“I saw you lose control with Gage! I saw who you are with him and I don’t fear that! Why would you want me, hold yourself back when you can be yourself with him? It’s because you don’t want it. You won’t kiss me, you won’t fuck me. You used me but didn’t possess me. You don’t want me. You paid my debt and wanted to protect me. I appreciate it, but there’s no need to play that game anymore.”
He shook his head, water streaming over his face caught up in anger. Tessa knew she was pushing him, but something had snapped inside her, and hurt overtook reasoning. “You think I’m so detached. You want to heal me? Doctor, there is nothing in me to be healed. You want my cock, I can give it to you, over and over, until you beg me to stop. You want my heart? I don’t have one. Don’t consider what I did to stop Luther was something honorable. I made that promise to my mother. You want to know why?”
The more he spoke, the more his fury engulfed him. Tessa felt for him, and she suspected that his anger was only a symptom of something so painful, it had a direct impact on his life, why he craved control and couldn’t help but detach himself from anybody and everybody.
“If I had that control you detest, I wouldn’t have succumbed to anger when my mother tried to prevent me from falling into the underground world. I was so consumed with money and power, so tired of being poor and miserable that I fucking didn’t care if I broke her heart, even worse, that I was putting her in danger. They used her as leverage to control me. Still, I was so full of myself, I was blind and thought they would never dare. They did.”
Tessa saw Locke vibrating in front of her, rivulets of rain tracing his hard body, steam coming off him.
“They did, right in front of me. She suffered her entire life, escaped it to protect me and I forced her back into it. I might as well have killed her myself! And you know what, I did!”
Searching for her words, Tessa wasn’t sure what she could say. “You were a teenager. A kid.”
“I knew better!” Now, snarling at her, Locke was coming undone right in front of her. “I don’t need a savior. Keep your fucking advice. What do you know of me? Not a fucking thing!”
Tessa was desperate to find a way to reach him. “Locke, you have to stop. You are not a monster, you helped those girls. You care about Gage. You helped me. Nobody who is all evil would do that.”
Those sea-green irises turned into darkening holes. “I wanted to take Luther down. That was my only goal, the only way to avenge my mother. Gage is a tool. And you were a tool too, one that ultimately helped me. And if you’re referring to what happened between us, you were an opportunity. A commodity, helping me save money and time searching for a whore who would have done a way better job.”
The words were like a slap in the face. Stunned she felt as if she was outside her body. And beyond the pain, Tessa realized at that instant that she cared for him, deeper than she’d ever felt for anyone before. But she still had enough self-respect to not let herself be trampled by someone who didn’t want her. If Locke meant what he’d said, there was no reason to fight for him any longer.
Locke stood there, soaked and magnificent, with eyes so detached, it was if there had never been any life in them. Without waiting any longer, Tessa went toward the stairs and made her way down. Inside, she grabbed a pair of shoes and stole one of Locke’s coats before heading to the emergency stairwell. With the power outage, the door was blessedly unlocked. Once outside the building, alone in the dark street and huddled in a coat smelling like the man who never wanted her, she disappeared into the night.
