Chapter 205

The Unwanted Bride Of Atticus Fawn Chapter 205 Book 3 Chapter 41 ~DANTE~

I must have misheard her. There’s no possible way that Willow said she might be in love with me.

We haven’t. . . I kissed her in my sleep. I touched her inappropriately once when she was drunk in my Jeep. We kissed for the fundraiser. But other than that, when have we ever been close? We’ve only recently started sleeping in the same room together.

She barely knew me. The marriage was f****d. It was only to grant a dying wish.

How can she love me?

I’ve never seen love in her eyes for me, nor have I been looking. I was correct in the past when I felt that Anya never loved me as much as I loved her; I may be right now as well.

I haven’t been paying enough attention to Willow as I initially thought. If I had, I would have noticed how much my words and actions hurt her.

She was happy that someone loved her sister as much as I did, but she wasn’t pleased that it happened to be me that loved her.

She didn’t want me to love Anya?

I don’t know what to do with any of this new information. This was new to me. All of it.

I have to be careful of my words. I couldn’t do anything to make this more painful for her.

The truth was I didn’t love Willow. I was not in love with her. However, I would be an asshole if I told her this. I’m sure she already knows the truth.

“You love me?” I ask in disbelief.

I’ve been avoiding looking at her body all this time. I told myself that I did it because of her, I did not want to make her feel uncomfortable, but I knew it was a f*****g lie.

Willow’s body tempted me. It’s drawn me multiple times while she was fully clothed. I feared what would happen if I saw every part of her. The feel of her soft breasts was still imprinted on my memory. Sometimes I found myself waking up from sleep dreaming about touching them. Then I would look at her and wish I could feel her like she asked me to that night in the jeep.

I wanted Willow, no doubt. But it was not love. And if it wasn’t love, I didn’t deserve to put my hands on her. She deserved love, not l**t. I didn’t know how to tell her this.

“I think I do.” She whispers with a defeated look in her eyes. It f*****g hurt to see that look on her face and not be able to fix it.

“Every time you say something nice, my heart beats faster. Every time I look at you, I have these strong feelings. When you insist on telling everyone how much you love my sister, I feel jealous. I love Anya, and I hate that I’m jealous of your love for her.

I hate that I wish that love were for me instead.”

I don’t know what the f**k to say. How do I make this better?

“And when you do things like keep all her pictures with you or have a picture of her in your wallet. Those little things break my heart even more.” She cries. “I don’t want to feel like this. I don’t even know why I’m telling you. Maybe it’s too much for me to bear. Maybe I want you to at least try and consider my feelings from now on. I don’t know, Dante; I know that I can’t keep on feeling this way and do nothing about it. I’ve never felt this way before. I’d never known what it meant to love a man or even like him before I met you. I believe it started as a crush. Since the first day I saw you, even when Anya was alive, I couldn’t stop thinking about you. Everything intensified after the night you kissed me while thinking I was Anya. And it’s only skyrocketed since then.”

My eyes widen as I felt my heart move faster at her confession.

I was a complete piece of s**t. All this time, Willow has been in pain because of my actions, and I’ve done nothing but make everything worse. Even now, I couldn’t do anything for her because I didn’t feel the same way.

When a tear rolls down her cheek, I felt it in my chest. I knew this wasn’t what Anya wanted. When she left her sister for me to take care of, she didn’t want me to hurt her in this way.

Everything that I did was not intentional. I never wanted to hurt her. I was so lost in my sorrow that I didn’t once think about her feelings.

I step towards her and slowly lift my hand to wipe the tears from her cheeks. The more I wiped, the more she cried.

“I’m so sorry, Willow,” I whisper. “I didn’t know that I was hurting you. I didn’t know you felt this way. I’m sorry that I’m such an asshole. I’m sorry for all the times I spoke about Anya before you. I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me. I should have known. I should have paid more attention to you.”

“It’s okay.” She tries to assure me. “It’s not your fault for not knowing. I know this marriage isn’t what you wanted. I don’t blame you at all, Dante. But I had to let you know. Keeping it inside of me was only becoming worse. I had to let you know the truth.”

Doesn’t she also deserve the truth from me? How can I tell her I want her but don’t love her? How could I explain that’s the reason why I had to keep my distance? I couldn’t mention Anya anymore. I couldn’t be selfish.

“Will you at least look at me tonight?” She whispers pleadingly. “Please look at me for once and pretend that I’m the one you want. Please. I know it’s too much to ask, but just for tonight, look at me and see only me.”