Running his hands through his hair desperately, with wide panicked eyes, he’d asked for a chance to let him explain. “Rosebud, please! Just hear me out. I had no choice. I couldn’t let you ruin your life waiting for me. Trust me, I’d never wanted anyone else in my life the way I’d wanted you. You were my everything. You still are.”

“And that’s why you wanted me away?” My vision was blurry with tears. “Now I’ll make your wish come true for real this time. I’ll go so far away from you that you’ll never be able to reach!”

He’d watched me as if he’d been stabbed. But the pain in his eyes couldn’t surpass the one I held in my heart at that moment. Ignoring his calls and pleadings, I’d turned away from him and ran away from there. From the man I never knew would hurt me this way.

More tears fell from my eyes, my throat tightened, causing me gasp for air. My nails dug into my palms as I cried my heart out. But the burn inside me didn’t go away.

I love you…

I closed my eyes, not being able to withstand the squeeze that shot through my chest. The words he whispered to me just before I left him last night still rang in my ears.

I hate you! I hate you, Achilles Valencian! For fucking up my life in this way!

“Thank God, Em! You finally picked up your phone! That obsessed man of yours is blowing off my cell phone since last night!” Cassie huffed through the line. “I called Tess. I know what happened.” Her tone softened.

I stayed quiet, closing my eyes.

“Though I had to literally plead her to tell me everything. Trust me, I wanted to kill that sister of yours and that idiot man when I knew what they did to you. Fucking pricks!” she cursed some profanities. “By the way, the way he’s blowing up my phone just to get even a little news of you, I’m wondering how he’s not already barging into your house to see you right now.”

With my jaw tight, I threw the huge teddy on the floor from my bed. I didn’t need it anymore. “He tried to last night. But I informed the watchman to tell him if he even tries to do anything to get into the house following me, he won’t see my face ever again.”

I knew he’d follow me and try to talk to me. So I’d already given the watchman my message to deliver to him. And to my surprise, he didn’t cross my set line. Instead, he’d waited outside my house, right beneath my window. Though I didn’t know he was there the whole night.