Page 62 of Raising Love
“Rushing out but didn’t want to rush the other night.”
His eyes locked on mine.
My eyes were watering, and I was trying like hell to keep the tears in, but it’s like I said—I don’t hook up. So of course, I would fucking cry over this.
God!
Leo took one look at me, and his chest seemed to cave in.
“Fuck,” he whispered. “Ivy, please don’t fucking cry right now, man. Not over this shit.”
“If it was just sex,” I whispered. “Why did you want it to last?”
It was so quiet after I asked my question.
“If it didn’t mean anything of significance, why did you want to take your time?”
“‘Cause you felt good, Ivy. Okay?” He closed his eyes briefly, exhaling sharply. “Really good. But that’s all that it was. Good sex. Nothing more. Nothing less. Please, just…”
I stared at him, feeling my heart crack.
“We were adults who got carried away… twice,” he added. “Adults doing adult things. That’s it.”
“That’s it?” I questioned, my eyes darting across his face.
He looked away.
“Because, Leo?—”
“Let’s just… focus on Baby Love, like we’ve been doing,” he spoke over me. “Like you said we should.”
I closed my mouth in reaction, stunned silent.
“Let’s not complicate things any further with this, aight?”
I released a scoffing laugh, quickly drying my eyes while sniffing back the ones that wanted to fall.
He sighed, closing the distance between us.
“No.” I shook my head, stepping back from him. “Just fucking go.”
“Ivy—”
“You know what?” I turned to snatch open his door. “I’ll go.”
“Ivy, wait,” he said behind me as I took large steps back to my room. “Hold on a second.”
But before he could add anything more, I was in my room, slamming my door and locking it. I pressed my back to the door, slapped my hand to my mouth, and held back as much sound from my crying as I could.
“Ivy,” Leo said on the other side of my door, knocking softly. “Come on, open the door.”
I shook my head, doing my best to quietly suck back my cries, keeping my hand firmly against my mouth.
“Ivy, open the door,” he said softly, his voice sounding like he was flush against the surface. “Please.”
I inhaled a deep breath and pushed myself off the door. Instead of opening it, I walked away, heading to my bathroom and closing that door too.
There was nothing left to say. He made it very clear. And if he were feeling something but simply didn’t want to say it, I didn’t like that shit either.
