I gulped down the sudden lump in my throat. "I'll look into it."
"You need to protect the things you love, because if you don't you could lose it all in the blink of an eye."
Stefan worked in security, so I wanted to believe that was all this conversation was about. However, I wasn't so naïve to trust that the safety of my store was what we were talking about. I had to bite down on my quivering lip to keep myself from falling apart while every past tragedy passed between us.
"That's a very valid point." I hated my lame response, but I just couldn't get myself to say more.
"You created something to be proud of, Greyson Rose. Put a security system on it to keep all your assets and property safe and secure."
"I promise I'll get something in place." He stared at me for a moment before nodding, and heading out toward the dumpster.
I double checked that the door was locked, released a pent up sigh, and made my way toward Stefan. He tossed the bag into the dumpster and turned back to face me. When our eyes met, I knew the time had come to face it all. In a single moment, his walls came down and I saw before me those tearstained eyes and look of absolute terror. My throat burned as I tried to keep the incoming tears back, and the control in my appearance.
He shook his head and opened his mouth to speak. Nothing came out. He snapped it shut, ran his hands over his face and when our eyes met, he tried again.
"I miss you, Grey, so much. I have been an absolute fucking wreck since you left. Everything you said to me in my office I deserved, and I know I shouldn't be given another chance." Cautiously he closed the space between us, shaking his head even more. "But I have to have a place in your world."
"Stefan-" He lifted his hand to my lips as there was no more room between us.
"Don't just tell me to go. Don't tell me to forget you, or us."
Screaming at him in his office had been almost unbearable but compared to this-it had been a cake walk. This was unequivocally tragic and we had only just begun.
"Stefan, it isn't that simple."
"Yes it is. Just tell me you're not going to toss me from your life, now that I just became a piece of it."
"It's too much, Stefan."
His hands reached out and took my upper arms in his grasp. "It isn't! Let me be there for you. Give me the chance to make this right, Greyson Rose."
Tears rolled past my barrier. When I stared into Stefan's face, I saw tears of his own forming.
"This isn't going to happen, it can't."
"Says who??"
Blinking away the tears I answered, "Me. We had our time and that has come to pass. I'm eng-" Stefan cut me off with a finger over my lips.
"I know you are, but please, just don't say it."
"Why now? You say you wanted to find me, but you never did. It has been six years since we signed the papers and suddenly you can't move on."
A flame ignited within those sad blues and in an instant we were moving backward until my back was pressed against the salon's brick wall.
"I can't believe you honestly don't understand! You have failed to realize that it wasn't like I saw you on the street and decided I'd pursue you again. I have wondered about you every goddamn day, since the fucking second you came into my life. That hasn't changed!"
My tears, frustration, and years of suffering were all boiling to the surface and I couldn't hold it in anymore. "So why could you say goodbye to me then, but not now!?"
His hands smacked the wall on either side of my head, keeping me locked in his space. "Because I never said goodbye!" He yelled out. Our chests heaved in and out rapidly as our passion mixed with our pain.
"You signed the papers, Stefan!! How much more of a goodbye did you expect?!"
"I was able to walk away and deal with life, because in my heart I knew I'd find you again. I knew more was meant for us. So I started putting myself back together and began working every day to become someone that would make you proud. When I saw you again, I knew it was time to get you back! I never imagined you would be engaged, and it didn't take me long to see that whatever connection we had was holding on by a single fraying string."
He took a breath, carefully moving his face closer. Making me yearn for his skin to brush against mine. While at the same time I needed him to back away, so I could attempt to breathe again without taking in his intoxicatingly familiar scent.
"When you yelled at me in my office and walked away, I knew it was all ending. Turning my back on you was easy when I believed, deep down, that we would find each other again. But when you shut my office door and didn't return-I realized that we really were over. That every single moment that I had cherished would be nothing more than a fucking memory haunting my every breath. I'm not in a drunken stupor like I was back then, I can see clearly that if you don't change your mind … that I lost you."