Total pages in book: 27
Estimated words: 24894 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 124(@200wpm)___ 100(@250wpm)___ 83(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 24894 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 124(@200wpm)___ 100(@250wpm)___ 83(@300wpm)
“You said that to her?” Keaton turns back around.
“It was—”
“We’re not doing this right now,” I cut Dr. Lone off because I sense that tension and anger rising around Keaton.
“Keaton?” Dr. Lone tries again. I know he’s trying to get him to leave, so I step back, putting some space between Keaton and me.
“Key?” I don’t know why I have the need to challenge this, but I do. As pissed as I still am at Keaton, deep down I have this possessiveness. He’s mine, and I need to prove it.
“Leave us,” he says to his father, and I let out a breath I didn’t realize I was holding.
“Come on, leave them be.” Shelly grabs her husband's arm and leads him out of the room. My parents follow after them, and Nora closes the door behind her, but not before giving me a small smile.
“Did you really think I wasn’t going to pick you?” Key asks, his voice low and soft.
“I don’t know what to think anymore,” I admit.
“I’ve made you doubt me. I hate it.” His shoulders drop.
“That makes two of us.” Tears start to well in my eyes, and in a flash, Keaton is in front of me. His big hands cup my face, and he’s so close all I see is him.
“I would never have left you unless I didn’t have a choice. You have to know that deep down. I know you do. There’s been no one else, not even a single date.” He states it as a fact because he knows me. Even if I have changed in some ways, there are some things that will always remain the same. They are a part of who I am, and Keaton will always be somewhere inside me.
“Tell me, Key, where have you been?”
“In a prison of sorts. One my father and I made for me.” He takes his hands away from my face, but one of them wraps around my wrist instead. He doesn’t want to stop touching me.
“Whatever happened that day made you different. I swore I saw your eyes change. Then you tossed that whole tower across the room.” I shake my head. “Over the years I told myself it wasn’t real. That your dad was just pissed and sent you off to some boarding school, but then you never tried to reach me.” I held out this small hope that when he turned eighteen, he’d magically appear because his parents wouldn’t have control anymore, but it didn’t happen.
“What you saw was real and only the start.”
“You could have told me something!” Why hide all this from me?
“I was scared.” His words hang between us, and I can’t remember him ever saying that before. Keaton was always so calm and sure of things.
“Scared of what you became?”
“For the first few days, they had to keep sedating me. I kept trying to escape like a wild animal fighting to break free. I barely remember it, but they said I was trying to get to you, and I was out of control.”
“You thought you’d hurt me?” He swallows and nods his head. Keaton might believe that, but I never will.
“When my emotions start to come into play, I tend to lose control. That happens most when I think of you.” His thumb drifts back and forth over the inside of my wrist.
“You locked yourself away somewhere so you wouldn’t come near me?” I gasp in a hushed whisper.
“I’ve been training to get better control of myself.” I can see it in his eyes that he hates this. My Keaton, the one I knew years ago, was always in control.
“And how is that going?”
“I threw a chair at my TV last night when I found out a man was at your apartment.” My mouth falls open and not only because he threw a chair at his TV. “I know, I should have been keeping tabs on you, but it helped to remind me of why I was trying to get myself under control.”
I know it shouldn’t, but it actually makes me feel better that he has been keeping tabs on me. That I wasn’t just locked away and lost to him. He was always thinking of me, and god knows I was always thinking of him.
“You came today even after the TV incident?”
“It was the date I set for myself to pull it together. There was no stopping me from coming today. I don’t think I could have stopped myself if I tried. It’s like whatever this is inside of me had agreed with that date, and if it didn’t happen it was going to break free.”
“Key.” I lay my head on his chest. “You seem in control.”
“You calm me. All this time I didn’t know what would happen if I got to you, but for the first time, I’m calm.” He sounds amazed for a moment. “But—”