Our Broken Pieces - M.E. Clayton Page 0,48

was scared. But, more importantly, I left because I refused to be the reason your life was ruined. And you let me go because you’re nothing but a liar!”

I was on her before my mind could fully process what I was doing. I had her slammed up against the wall, my fingers digging into the flesh of her arms. The thud of her body hitting the door could be heard throughout the apartment.

I knew my mind wasn’t right. I knew, in this moment, I was a danger to myself and anyone dumb enough to get in my way, but I didn’t care. I was damaged enough not to fucking care. However, if Mystic was telling the truth…

“I never lied to you,” I raged through clenched teeth. “Never.”

Her eyes were watering, but those were tears of pure, unadulterated rage. “Did you, or did you not look for me beyond those two weeks, Gage?”

We both knew the answer to that question.

We both knew the truth.

And it was a truth that was going to change everything.

Chapter 27

Mystic~

I was angry.

I was angry and hurt.

I may have hurt him, but he’s the one who had let me go.

He had let me down, and I’ve been suffering for it for ten goddamn years.

The horrible part about it all? With his hands digging painfully into my arms, I didn’t care about how much I had hurt him or how much he had ruined me. Just like in the conference room at CI, I was catapulted back to that fateful day in the park restroom.

The day that, the boy I feared, had taken what he wanted from me and I had fallen in love with him for it. The day where fear and desire had warred with one another to create a bond forged in vehement fire. Violence had become my religion, and Gage was the temple where I had worshipped.

And staring up at this beautiful, broken, enraged man, I was ready to drop to my knees and rediscover my lost faith. His hands were going to leave bruises and my core soaked my underwear with the knowledge.

This was the hell that embroiled drug addicts, alcoholics, and gamblers. The struggle of knowing something was wrong and unhealthy but being too weak and powerless to walk away from it. Because, even though I’d been the one to leave all those years ago, Gage was the one who had ended us.

“What was I supposed to do?” he asked, regret lacing each word. “You vanished, Mystic. You vanished and everyone close to you told me you left by choice.”

This bastard.

“Since when had you ever given me a choice, Gage,” I tossed back. “That afternoon in the park restroom? Any time after that? The night of Margot’s birthday party? All of a sudden, you believed I was making choices without you.” I got in his face because I was done carrying this burden. “You walked away from us. Not me.”

His hands tightened around my arms and he shook me a bit. “If I’m the one who walked away, then why haven’t I been able to go a day without thinking of you?” he barked. “If I’m the one who ended us, why can’t I fuck another woman without imagining your face on her body?”

That stung.

I knew Gage was too much of an alpha male to go ten years without sleeping with another woman, but I didn’t want to hear about it. Granted, I hadn’t kept my legs closed these past ten years, but this was all about perception. He had blocked me from his life.

He had.

So, while the sex had been unfulfilling, I still never felt guilty over it. Sure, I had felt guilty that I couldn’t enjoy as much as I had led my partner to believe, but I never felt guilty for trying to move on, even if I knew it would be near to impossible. My celibacy, now, was out of unfulfillment, not because of Gage Evans.

And because I didn’t want to be the only one dancing on the edges of this hell alone, I got petty and vindictive. “Trust me when I tell you that you are the one who ended it. If you hadn’t, I would never have been able to move on and get underneath the next guy.”

Gage’s hand snaked out and circled my neck and squeezed. Did I think he was capable of strangling me to death? Yes. Did I think he would? I wasn’t sure. Was I scared that he would? No. Was I