Chapter 90 Our Relationship Was Fake

Chapter 90 Our Relationship Was Fake
Gianna
He doesn't hear me. My chest tightens as I stare at the phone in his hands, my mind refusing to accept what my eyes are seeing. Maybe he doesn't know Gianna and Kitten are the same person, but that doesn't stop the ugly sting of jealousy from spreading through me. He'd been intimate with another woman.

He'd spent money on her, showered her with gifts, called her his personal whore, and all the while he'd been telling me I was the only woman he wanted. Was that why he'd never allowed me into this room? Was this what he'd been hiding behind a locked door every single night?

Then another thought crashes into me so violently it steals the air from my lungs. The piercings. Every single time Dmitry and I had slept together, I'd seen the rings through his nipples and the piercing through his cock. Tamer had those exact same piercings. I'd touched them. Teased him about them. I'd even joked that whoever convinced him to get them deserved a medal. How had I never questioned it? How had I been so spectacularly blind? The answer is embarrassingly simple. I never wanted to question it.

I buried myself so deeply in the fantasy that I convinced myself the man behind the screen could never exist in my real life.

My brain desperately searches for another explanation because accepting the truth feels impossible. Maybe Tamer leaked one of the recordings. Maybe Dmitry somehow found it online and had been watching it out of curiosity. Maybe the piercings are nothing more than a coincidence. Plenty of people have piercings. Plenty of men wear the same jewelry. The excuses sound pathetic even inside my own head, and I know I'm grasping at anything that will stop my heart from breaking.

"God, Gianna," I whisper to myself, tears burning my eyes. "You're so fucking stupid."

Without giving myself another second to think, I shove the study door open so hard it slams against the wall. The bang echoes through the room, startling Dmitry so badly that his phone slips from his fingers and crashes onto the hardwood floor.

"What the fuck is going on here?" I scream. My voice cracks before I finish the sentence, making the question sound far more broken than angry.

Dmitry spins around so quickly his chair rolls backward. His face drains of every bit of color as his eyes lock onto mine. His lips part, but no words come out. He simply stares at me with an expression somewhere between terror and disbelief, as though he'd imagined a hundred different ways this secret could come out and none of them looked like this.

I point toward the phone lying on the floor, my entire body trembling so violently I can barely keep my hand raised. "Who is she?" I demand. "How long has this been going on?"

"Gianna..." His voice is barely audible. He takes one hesitant step toward me before stopping himself. "I can explain."

"I don't want an explanation." I shake my head so hard my vision blurs. "I asked you a question. Who is she?"

He runs both hands through his hair, pacing a small circle before finally looking back at me. "Please..."

"How long, Dmitry?" I interrupt, my voice rising with every word. "Tell me how fucking long."

His shoulders slump as though every ounce of strength has left his body. "I never intended for any of this to happen."

"Answer the question."

"I wasn't looking for..." He swallows hard, rubbing at his face before forcing himself to meet my eyes. "I wasn't looking for another woman."

The room spins, another woman.
The words repeat inside my head until I can barely hear anything else.
"And I didn’t lie when I said I found you by accident," he continues hoarsely. "I didn't know it was you at first. I swear to God I didn't. When I realized..." His voice breaks completely. "When I realized Kitten was Gianna, I should've ended it. I know I should have. Every logical part of me knew it was wrong, but every time you pushed Dmitry away, you ran to Tamer instead. Every fear you couldn't tell me, every secret you couldn't confess to me, you gave to him, and I couldn't let go."

My knees buckle beneath me before I even realize they've given out. The floor crashes into my legs, but I barely feel the impact. My stomach twists so violently I think I'm going to be sick. Every conversation flashes through my mind. Every late-night confession. Every tear I'd cried over Dmitry. Every complaint I'd made about him. Every vulnerable part of myself I'd entrusted to Tamer.
It had all been him.
Every single word.
Every single secret.
Every single fucking time.

I don't even notice Dmitry moving until he's already kneeling in front of me. His face is wet with tears, his breathing uneven, and he reaches toward me with shaking hands.

"Gianna, please..."

The second his fingers come anywhere near me, I scramble backward across the floor until my back collides painfully with the bookshelf.

"Don't touch me." My voice comes out raw enough to hurt my own ears. "Don't you dare fucking touch me."

His hand freezes in midair before slowly falling back to his side. "I'm sorry."

"No, you're not." Tears stream freely down my face as I stare at him like he's someone I've never met before. "You let me tell you everything. You watched me cry over you while pretending to be someone else. Every time I thought I was escaping Dmitry, I was running straight back into your arms, and you knew. You knew every single time."

"I never wanted to hurt you."

A bitter laugh escapes me before another sob follows it. "Do you hear yourself? You built an entire relationship with me on a lie. You listened to every confession, every insecurity, every fear I had, and you never once gave me the chance to decide whether I wanted to keep talking once I knew who you really were."

His breathing turns ragged as he drags a trembling hand down his face, his composure unraveling right in front of me.
"I fell in love with you twice, Gianna. First as you, then as Kitten, and I couldn't bring myself to let either of them go."

He closes what little distance remains between us before stopping just short of touching me. His hands hover uncertainly near my face, fingers twitching every few seconds as though every instinct in him is screaming to hold me, yet he knows he no longer has that right.

"I helped Kitten because I could hear the fear in her voice during that first explicit camshow. She was terrified, trying so hard to sound confident when she wasn't." His own voice cracks under the weight of the memory. "I paid off because I wanted to make sure nobody crossed your boundaries. Then I realized Kitten was you." He lets out a shaky breath and gives a humorless laugh. "After that... there was no separating the two anymore. I wasn't choosing between you two."
He finally lifts his eyes to mine, and they're filled with an honesty that only makes everything hurt more.
"I didn't choose Gianna over Kitten, and I didn't choose Kitten over Gianna. I chose you. All of you." His jaw tightens stubbornly. "And as fucked up as this is, I don't regret making sure you were safe."

My entire body shakes, the humiliation, the betrayal and the love I still feel despite all of it, everything crashes together until I can't tell one emotion from the next.

"Fuck you," I choke out, tears spilling faster than I can wipe them away.

"I know."

“Oh, shut up," I point an unsteady finger at him. "Stop painting this like it’s some romantic heroic act. You lied to me. Every single day."

"You can hate me for the rest of your life if that's what you need." His voice is calm now, almost resigned. "But if I had to go back and make the choice again, knowing exactly how this ends..." He shakes his head without looking away from me. "I'd still do everything I could to keep you away from the men who would've treated you like nothing more than a body."

I fight back the urge to roll my eyes, this is stupid. My heart is stupid for fluttering at his silly words. Another round of realization suddenly slams into me.
I stare at him, my breathing catching. "You knew."

He frowns, confused at my accusation.

"You knew about Kevin."

Understanding flashes across his face. "Gianna..."

"You knew our relationship was fake." My voice cracks under the weight of the accusation. "If you knew Kevin and I weren't real..." I swallow painfully. "Then why?" My eyes search his desperately. "Why were you so cruel to him? Why were you so angry every time you saw us together?"

He doesn't answer immediately, his gaze drops to the floor before lifting back to mine. "Because it being fake didn't mean it was harmless."
I stare at him in silence.

"You may not have loved Kevin," he says quietly, "but he loved you. I saw it every time he looked at you. Whether the relationship was real or not didn't change that."
His expression twists with something raw and ugly.
"And even if I was wrong..." He lets out a bitter laugh. "Even if he never loved you at all, I still did."
His eyes don't leave mine.
"Watching the woman I love smile at another man, let him hold her, laugh with him..." His throat bobs as he struggles to steady his voice. "Nearly drove me to insanity."