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2021-08-19 01:10:10“No Christian.” I haul out the sexy dress from my case for the third time and throw it back on the bed. He borrowed it from a senior, after a runway show they put on days ago, and I am not impressed with his choice of dress for me at my sister’s party.
“He will literally have his eyes pop out of his head if you wear this.” He smirks, holding up a scrap of cloth and sashaying around my bedroom like a movie star, molding it against him.
“I think most of me will be popping out in this. He’s seen me in various forms of skimpy clothing, and trust me, it does nothing for him. I know him, Chris, this will just make him think I’ve gone back to slumming it with sleazy men and backstreet nightclubs. Not that I even care about making an impression on him, so really, it’s not needed.” I swipe the dress from him and throw it away, over the bed this time. Glaring sternly, trying to make him stop interfering.
Ever sin
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“You never told me that, baby girl?” Christian’s voice floats my way as Jenny nudges me gently and nods across the aisle. I had finally gotten into my book after all and blanked them all out as I was pulled into a magical world of Vampires and Werewolves fighting over human girls. I look up nonplussed, catching Arrick glancing my way with that infuriating unreadable expression and yet a softness to his face that I haven’t seen in a long time. He almost looks a little bit happy and it just makes me feel shittier.“What?” I look to Christian, who is now leaning with elbows on his table casually and pondering me with an open expression, everyone seems to be looking at me. Which only makes me feel more antsy and confused.What did I miss?“That you were some sort of adrenaline junkie adventurer, who used to do things like base jump and snowboard with Arry here. He says he even taught you some self-defense moves when
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I unload my clothes from my bag into my wardrobe, alone in my bedroom while Jenny and Christian are being shown to guest rooms downstairs, after a less stressful drive from the airport. Jake had two cars waiting for us upon landing; thankfully Arrick went with his brother and Nate in the other car and left us three to head to my parents” home in peace. My head and heart still reeling with the after-effects of being so near him for that journey. I just feel drained, uptight and antsy, like I am all out of whack and I can’t get my act together. I need some cooling off time to breathe and accept the fact that YES, that asshole still fucks me up whether I like it or not.Whether he deserves it to or not!I’m taking some time out after being welcomed home by my mom and dad, getting my head together after seeing him again. I must admit, I need this more than I thought I would. Being around him still hurts more than it should, part of me aching for
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The Huntsberger house is transformed, the huge adjoining dining room and family room has been emptied through the day and now styled with floral arrangements and seating which pours out into the gardens from the wall of veranda doors. It’s looking like a huge function room in any classy hotel. Leila has always insisted on using “home” for her parties. I think it’s the little bit of sentimentality and that this place signifies safety and happy memories for her. It also means strictly no paparazzi for any of the more well-known guests and we can monitor who gets to come in and let everyone relax to have an enjoyable time.Food is being laid out in the adjoining TV room, music blaring from the sound system outside and a huge marquee, housing a bar and extended lounging area is set up. I can see a wooden floor for dan
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The now arriving others, as Leila does the rounds forcing couples this way are soon starting to surround us, and I try my hardest to relax, tell myself this will not be that bad, that I can endure this. I turn towards him when he draws me to the middle and hesitate, swallowing hard, breathing harder when faced with his body edging against mine and don’t know how else to play this, except look completely out of my depth.“Relax. It’s just a dance, sure Christian won’t mind.” Arrick says flatly, looking over my head as though watching people come onto the floor behind us. I guess he can see or sense my tension. My expression must be one of shell shock. We stand awkwardly for a moment before he slides his hand to my waist and tugs me into him, softly and slowly. Lifting his free hand and offering it to me, so I get the choice if I want to touch him again or not. I t
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“Sophiee, you know I lurve you a million times over babes.” Leila slurs over the top of me, alcohol breath almost flooring me with its sheer toxicity, captured in her crazily strong embrace as we both sway. I’m a little worse for wear too, having drunk one too many champagne cocktails. The party is wearing down, but Leila is beyond wrecked and slobbering a gush of emotion all over me as I try to say my goodbyes to her.“Baby, come on, Sophs is being suffocated by the fumes coming off you.” Daniel is trying to extract his wife’s arms from me and guide her towards the door, “trying” being the word, as he fights with octopus limbs in a bid to coax her away. A lot of guests have departed already, and Leila is being taken home to pass out or get up to whatever they get up to when drunk and childless in an empty house for the night. I do not even want to know what my sister and her husband are into if I am being honest, the thought te
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“I deserve that and more, Sophie. My life is nothing without you. You have no idea how many times a day I think about you, how much it eats me up every second that I made you leave me. How much I just want you back in my life, even if I only get to be friends.” He’s still sniffing back tears, making my heart ache harder and I am trying so hard to hold myself together. Guilt adding itself onto the list of crazy feelings and emotions piling up in my head. I am close to hysteria and about as near the cliff of insanity as one can get before leaping off.“You didn’t make me leave you. You chose someone else and then told me to go. There is an enormous difference. You can’t undo that.” I throw back, my voice equally ravaged with raw pain and tears, so it hurts my throat, losing all the resolve to stay aggressive and angry and becoming more and more weak and childlike, reverting to fragility I rarely show. Body in defensive mode and mo
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Arrick moves into my mouth again, seemingly unable to stand the distance, kissing me as passionately as he can, hands ravaging my hair and throat in a bid to keep me close as humanly possible. I can’t withstand his kiss, how it makes me feel, from inside out, an ache and yearning, burning to an almost unbearable fever pitch. His tongue finds mine, pushing us further into the sort of kissing that leaves no misinterpretation to how much he wants to have sex with me. His hands moving down to cup my breast as he pushes against me, my work their way inside his shirt, unbuttoning as I go and revealing that expanse of hard naked torso and tattoos. He presses a knee between my thighs, the pressure making me writhe and grind back to him. We both know where this is heading, and I don’t even hesitate about whether I want it or not.He slides his leg further between my legs and moves in against me seductively teasing me sexually as his muscle rubs my softness. I let out a sof
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“Sophie … Sophie? Look at me, come back to me.” His soft voice brings me back to my senses and I realize my legs are closed, my tense body held rigidly and curled up in the fetal position. He’s not inside me anymore and somehow, I’m being cradled in his arms, my face turned away from him. Beside him and gasping for breath, his arms around my upper body as he holds me tight against him and strokes the hair back from my tear-stained face. “Just breathe, slow and steady. You’re safe, it’s me, it’s Arry. You’re safe with me.” I zone back in, realizing I am gripping his arm with deadly intent, my nails digging in, yet he doesn’t seem to care. My face is soaked, and I am so dizzy I can barely get my head together. I don’t know where I went, or for how long I went there, but the taste of blood in my mouth shocks me and I’m confused and scared. My whole body shivering
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I deserve it, I know I do, probably worse, it’s not even that painful but as I stare at her again, I can’t hide how much it actually wounded my heart. Sophie has lashed out at me before, sure, in crazy ways, frenzy fueled attacks when lost in her pain or triggered with her PTSD, but she’s never slapped me in the face for anything. This was a direct ‘how fucking dare you’ kind of assault that speaks volumes to the depths of the carnage I’ve caused on her soul.“You lost me. You don’t get to do that anymore.” She wails at me, pulling my hands and arms from her body and shoves me back with as much force as she can muster. Prickly, seething, hating me with utter crushing heartbreak. She’s breathing as heavily as I am although her pain and hysteria seem to be calming mine and I know I need to stay patient and cool if I’m going to bring her down from fierce.I know how to deal with her at her worst, I can hand
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Arrick’s POV~ Leila’s party ~Leila’s party is losing its sparkle for me. Too drunk, too miserable at having to see Sophs swanning around with golden boy Christian all night and I am done with being here. I’ve said my goodbyes to my brother and I’m leaving before I do something stupid I’m going to totally regret concerning ‘boyfriend’ and drag Sophs into a dark corner to kiss the shit out of her if I stay here. Seeing her looking this beautiful, this happy with someone else is killing me.I spy Sophs, Leila, and Daniel huddled together at the front door as I head that way, a little too late due to not watching where I was going and swerve at the last second before she spots me. My heart lurching at running into her again when I’m already a complete emotional wreck. Hating that even still, my initial reaction to seeing her is a swift kick in the gut. Almost keeling sideways because I am way too
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Arrick’s POV~ Seeing Sophie again. (Restaurant) ~I push the money in the driver’s hand as I follow Charlie and Tom out of the cab onto the sidewalk. I’m still tired from my three hours in the training ring and starving, it’s my turn to pay for lunch and I got to pick the venue. This place is new and no chance of Natasha hitting it with her colleagues on her lunch break either. I’ve been trying to put distance between us since the breakup, trying to stay out of her way and I hate that she has a knack for showing up wherever I am. It feels like she just won’t let go, and although I understand her pain at our breakup, it’s also stifling, and I just want her to move on. She won’t do that if she keeps trying to cling to me.“Hurry up, man.” Tom, my sparring partner today is impatient as hell and throwing me a look that is supposed to hurry me up. I straighten on the street and glare him down.
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It kills me that I can love her this much and was stupid enough to give that up, to give her up. It’s so black and white in the clear light of my brain defogging and how fucking dumb I am. It was never about what my heart wanted; it was always about what was best for everyone else’s.I don’t want Natasha; I don’t think I ever really did. I want Sophie. If I’m being honest then I’ve always wanted her, needed her. It’s why I could never ignore the two a.m. cries for help. It’s part of my soul to be there for her to fall on, to depend on, to call, and lean on. I grew up for her and became her rock, gave her that safe space to grow and heal and kept the world at bay so it didn’t touch her. I created our bubble together so Sophie could thrive and feel secure, enjoy life without fear and I always told myself it was because I never had a kid sister and she just screamed out for protection. So precious, so angelic and I wanted to
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Arrick’s POV~ Breaking up with Natasha ~Sitting on my couch, leaning forward with elbows propped on my knees, I stare at my cell for the millionth time and scroll to Sophie’s name on the list. Last call was twenty-eight days ago... twenty-eight long days of hell, silence, loneliness, and lack of Sophie. Twenty-eight days; the last time I felt anything but the constant absence of her and heavy pit in my stomach, from her disappearing in every single way, and leaving a gaping silent sunless space in my life.I’m missing her like crazy, keeping her last texts messages because it’s all I have left of her to hold on to. I scroll to the very last one, again. It’s a nothing text; I don’t even remember what it was in response too, as it’s not connected to the conversation before it. Just one single text, one that sums her up in so very few words and I stare at it as my chest heaves with that same ingrained weight
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Natasha’sPOV~ Life after Sophie ~I watch Arrick push his food around his plate distractedly, eyes on what he’s doing, yet he seems completely detached from the here and now. We’re in a busy restaurant, the food is good, the company not so much; he has barely said two words the whole time we have been here, and he has had about four beers with dinner so far.Arrick never drinks excessively, normally, but I guess this sums up our life of the past three weeks. I’m irritated, upset but I am trying to keep the pleasantries going. I am trying so hard to not let it get to me, to keep a smile on my face, a positive outlook that we can get through this bump in the road of our relationship, but he makes it so hard.I try not to watch him too much as I eat my own food and give up on small talk. His nods and ‘hmm’ responses make me want to throw my wine glass at him, and I am trying to avoid all forms of naggi
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Arrick’s POV~ Letting Sophie go ~I lay on my bed staring at the ceiling of my room. I haven’t moved from this spot all night, still fully dressed and unable to even get up and function. The weight in my chest is almost holding me in place, crushing me with the pain, and I can’t stop running last night through my mind endlessly. I’m restless, torn, scrunching my fingers in my hair like I can rip this out of my head. The worst sort of agony that surpasses all.I want to go to her room and see her, but I can’t. I can’t get her out of my head, even though she is only feet away and it’s torturing me.I kissed Sophie... I did more than kiss her, and it felt good, it felt right. It made me feel a thousand things about her that I can’t even begin to analyze, comprehend how to, and all it did was make everything fall apart even more than it was, especially when Natasha showed up and slapped me back to
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Arrick’s POV~ After the nightclub ~I sink back on the couch and stare into the semi darkness, cradling my second coffee since we got back here, and try like hell to sober myself up. Head swimming and sinking slowly into the softness of my couch, while trying to get a grip on reality. All I have done since we got home is sit here and try to pull all the shit in my head back together. Try to make sense of the entire night that pretty much went to crap from the moment I downed the first vodka.Drink and I are not friends right now, and if I have any chance of salvaging anything, then I need to sober up fast. Sophie is in the shower, she headed there as soon as we got back, and I sat here waiting for her. I need to talk to her, to figure some of this out and I have no clue what to do. Tonight, taught me a couple of things.One. That drunk, I feel about Sophie the way she feels about me and I want her in every way; physically, menta
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Sophie grabs my wrist and tries to yank me to the side, but I cannot tear my eyes from her. I want to tell her I made a mistake, that she is who I want, that she is all I can even think about. I want to wipe away the memory of that asshole on her body, and replace it with memories of kissing her softly, cherishing her always. No one should ever touch her, except me.“Natasha.” She snaps at me and slaps my hands down from her face harshly, bringing my focus back to reality again. I tear my eyes from her and glance up as I see Tasha heading our way, looking completely non-plussed and again the accompanying guilt is like a constant shadow with her, and wracks me to the bone and almost smashes me in the skull. Nothing hits home and drills to my shame brain, like Natasha’s appearance.It makes me feel shit for even thinking what I just did. That same doubt and uncertainty hitting me with equal force, and I sigh hard. So much for fucking choosing.&l
