Chapter 20

• Was I making a mistake?’
• The words echoed in my head, a relentless, torturous refrain. The image of Harden’s face, etched with such raw emotion, flashed before my eyes. He had looked at me with so much feeling, so much everything in his eyes. He looked at me like I was his, like I was the only thing that mattered. And I had told him the one thing I knew would shatter him, the one thing that would make him hate me.
• It was the only way. The only way to get him to leave, to make him believe that I had feelings for someone else. How’s that even possible, when all I can do is think of him? Every fiber of my being screamed for him to stay, for him to hold me, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t.