Work In Progress (Red Lipstick Coalition #3) - Staci Hart Page 0,123

long moment, he said nothing. I watched as his hand passed over his face, fingers pressing into his eyes. Cupping his mouth. Testing the bridge of his nose.

The breath he took shuddered with barely restrained fury. “You lied to me.”

“Tommy, I never lied to you,” I breathed.

“But you did.” The words were so still, so hard. “The second you wrote about me, put my secrets, my life on paper, and handed it to Janessa, you betrayed me. Keeping it from me was its own lie.”

“I didn’t mean to leave them with her, but I was s-so upset and…Tommy, I swear, I was going to tell you as soon as you were finished with the book.” A rush of tears, my nose stinging, throat tight. “I-I didn’t want you to worry, and I thought…I thought I could find a way to fix it. I was trying to protect you, not hurt you. Because if I didn’t write this story, someone like Vivienne would. Someone who would hurt you. I would never hurt you. Never.”

“Never intentionally,” he amended. “I know you didn’t intend to hurt me. You didn’t intend to break my trust. But you did.”

My breath hitched, a tear slipping from my lashes to fall to my skirt, too heavy to roll.

He was a hundred miles away, the road between us crumbling with every breath. “Never once did I ever question you. Never once did it even cross my mind that you would lie to me. You married me under the promise of a job, and still, I trusted you completely.”

My brows were knit together so tight, my whole face bent. “Tommy, I don’t care about the job. I did it for you. The article was meant to help you, and—”

“That article was never for me. It was for you. But what’s worse than knowing you were plotting with Janessa? I had to learn the truth from fucking Vivienne Thorne.”

“Vivienne?” I whispered, trying to piece it together.

“She came here when you were gone to let me know exactly what you were doing. And I was naive enough to think she was lying. That all she wanted was to get between us.”

My hands were stiff and foreign in my lap. I looked down at them, not recognizing them. “She’s writing an article about you for Janessa,” I said, staring through my fingers. “They’re in it together.”

A sharp inhale through his nose as he scrubbed a hand over his mouth. “Goddammit, Amelia. If you had trusted me, we could have headed this off. If you’d been honest with me, I wouldn’t have gotten blindsided. Coming from you, I could have handled the truth. But coming from her?” He flung a hand at the door. “You should have fucking told me, Amelia.”

“I’m sorry,” I said through my tears, flowing freely. “I’m so sorry.” I reached for his hand.

But he jerked it away, standing with enough speed and force to nearly knock me back. The pain in his voice was acute, a barb aimed at my heart. “I believe you. I know that you’re sorry, and I know you wouldn’t deliberately betray me. But you gave the enemy the blueprints of my life. You kept it all from me—the blackmail, her deceit. You went around me when it’s my life on the line. Now she has it all, and we both know she’ll use it. I’ve been betrayed like this before, but I never thought it would be you. This is my bruise, Amelia. This is my deep, dark bruise, and you just pressed it.”

“Tommy, please,” I cried gently. “I love you.”

“I know that. I do,” he said, emotion shaking his voice. “But I’m too fucking hurt to be reasonable.” He turned his back on me, striding across the room, chewing through the space like a prowling animal.

For a moment, I sat stupidly on the coffee table, unable to parse what was happening. “W-where are you going?”

He paused, glancing over his shoulder with betrayal touching every beautiful line of his face. “To Chicago. Without you.”

My breath skipped, my heart aching so deeply, I pressed my palm to it. “Is this the end?”

The vision of him blurred beyond the curtain of tears, but when I blinked, they cleared. And in that briefest of moments, I saw his regret, his love, his longing. But he shook his head, looking away.

“No. But I need time, space. We’ll talk when I get back.”

He disappeared into his room, slamming the door behind him. And I was left alone with my