Page 74 of Wild Heart

“Well, I’m glad you’re feeling well enough to join us for our last breakfast here this morning,” he said.

“Me, too.”

Luckily, that was the extent of the questioning. For the next forty-five minutes, I sat with the family and had breakfast, a multitude of conversations breaking out amongst everyone.

I chimed in every now and then, so nothing would seem out of the ordinary. I even stomached responding to something Tate had said in two separate instances, but it just about killed me. I was dying inside.

All I wanted to do was get back to Landing and have some time alone.

It was after breakfast when everybody dispersed from the dining room to pack and prepare for their return trip home. That was when, no matter how much I had hoped I would have avoided it, Tate sought me out.

There was a gentle knock on my door before I heard him say my name. “Ava?”

“Yeah?”

“Can I come in?”

I hadn’t taken the time yet to figure out how to handle this with Tate. Unless he was prepared to come out with the truth right now, I didn’t want to bring the situation up. I needed to give myself some time to think before I simply reacted.

So, keeping my voice as neutral as possible, I answered, “Sure.”

Wanting to avoid looking at him as much as I could, I set about busying myself with packing.

“Hey, I just wanted to come in and check on you,” he said.

I offered a quick glance in his direction. “Yeah, thanks. I’m okay.”

“Are you sure?”

“Well, I haven’t hurled up my guts today, so I guess I’m doing alright.”

“I wish you would have told me you were leaving. I would have walked back with you.”

Like I could have if I wanted to. He was too busy fucking up for that to happen. I wondered what he would have said in his defense if I called him out right now on it. Having learned my lesson before, I held back from losing control and waited.

I shrugged and opened the drawer with my undergarments. As I gathered them in my arms, ignoring the way Tate had looked at them, I said, “Yeah, I just told Ivy and got out of there.I didn’t make it far before I was doubled over the bushes, so it was good I left when I did.”

When I moved back to the dresser to empty the next drawer and Tate didn’t say anything, I looked back to see him staring at the undergarments I’d tossed into my suitcase. Was he thinking about how to tell me the truth? Was he thinking about how he couldn’t wait to see me in them, so he decided to sleep with someone else instead? Did he wonder if he told me the truth, whether I’d walk away from him for good?

He surprised me when he looked at me and sent a mischievous grin my way. “You’ve had all of those with you this entire time?”

So, evidently, he hadn’t been thinking about anything I had presumed he was. And it shocked me. Because I’d suspected he would. After all the remorse and regret I’d heard in his voice last night, there wasn’t an ounce of it to be found today.

It made no sense, and there was that part of me that wanted to ask him how he did it. But I didn’t. Instead, I gave him a nod and said, “I guess I wanted to be prepared.”

His brows shot up. “Prepared?”

“Yep.”

I gave him nothing but that single word as I continued packing.

“You sound like my kind of girl.” Just like that, he tossed it out. Like he hadn’t stripped another woman out of her clothes last night.

I shot him a look that I hoped indicated I wasn’t amused. Whether it registered for him or not, I didn’t know.

Tate took the opportunity to drop that subject and move to another. “So, do you have any plans for when you get back home to Landing?”

I put the last of my clothes into my suitcase and answered, “Well, I’m hoping to leave here as soon as I finish packing. Andsince I didn’t sleep well last night, I’m just going to try to rest today. I’m hoping whatever this was that made me sick doesn’t turn into something else, because I’m moving into my new place tomorrow.”