I stood there in the doorway, shock rolling through me like a thunderstorm.
She knew.
Holy fuck.
"Close the door," Estella said.
I didn't move. I couldn't.
She closed my book and stood up. "Unless you want everyone downstairs to hear about how pathetically in love you are with Alex, I suggest you do what I say."
Right. I saw who had the upper hand here. I apprehensively complied, trying to figure out something to say. Anything to say.
But all that circled through my mind was a chorus of "I'm fucked."
"Estella," I said carefully. "I wrote that book years ago and I, uh, I based a character around him, but it isn't, I mean it doesn't-"
"Shut up," she said, cutting off my rambling excuse. "You actually think I'm that stupid?"
Did she really want me to answer that question?
"It's funny," she said. "The only reason I even brought your book along was because I liked you, Emilia. I really did. And the only reason I started to read it was because of my suspicion."
I didn't move.
"I knew you two were close," she said, moving toward me. "But I trusted you. And I trusted him, too."
More like she trusted him not to find me more attractive than her.
"Alex told me about the agreement between you two," I said carefully. "And I saw you and James. Alex and I aren't any different from that. We were just having fun. And you guys had a deal-"
"I know we had a deal," she spat. "But it's different."
Rage burned through me. "How is it different?"
She stared at me for a long time. "Because Alex loves you back."
I didn't know what to say. She knew. She knew everything.
"I didn't want to believe it at first," she said. There was almost a sadness about her voice. "I saw the way you two were together. The way he looks at you... he's never looked at me like that."
My heart leapt at the weakness in her voice. I knew how she felt, to love someone who didn't love her back.
But then the frailty disappeared from her eyes and her face went cold. She straightened her spine, looking me over carefully.
"But Alex is still my fiancé, and he is still going to marry me. There's too much I have to lose, and I certainly can't let you get in the way of it all, can I?"
Alright. I could see where this was headed.
"I think that maybe you and Alex need to sit down and talk about the fact that the two of you aren't in love and-"
Her laugh cut me off. "Are you serious?"
"What?"
"You think that this can just be talked out? Do you really think I'm going to go down without a fight and leave you and Alex to ride off into the sunset together?"
"Um."
She took a few steps closer to me, stopping only inches from my face. "Listen to me very carefully, Emilia."
I waited, my hands balled into fists at my side. Never in my life had I wanted to punch somebody in the throat so fucking badly.
"You're going to leave this room, find Alex, and tell him that you don't love him."
...What?
"What?" I stammered, trying to wrap my head around her words.
"You heard what I said."
I stared at her like she was absolutely fucking insane. Because she was.
"I'm not going to do that."
A sinister smile spread across her painted lips. "Yes you are. And then you're going to pack up all of your things and you're going to catch the next flight back to Sheffield. "
"I'm not-"
"You are," she cut me off, her voice sharper than before. "I'm doing this for you, Emilia. Trust me."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean," she said. "How heartbreaking would it be to see Alex's career destroyed and know that you're the cause of it?"
My breathing went shallow. "What are you talking about?"
"You know what I'm talking about," she said. "You're his best friend, after all. You know what he did. And you know that I hold all of the power to expose it."
Oh my god. The accident.
She wouldn't.
But as I looked at her dead in her cold eyes, I knew with my entire being that she would.
"You can't do that," I said, pointlessly.
She gave me a patronizing look. "I can."
I could have killed her. I really could have fucking killed her.
"That isn't love," I said, rage burning through every cell of my body. "You don't do that to people you love."
She smiled venomously. "It isn't about love anymore."
She was going to expose the accident to everybody if I didn't do what she said. I felt like I was going to throw up.
I turned to leave, but her voice stopped me before I could.
"You should really think about your next move," she said. "Sure, you can go tell Alex and the two of you can run away together. But do you actually think you two would ever work out?"
I opened my mouth to tell her to fuck off, but she spoke before I could.
"Think about it, Emilia. Alex isn't going to move back to Sheffield after this is all over. His life is in LA now. His friends, his career... it's all there. It's not like just because the two of you have started hooking that everything is going to go back to the way it was when you were kids."
Her words burned through me. I wanted to push her back against the wall and tell her that she was wrong, that she had no clue what she was talking about.
But I couldn't, because her words made sense.
And that made me impossibly angry.
"The two of you would never work together," she said. "Not the way that he and I do. And you know it. You know what the right thing to do is here, Emilia."
I had a choice.
I could do what my head and my heart and my soul begged me to do: run down to the house and tell Alex everything. He would take my side and he would kiss me and we would leave together.
But if I did that, Estella would destroy his career.
And I knew Alex. He would tell me some humble shit, like I was worth more than his career. Or maybe he'd say that we could all talk it out.
But even if that happened, Estella was right. We lived in different worlds, he and I. Worlds that never touched.
And I knew what was best for Alex more than he did. I always had.
I felt the angry tears brimming in my eyes. I turned away from her and headed for the door, not really sure where I was going. I just needed to get away.
I had my hand on the door handle, ready to run, when her voice stopped me.
"If you love him," she said, her voice more gentle than before. "You'll leave tonight and never look back."
I did love him. I loved him more than I thought was possible. And that's why my heart was glass, shattering into shards of despair.
Because I knew what I had to do.
I loved Alex.
I loved him,
I loved him,
I loved him...
And that's why I left Estella's room and headed back to the boy I loved, tears falling the entire way there.
I loved him,
I loved him,
I loved him...
And that's why I had to let him go.