An Open Relationship? Fine Meet My New Boyfriend novel · Chapter 20 of 24
Chapter 20: Before and After
Eliza's POV
On Friday night I rang his bell at nine.
Cillian opened the door with a paintbrush still in his hand.
"You're painting at nine o'clock at night," I said.
"I couldn't sit still."
I stepped inside and shut the door behind me and leaned on it.
"I read the folder," I said. "All of it, on Dani's couch. It took me four hours."
"And?"
"I'm in about forty of those photographs."
I let him wait a moment.
"In none of them do I look like a woman you were hunting."
He put the brush down on the newel post.
"Tomorrow I stand on a stage and say yes to a man I despise," I said.
"I want to know where you'll be."
"In the room. At the back."
"And after?"
He didn't answer.
"I'm asking where you'll be after," I said.
"For two weeks I told myself you were being kind. That I'd wake up one day and find out I'd had a rebound."
I took a breath.
"Before the plan, I wanted you. After the plan, I want you. I'd like to hear that isn't one-sided."
He crossed the hall in three strides and put his hands on my face.
"I was afraid you'd see me as one more man managing you," he said.
"It isn't one-sided. It was never a rebound."
His thumbs moved on my cheekbones.
"Trevor managed you. I held a folder for six weeks and called it protecting people. I thought, if she learns all of it, she'll look at me and see him."
His voice cracked.
"I'm not him. I'm scared I'm not that different."
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