Page 49 of The Love Dare
Her bag is eighty percent packed when she hears a commotion outside the door. Deep voices. Pounding feet. The thunder draws closer, until?—
“Winnie!”
It’s Tyler.
He must’ve noticed her absence from the party downstairs.
She hardens herself against the pull that’s always there.
“Get out of my way,” he demands. Something slams against the wall with athud. Indiscriminate mumbles follow. Then Tyler, clear as day in a voice as hard as steel, says, “If you don’t open that door right now, I swear to god, I will break it down.”
The knob turns.
Aclickfills the sudden silence.
The door swings open.
Tyler takes one look at her face, which she is sure must be stained with two runny black lines, and mutters, “Fuck.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
tyler
He’sacross the room in an instant, falling to his knees beside her. He cradles her cheeks in his hands and dips his thumbs beneath her glasses to swipe at the wetness. Black mascara smears across her creamy skin. He hates this. It’s not the first time he’s dried her tears, but it is the first time he’s known with a hundred percent certainty that he’s the cause of them, and it breaks his fucking heart.
The producers have been playing him like a goddamn fiddle. They still are. He can feel them hovering behind him, capturing the scene they shoehorned him into making on film.
Every day he demanded to see her, and every day they responded with empty promises as they paraded some other woman in front of him. Six times he’s shown up to the mini-dates, expecting her to be waiting, and six times they’ve denied him. They excluded her from the group date, they canceled the stupid cocktail party where he could’ve pulled her for a conversation, and he knows they were the reason she showed up to the rink forty-five minutes after all the other girls. For the past six days, he and Winnie have been separated by nothing more than a hundred yards of grass, but the guesthouse might aswell be Alcatraz. They tell him where to go and when. He has no control, no say, no input. And it’s past time to mount an escape.
He’s done.
Tyler captures her gaze. “I’m getting you out of here.”
It’s the exact wrong thing to say.
Pain lances through her eyes before her gaze drops to her suitcase.
“I know, Ty. I know. That’s why I was packing. It’s time for me to go home. I get why you didn’t, but you should have just been honest with me the first day. It would have hurt less. I was prepared for the rejection. I?—”
“No, Win.” He grips the back of her head and tugs on her hair to angle her face up, forcing her to look at him. “I meant you and me—we—are both leaving. Together. We’re having a one-on-one date.”
“A one-on-one date?”
“Yes.”
“Now?”
“Yes.”
“But it’s the puzzle ceremony.”
“I don’t give a shit.”
“I don’t understand.”
Tyler drops his forehead to hers with a groan, wishing she could just for one second peek inside his brain and understand everything he’s been feeling for the past few days, the past few years, the past decade. But she can’t. So he finally has to find the words to tell her, right here, right now, before he loses her forever.
“I love you,” he blurts, the words so trite, so inadequate, he’s frustrated with himself. “I can’t even tell you how long I’ve been waiting to say that to you, but now that I have, it sounds so lame. I wish I was the type of guy who could write a sonnet for you, who could explain this to you in the way you deserve, withbeautiful words that would convey every ounce of how I feel. But I’m not. And I can’t, so I won’t even try. I’ll just say it again, because it feels so fucking good to finally say it out loud. I love you. I am so in love with you, Winnie. I’ve thought it a thousand times, and I thought about telling you a thousand more. And I’m so sorry it’s taken me this long to say. I have so much to explain, but I don’t want to do it here, with everyone watching. Which is why I want to leave, on a one-on-one date, if you’ll agree to come with me.”
