"I don't know. She got here literally right before you—"
"Why didn't you tell her to leave?"
"I—" He turned back to look at Fran. "I'll tell her right now."
Cara shook her head. "Did you tell her there was nothing left between you two?"
"No, I didn't think about her. I just wanted to move on—" He stopped his explanation and held her eyes, searching. "You don't trust me."
A heavy sigh came from her chest, and she shook her head. "I don't trust you."
He dropped her hand. His arms hung down his sides, pulling his shoulders and head down with them. "What can I do?"
Get a fucking time machine.
"I think if you were serious about me, Fran would know by now that things are completely over between you two."
"I only told Maria—"
"If you were serious about me, Maria would know by now that things are completely over between you and Fran."
"I…" Antonio trailed off, shaking his head.
"You talked to Maria about Fran yesterday," Cara said, her voice betraying her sadness.
Antonio took a deep breath to steady himself. "Blake came in and said he was going to break up with her. I only told Maria because Blake was being a dick, not because I wanted something to happen between me and Fran."
Cara nodded and pulled in an unsteady breath, desperate now to stop the tears.
"Soyou were worried about howFranwould feel about Blake mistreating her, but you didn't think about howIwould feel being mistreated byyou?"
Antonio's jaw dropped. Cara was pretty sure he'd have been less shocked if she punched him and broke his nose.
"That's not…" he drifted off, as if finally seeing things from her point of view, and not liking it. He sagged slightly and shook his head. His face showed his grief.
"I hate that I mistreated you," he said, his voice catching.
"Yeah, me, too."
He dropped his eyelids and shook his head. "I want to fix this."
The tears Cara was holding back ran freely down once again, and she turned away from him, forcing her feet forward. She pulled open the door and took a step out but couldn't resist glancing back for a split second.
When she saw him standing there, shellshocked and broken in the hallway, her heart cracked the rest of the way.
She should have known better than to get involved with him. She should have listened to everyone around her when they told her not to trust him.
She shook her head and left. Never again.
twenty-six
Antonio looked at his feet as Cara walked away. He couldn't bear to watch it happen. Of all the worst-case scenarios he'd imagined would happen that day, he never considered that Cara would break things off with him and walk away.
How could she think he was more worried about Fran than about her? Cara was all he thought about. For weeks, she occupied his mind.
He hadn't even spoken to Fran until she'd showed up out of the blue. He thought he'd done the right thing by giving her a heads up about Blake. Hadn't he?
He finally snapped out of it and marched toward the door. Maybe he could stop Cara and somehow convince her that he was being honest.