“I know, but… it’s different now. There’s—”
“There’s what?” he says, coming to stand in front of me again. “Say it. There’swhat?”
I grit my teeth together.
“There are feelings,” I ground out, my eyes burning with tears.
“Exactly,” he says. “That’s exactly what I mean. We both feel something here, we both know this can be something if we give it a chance. I’m terrified of what it’ll mean for me. I could lose everything. I have a lot on the line too, Cassius. It isn’t only you.”
“If this fails for you, you still have money, Harmon. You have something to fall back on.”
“I told you I don’t care about the money,” he barks, throwing his arms up.
“And you can say that because you have billions!” I shout with a humorless laugh. “You have enough to survive for the rest of your life, even if your company fell to the ground right now. It’s easy for you to say that because you have something to fall back on.”
“And what’s the point of having that if I’m alone?”
I shrug. “You planned it all along. Why has it changed?”
“Because I didn’t have you before.”
“Harmon—”
“Cassius, please, let’s—”
His alarm goes off again. His jaw clenches, and he runs his hands through his hair, before going around the bed to shut it off. I stand in the same spot, though I should have taken the opportunity to run out of here. Only to remember I don’t even have my car here.Shit.
He tosses his phone to the bed as he comes around to stand in front of me again.
Move, Cassius. Leave.
But I can’t. I just fucking can’t get my legs to work.
“Cassius, let’s talk about this. We can figure something out.”
“I don’t see how we can figure this out. I know what I said before, and maybe then, when I was desperate for it, I would have done anything. But now… it doesn’t feel right. I can’t take your money if we’re doing this, and that ruins everything.”
I fight away the tears, because I realize now that I’m the one who did this. I fucked it all up. Just like I always do.
“There is a way to fix this. There’s a way to make this work. There has to be.”
I hear the desperation in his tone, and it makes me want to give in, it really does. I could ask him so easily to pay for Cammy’s school, and I know he would do it. He would do it because he’s as desperate as I was then. Only he’s desperate for me… for this. For something real. For us. I want that too, it’s just that my problems are more real than any relationship could be. And I know I’d feel weird for the rest of my life if I took his money because we’re fucking now.
“You know this is wrong, Harmon. I know you do.”
“It’s not. How can it be?”
His phone goes off again. “Fuck,” he growls.
This time I do take the chance to leave. I hurry to the bathroom to take a shower. It’s quick, and when I’m dressed and out, there’s a note on the bed with a set of keys telling me that weWILLtalk about this later.
I don’t hurry home because I don’t want to answer the questions Cammy will have. I told them Chrissy was getting a car to school, so I can show up after she’d have left. Guilt eats away at me because I could bring her but am choosing not to, but I need a moment for myself. Just a little while to worry about my own problems for a minute and not everyone else’s.
I don’t know how Harmon left, or if he was even gone when I did, but the keys on the bed were for his car. The only one I saw him drive—and the only one at his house. It’s possible he has others or had someone pick him up in the twenty minutes I was in the bathroom, or he was hiding out in the house somewhere waiting for me to leave.
I don’t know. I want to ask but I won’t.
How am I supposed to move forward with this?