Neither one of us says a word the entire way home. I sit quietly, staring out the window as lights and shadows whip past, jaw set in an angry clench, one hand fisted around the little black clutch I brought along. The other toying with the necklace Patrick gave me last night.

He bought my paintings. All of them.

Any other girl would see it as some grand, romantic gesture. A year ago, I would’ve been one of them. But I spent the better part of a year fighting tooth and nail for my independence—making myself believe that I’m enough. Patrick buying those paintings feels like a slap in the face.

Like a big, fat no you aren’t.

I half expect him to drop me off on the curb and leave, but he doesn’t. He parks and gets out. Circling the front of the car, he pulls my door open and offers me a hand, and I take it because this dress is too short and these heels are too high to make a graceful exit on my own.

As soon as I’m out of the car, I pull my hand free and lift my chin. “Thank you,” I say because my mother raised me to have manners.

“You’re welcome,” he answers, his tone thick with sarcasm.

Rather than start screaming in the street, I wait quietly for him to unlock the security door and pull it open, motioning me inside. As soon as I’m in, I turn, reaching for the keys. All I want is for him to leave so I can change my clothes and go to bed.

He makes it clear I won’t be getting what I want anytime soon when he palms the keys and slams the door shut behind us both. Without explanation, he strides down the hallway, taking the stairs, two at a time, leaving me little choice but to follow.

When I get to the top of the stairs, I find the door standing wide open. Slamming it shut, I stomp my way through the laundry room, stopping short when I spot him in the kitchen. He’s got his jacket unbuttoned, tie yanked loose, top button on his collar undone. Leaning against the counter, he’s drinking a bottle of water, and it’s so normal, so Patrick, that for a moment, it’s like the last year and a half never happened.

But it did happen. All of it.

And for better or worse, it’s changed us both.

Maybe too much.

On the counter he’s leaning against, I see the tulips he brought me, and I have this distinct feeling of being caught in the past while being unceremoniously shoved into an unknown future. I don’t like the way it feels. Like things are happening and changing and if I don’t move fast enough, hold on tight enough, I’m going to be left behind.

“I’d like you to leave,” I say, unbuttoning my coat.

“No.”

No. The word, delivered in a conversational tone, stops me short. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me just fine.” He straightens himself from his slouch and turns just enough to set his half-drained water bottle on the counter. “But I’ll say it again—no. No. I’m not leaving. No. You’re not leaving.” He looks at me, his green gaze steady and unwavering. “Not this time.”

That’s when I realize he’s just as angry as I am.

Maybe even angrier.

“When I asked you what you bought with the money from Sara’s father, you said stuff.” I throw my arms up, shaking my head. “Stuff!”

“So?”

“So?” I say, crossing my arms over my chest. “So, you had no right, Patrick.”

“I had the money,” he says, shrugging casually before tipping his water bottle to his mouth again. “They were for sale.” He looks at me, his jaw tight. “That gave me the right.”

“Those were my paintings,” I shout. “They were mine.”

“They weren’t yours,” he shoots back. “You got rid of them.”

My mouth hangs open for a moment, no sound coming out. How can I argue with that? To anyone looking at the situation from the outside, that’s exactly how it would look. Because when you don’t want something, that’s what you do. You sell it. Get rid of it.

“I didn’t need you to buy them,” I say, totally ignoring what he just said. “I’m an artist, and a damn good one. I can make it on my own. I don’t need you to rescue me.”

“You think I don’t know that?” He looks at me like he can’t believe what I just said. “That I haven’t always known that?”

“Then why?” I ask, flinging my arms in the air. “What other reason could you have had for buying them?”

He shrugs. “I bought them because I could,” he says, his tone calm and casual again.

I look at him standing in front of me, in his five-thousand-dollar suit and his platinum cufflinks, leaning against the granite counter in his gourmet kitchen inside his luxury apartment and I have that feeling again. The feeling that I’m looking at a stranger.

And that scares me.

“Who are you?” I say, shaking my head. “What happened to you?”

“What happened to me?” he says it on a laugh, shoving a rough hand through his hair. “You happened. And then you left.”

“Fuck you, Patrick.” Now I do scream, my fists balled up in frustration, chest, and neck so hot, I feel like I’m on fire. “Fuck you. Fuck your car. Fuck your fancy suit and your expensive aftershave.” I lift my hands and wave them wildly. “Fuck this apartment and your goddamn cufflinks.” I’m not making sense. I know that. A small part of me recognizes the fact that I’m teetering on the edge of hysteria. And that part of myself welcomes the insanity.

He lifts his water bottle, taking a drink as if considering my outburst as anything other than utter nonsense. “The aftershave was a Christmas gift from my mom—” He tilts his head. “I think we can both agree it’s better than the robe.”

“You think this is funny?” I rake a hand through my hair.

“No,” he says, his jaw tightening around the word. “This isn’t funny at all.”

“Finally, we agree,” I say, swiping my hand over my face, annoyed with myself when they come away wet. “You can’t buy me, Patrick. I’m not for sale.”

“Excuse me?”

I don’t know where that came from. What I meant by it but I can tell from the look on Patrick’s face that my words hit their mark. “Where are they?” I demand. “Where are my paintings? I want them back.”

“They aren’t yours,” he informs me. “I bought them. They’re mine.” He comes at me. Before I can even think to move, he’s in front of me, close enough to touch. “But if you want to see them, I’m more than happy to show them to you.” His fingers close over my wrist as he moves past me, moving deeper into the apartment, pulling me along in his wake.

“Because you’re a nice guy?” The dig slips out before I can stop it and it stiffens his shoulders.

“I am a nice guy,” he shoots back, pulling up short in front of a door. “Until I’m not.” He pulls my keys from his pocket and jams one into the lock, giving it a vicious twist. “And you know what?” He turns the knob and pushes the door open. The room beyond it is dark. “Right now, I’m not.” He jerks on my wrist, all but tosses me inside.

Standing there, letting my eyes adjust to the dark, shapes pull themselves from the gloom, and I feel my chest tighten. Familiar shapes. My chair. My dresser. My paintings.

Our bed.

“The car is a lease.” I turn to see him standing in the doorway, his face cast in shadow as he casually shrugs out of his suit jacket. “I don’t have many occasions to drive it but I take the opportunity when I can because as it turns out, I like to drive fast.” Jacket off, he folds it and sets it on my old dresser. “The suit is from the Bostonian magazine shoot.” He bends his arm, working a cufflink loose from his shirt. “Boston Chamber of Commerce picked up the tab—I kept it because it was a gift.” He gets rid of the cufflink with a haphazard toss, and it lands on top of his jacket. “But I wear it because it looks goddamn good on me.” He flashes me a grin, working on the other cufflink. “So good, I bought three more, just like it.

“When you left, I lost my fucking mind.” Second cufflink loose, he tosses it next to its partner. “I moved out. Thought maybe I’d rent the place out, but that meant I had to repair the bathroom after your little pyro routine and once I swung my sledgehammer into the wall, I just kept swinging because tearing this place apart was the only thing that kept me together,” he says, shoulder leaned against the jam. “I wanted it gone. All of it. Every square inch of this place because it’s where I had you and lost you and I couldn’t be here without feeling like I was coming apart at the seams.

“I saved this room for last.” Face tipped down, he folds the cuff of his sleeve, rolling it with slow, deliberate turns, revealing the scar, raised and bright pink, against the skin of his forearm. “It was going to be cathartic, tearing it down. It was going to help me move on.” He starts on the second sleeve, looking up at me, his gaze unreadable. “Must’ve brought my sledge in here fifty times, intent on finishing it but I couldn’t. So, I locked the door and left.”

We’re standing in my old bedroom.

“I want—”

“Those paintings aren’t yours.” He says, coming toward me. Circling me slowly. “I already told you—I bought them. They’re mine.”

He’s standing behind me now, so close I can feel the heat of him. I close my eyes and feel myself sway slightly. The sudden absence of anger has left me more than a little punch-drunk. I never considered how my selling those paintings would make him feel. I never even asked.

“Patrick...” I whisper his name a moment before I feel his hands close over my shoulders, pulling me against him.

“I don’t have to buy you, Cari,” he says in my ear, his hands slide down my shoulders, my arms, until they reach my hips. “You’re already mine.” he murmurs against my neck, fingers digging into the dress fabric that covers my hips, dragging it slowly up the length of my thighs. “And I’m going to prove it to you.”