Page 109 of Surprise! I'm Engaged To My Boss
“All this what?”
“Being Alice's father. Who am I kidding? I can't be a good father to her, just as I can't be a good husband to you.”
What? But what was he talking about?
“Of course you can, Michael.”
“Oh, can I? Do you have any idea of the dangers Alice faced? How can I know that it wasn’t really someone who wanted to hurt me? And what about you, Camila? They put drugs in your drink twice when you were with me. And as for that guy at the bar, God only knows what he might have tried to do to you if he had managed to get you.”
“But he didn't.”
“But he could have. And what about the bar videos? If they leak online, what kind of things will people say about you? And your grandmother, Cami? Imagine Jenna having to deal with people saying mean things about her granddaughter, whom she loves so much. You've already put up with enough mean comments here at the office. Today you got into a fight with someone. You said yourself that you've never experienced anything like that before.”
“I can handle all of that.”
“But I don't want you to have to deal with it. Not if I can help it.”
“And what are you going to do to avoid it? Are you going to break up with me?”
He paused, which seemed to shatter my heart into a thousand pieces. It was proof that, yes, he had considered it.
“I can't let you go through this, Cami...”
“How aboutIdecide what I'm willing to go through or not?”
He didn't respond, and that made my sadness turn to anger. I could accept that he wanted to break up with me if he had a plausible reason for it. But toprotectme? I could perfectly decide what I wanted to be protected from and what I didn't.
“We can end things if you say you don't love me. Other than that, I won't let you give up on me or Alice.”
“I'm not giving up on you, Cami. I'm just deciding what's best for you.”
“The best thing for me is to stay with the man I love. And the best thing for Alice is to be raised by her father and not by nannies hired by her grandparents who don't even dedicate any time to her.”
“Is this really the best thing to do, Camila? Look at me. I'm a fraud! And I haven't stopped bringing problems into your life since I arrived. You would be much better off if you hadn't met me. Maybe we both would be, in fact.”
I was suddenly speechless at that last statement. It hurt me like a knife being punched into my heart.
“If that's what you think...” was all I could say.
I grabbed my bag and walked to the door, leaving him behind, hoping he would call me. That he would say he said it without thinking, that he would ask me to talk more... But he didn't do any of that. He didn't say a single word, and I knew he really wanted me to leave.
So, with my bleeding heart, I did his bidding.
Chapter Fifty-One
CAMILA
My grandmother had been staying late at the bookstore, excited about planning the renovations. That day, I was very grateful for that, because I would hate for her to see me come home in that state and ask me what happened.
How could I explain what I alone was unable to understand?
I went straight to my room, followed by Waffle. I changed his water, cleaned his litter box, and put food in his bowl, but he didn't care about any of these things and just came to the bed where I lay down, lying down next to me. It was like he somehow understood that I wasn't okay.
“Humans are so confusing, Waffle...” I blurted, stroking the hair on the back of his neck. “I believe, or want to believe, that he said that horrible thing just to push me away, but... it hurt so much.”
The cell phone in my bag, which I had thrown on the floor next to the bed, rang. I didn't have the energy to answer it.
“If it's him... I'm so angry, I don't want to say anything right now, or I risk saying something stupid. Do you see, Waffle, how confusing humans are?”
