Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele novel Chapter 123

Chapter 123 

Chapter 123 

+25 BONUS 

Squealing I grab her hand and begin jumping up and down. She has no choice but to stand with me, the force of my glee making it impossible for her to stay seated.. 

“I am so dang happy for you!!” I hug her tightly, jumping up and down some more until she starts laughing. “You’re not mad?” Her voice shakes and I look up to see she’s almost crying. “I was so worried you’d be angry,” 

I can’t stop smiling. My cheeks feel stretched to their limits as uncontainable joy fills me. “Why would I be angry about my two best friends finding love with one another?” 

“It’s just,” she looks to the side. “I knew that he had a thing for you, I just wasn’t sure if maybe you had a thing for him as well.” 

I sigh, as I retake my seat. “If only I did, but I’ve never been interested in him that way,” I confess, “There have been times when I wished I could love him, but I never could see him that way.” It’s a shame I didn’t want Clark romantically. Loving Atlas Steele feels like fighting against the world sometimes. Loving Clark Steele would have been so much easier. 

Tilly takes her seat and begins telling me about how it all started. She always thought he was cute, but she didn’t think of him as a romantic partner until the Fashion Expo. Apparently, during all the times I was struggling with my pregnancy, taking naps, and avoiding Atlas, while they were running my booth together they developed a bit of a rapport. They realized they had much more in common than just me and began hanging out. 

“We were just friends, or so we thought,” Tilly smiled. “He’d confess about how hard it was to be secretly in love with you and not able to say anything because of his loyalty to his big brother, and I’d commiserate with him, wishing I could do something to help him and you. You see, I was convinced that maybe if I learned enough about Clark, I’d be able to show you how wonderful he is and how much better he’d be for you than Atlas.” 

“But we were both fooling ourselves. Even in those early days, we were fighting a mutual attraction,” she rotates the ring around her finger using her thumb, smiling down at it as she adds, “Love and concern for you might have brought us together, but it was an attraction to one another that kept us coming back.” 

“Our relationship first became physical the night you disappeared. We hadn’t planned it that way, we hadn’t planned it at all actually,” her eyes shine with regret as she recalls what happened that evening.” Seeing Atlas attacked and then watching you collapse after Jude poisoned you put us both in a very sensitive emotional state.” 

“We stayed up all night waiting to hear about you and by the end of the night, we were comforting one another and one thing led to another. When we woke up the next morning, we swore that it would never happen again. We promised one another that we would keep away from each other for your sake. He felt so guilty sleeping around with me when he had spent all day telling me about how much he was in love with you.” 

“And then we got the news that you were gone,” she chokes, stumbling over her words. “We felt so guilty. While we were making love you were being kidnapped. On some level, we felt like it was all our fault.” 

“That’s ridiculous,” I interrupt her. “Neither one of you could have predicted that would happen. 

Chapter 129 

+25 BONUS 

“Even so,” she looks so vulnerable as she tells the story “We still couldn’t help but think we were terrible friends for letting it happen to you. Which is what made it so hard when in the following weeks we kept falling into bed together every time we missed you” She Buried her face in her hands. “I felt like such a whore, sleeping with someone who was secretly in love with you, being a stand–in for someone he couldn’t ever have.* 

The starts to cry silently, speaking around sniffles. “When Clark discovered where you were, and had confirmation that you were still alive, he was so excited. He was so obsessed with bringing you home that it made it so much easier for us to stay away from one another” 

Tilly then went on to explain all the other things that kept them apart. Angelica’s memory, Clark’s proposal, and my need for someone to help support me through a difficult time. “I was ready to give him up, Cordy, forever…for you.” 

“But I’d never ask that of you,” I am shocked she’d even consider giving up someone she cared for just to keep me happy. “If you had told me, I’d have supported you.” 

“I realize that now,” Tilly shakes her head. “But in the moment all I could feel was fear and quilt. 

“So what changed? Because something obviously changed. She wouldn’t be wearing his ring of sheaking out of his room if they hadn’t come to some happy agreement with one another. 

“Malibu,” she lets out a deep breath. “We ran into one another with no one else around and something between us sparked. While we were there, we didn’t need to pretend to be anyone else for anyone else. Nobody we knew was around to see us. So we just got to be two lonely, single people.” 

“And that’s when you finally figured it out,” I sigh. It’s so romantic.