My breath catches.
He hears that too, and his voice changes. Softer now. More dangerous because of it.
