Chapter 85

I stand for the longest time in the kitchen area of the lower floor, knowing I’m delaying the inevitable. Alexi is upstairs, barging around like a crazed panther and looking to take it out on the person who publicly disobeyed and humiliated him. I can almost visualise him in all his vicious glory. Caged, wild and ferocious while his family try to contain the eruption.

We were to be a secret… I have made that impossible now.

I feel like I can’t breathe, lungs constricted and wrapped in chains. My body is heavy, running cold with the profound acceptance that this will only end badly for me, and I can’t stop shivering. I’m so jittery. Avoiding him is delaying what I deserve but facing him is a fate worse than death.

I need air; I need space; I need solitude. My head is spinning a million miles an hour, and the pain from his ‘date’ revelation is numbing out as logic and sense filter through to give me a massive shake. Regret replaces anger for what I did; apprehension