by JC Harroway
I fill my lungs and inch closer. ‘The thing is, I’ve fallen in love with you.’ My voice breaks but I plough on. I need to say this. He needs to hear it. ‘So you don’t have to need me, but I’d like you to want me.’
His face falls in shock. ‘No... Don’t say that.’
I breathe through the first sting of rejection. I expect a fight. But he knows I’m tenacious.
‘I want us to have a relationship. I know you’re not in the same place yet, that you didn’t want anything to change, but it has.’ I know he feels it too. ‘I just want some reassurance that you want more than to say goodbye. That perhaps one day you could want more. With me.’
I touch his arm, reassuring him that the horror in his eyes is unwarranted. ‘You don’t need to promise me marriage—it’s not the game changer I thought it was. I just want you in my life, and I think you want the same.’
His face contorts with anguish. ‘Monroe...’ His tone is laced with warning, his use of my first name a red flag. I should heed it, but I’ve never been able to accept that something is out of my reach.
‘I’m tired of denying it, Hudson. Of holding back because you’re not ready to hear it. But what if you’re never ready? I’ve got nothing to lose.’
His stare hardens and I wither inside.
‘Why are you doing this?’ He scrapes a hand over his face in frustration. ‘We have everything to lose, don’t you see? We had a good time. Don’t—’
‘What? Ruin it?’ I interrupt. ‘That’s what you were going to say, isn’t it?’
He looks down, his eyes almost black. ‘No... Yes... I don’t know.’ He’s cornered, fighting for his life, and I love him enough to relent.
‘Sterling is never going to accept what we did.’ He stuffs his hands in his pockets. ‘It’s driven a wedge between us already, and that wedge will split Bold apart. We’ll lose it all.’
His words bombard me like arrows. He only cares about money. About professional success. About Bold.
‘I told him it was over,’ he says.
Shock jolts through me. I search his handsome face. How can the man I’ve known for five years, the man I’ve shared this past week with, end this without even telling me first? How can he be the place where I belong?
‘So all you care about is how my love threatens the business?’ Ice trickles through my veins, because I see his excuses for the lies they are. He’s not worried about Sterling, who would have to come around to the idea of a relationship between us, just as Hudson had to deal with our divorce. He’s running scared.
‘I never promised you anything.’ It’s a whisper, almost as if he’s ashamed to hear his own words. ‘I’ve always been alone. I’m happy with that.’
‘Oh, I know. But guess what? I want more anyway.’ I fist my hands on my hips.
‘You had more with Sterling, but you couldn’t make it work. You wouldn’t move, even for him. Wouldn’t live away from your family. So how exactly would we work when you live here and I live in Tokyo?’
‘I don’t know. I hadn’t thought through all the logistics—’
He interrupts. ‘I can’t compensate for your big family any more than Sterling could. What makes you think I could offer more than he did? I’m fucked, Monroe. I always will be. You’re searching for this Holy Grail of relationships—the one...perfection. But you’re looking in the wrong place if you think I’m what you need.’
He grips my upper arms, his wild stare clashing with mine. ‘What do you see when you look at me, when you imagine yourself to love me?’
He doesn’t wait for my answer.
‘You see an ideal, something I’m not. I’m flawed and broken. What makes you think a man with my past can make you happy and give you everything you want—commitment, children?’
I break free of his hold. ‘I’ll tell you what I see. You’re a fraud. I always thought that you were the boldest of us, but you only take calculated risks. You only take risks that aren’t emotional... Because you’re scared, Hudson. Scared to let yourself be vulnerable. Scared to feel and to care. Scared that everything you think you have will be snatched away from you. But what do you really have? What have you truly ever risked, apart from your money? Nothing.’
‘I’m perfectly happy with my life.’ He looks like a man being led to a firing squad.
‘Good for you. But there’s more to life than work and amassing a fortune you’ll never spend. You think your achievements keep you in control, make you worthy. But you’re already worthy—of love. Don’t you see that?’
He shakes his head, dismissing the truth.
‘You think you’re alone. That no one cares. But Mr Oshima cares. Sterling cares. I care.’ My voice breaks, just short of a sob. ‘It’s your strength I love. Your determination. Your passion. You showed me all of those things this week. They’re in you. They are you.’
‘Stop, Monroe.’ His mouth mashes into a grim line.
I can’t. Not until he believes me. ‘You argue that you can’t do emotional intimacy, but you can. I feel it so deeply when we’re together, I can barely breathe.’ I press my hand to my chest and fight the rising panic. ‘You can fool yourself you have everything you need, fill your life with work. But it will never be enough if you’re using it as a way to stay emotionally detached.’
I’ve gone too far, but there’s no point holding back. I’ve survived losing love once, and I’ll survive it again. I won’t compromise my dreams or desires, not even for him.
His face, his entire body, might as well be carved from stone.
‘You don’t have to love me, but until you open your heart and take the risk—that it could fail and it will hurt, but it won’t kill you—you’ll never be content.’
My eyes burn. I push on, uncaring of how much damage we’ve created. ‘I may want things that seem unrealistic to you, like true love and a family. But I won’t compromise. Unlike you, I’m prepared to put everything on the line, to take those emotional gambles, because I know the payoff has the potential to be everything I want.’
I deflate at the futility of my dreams with Hudson. He’s right. He is too damaged to be what I need. He has no desire to change. He told me that in Tokyo.
‘It’s okay.’ I offer a wobbly smile. ‘I wanted more with you, but I misjudged things.’ I swallow hard. This isn’t how I envisioned us ending.
His grief, pain and confusion tell me we’re in different leagues emotionally. I’m expecting too much from him.
‘There’s one more thing you need to hear. I love you enough to go back to just being your friend if that’s all you want. You can push me away, but I’ll never abandon you.’
Hudson
The drone of the plane’s engines should lull me to sleep, considering how little of that vital commodity I’ve had these past seven days, but I don’t think even a general anaesthetic could knock me out. Every inch of my body aches. Every time I close my eyes I see Monroe’s exquisite face, pale and slashed with pain. Pain I caused. Because I can’t love her back.
No. She wasn’t demanding love. She knows me. Perhaps better than I know myself. And the thing is I do love her. I always have. As a close friend. A respected colleague. A person.
Even perhaps with a romantic love.
I rub my hand over my face, my breathing shallow and tight with panic. It’s not admitting the emotion I find terrifying, it’s trusting it. What do I know about love? What do I have to offer? I’ve never wanted the trappings she has, but that’s not what she asked for. All she wanted was more. For me to be open to a relationship.
I blink, fatigue making my eyes gritty. I glance around the luxurious cabin of my private jet—pristine and empty, just like my penthouse, which is all that awaits me in Tokyo. Is Monroe right? Am I a suit addicted to the office so that he doesn’t have to feel the gaping inadequacies of his life? Is that truly all I want?
; I’ll never abandon you.
Her final declaration loops through my head, every pass bringing recrimination and self-loathing. I feel the words, the sentiment and truth behind them wash over me. Haven’t I always felt her acceptance? Hers and Sterling’s? It’s what allowed me to let them into my life in the first place.
This past week, Monroe has shown me that with her I’m safe. She laid herself open to me, even at the end when she saw how huge the chasm is between her own feelings and mine. She continued to offer her friendship, even after I rejected her love. She wants me to heal even if I can’t be whole for her.
And I offered nothing in return.
My hand hovers over my phone—she’s just a call away. Every cell in my body wants her to be happy and fulfilled. To have all of her dreams come true. I want to see her smile and laugh every day, the way she does when she’s around her family.
I think of her a year from now—if Bold as it is currently survives the fallout of my thoughtlessness. Will she visit Tokyo again? Will she be in a relationship? Will her eyes sparkle the way I’ve watched them do a thousand times this week, only for another man?
I grit my teeth and swallow hard. Jealousy is no reason to hold on to something as precious and unique as Monroe.
My phone rings. It’s Sterling. I calculate the time in London. We’re a few hours from Singapore, which means he and Monroe will have just finished their planned brunch after my early departure. What if she’s not okay?
I snatch up the phone and accept the call, my pulse a riot. ‘Hello.’
Sterling sighs down the line. ‘I don’t know whether to tell you what I’m about to tell you, or just hunt you down and kick your ass.’
I make a fist. ‘Is she...okay?’ I hate it that I don’t know. That I have to ask him. That I’m the reason she might not be.
‘She’s fine. She’s the strongest, gutsiest woman either of us knows. That’s why we’re in business with her. It’s also why I’m ringing to urge you not to throw away the only chance you’ll have.’
My throat is tight. Just thinking how much I’ve hurt Monroe makes me want to thump something.
‘Look, man,’ he continues, ‘neither of us knows what you’ve been through, growing up the way you did. But do you really want to be alone simply because you’re shit-scared? Is that a good enough reason to lose her? You’ll never find another woman like her. I know. I lost her too. But I live with that because I was partly to blame.’
I close my eyes, picturing the two of them together—an intimate tête-à-tête where he comforted her and advised her, the way I did when their marriage disintegrated.
‘You know she’s right about you—she’s always right.’ He chuckles, but I don’t have the stomach to join him. ‘That’s why we concede to her more often than not.’
I suck in a breath. ‘What did she tell you?’ I’m too scared to ask if she’s done with Bold and, more importantly, done with me.
‘She said she loved you enough to question the importance of marriage. She said she knew a relationship would be hard for you, but she told me how you’ve been putting yourself out there emotionally, with her and with Blackhearts, and it gave her hope. She said she expected too much from you. So now you have to ask yourself one question. If you could only wake up one more day, would you want to wake up alone or by her side?’
I concentrate hard, allowing the emotions I usually push away to flow through me as I contemplate his scenario. The end of the world, a zombie apocalypse, me struck down with some terminal disease...
I recall the dawn breaking after Typhoon Kano on that first morning. Think of all the dawns I’ve witnessed this week—a week of hardly any sleep. Monroe was beside me for most of them. Would I even want one last day alive without her...?
‘Fuck...’ I whisper under my breath, because the answer is so straightforward. I don’t want tomorrow without her, or the next day, or the day after that.
Sterling’s snort reminds me that he’s still listening. ‘I’ll never say I told you so,’ he says. ‘Just make this right.’
‘What do I do? How do I change?’ My voice whines with desperate panic.
‘Don’t ask me, man, I have my own shit going on. Besides, for some crazy reason, Monroe seems to love you just the way you are. That’s a good place to start.’
We disconnect and I fire off an email to Hina, instructing her to cancel all of my meetings for the next week. Then I head to the cockpit to speak with the captain. He’ll have an hour to refuel and lodge a new flight plan.
We’re going back to London.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Monroe
MY MORNING RUN from my home in Kensington Place takes me through Kensington Gardens, past the palace and the Albert Memorial, and along the edge of the Serpentine, the lake that separates the gardens from Hyde Park. It’s a route that never fails to uplift me because, as much as I want to be in the zone, I also love this part of London. The park is alive come rain or shine. The criss-crossing paths cater to dog walkers and mums with pushchairs. The lake teems with ducks and swans and their fluffy offspring, and swathes of cheerful daffodils shelter under the trees.
With my lungs burning and my muscles lax from the exertion, but feeling in no way uplifted—a tall order for the park today—I finish my run and head for my favourite coffee shop. I buy a large latte and an almond croissant I have no appetite for. But purchasing my favourite treat gives me hope that one day I’ll be hungry again. One day, hopefully soon, this crushing pain will fade and I’ll forget that I love Hudson Black.
Only I can’t forget him. I have to talk to him and Sterling tomorrow in a video call. How will I survive seeing his face, his beautiful cognac-brown eyes concealing his pain? Because I know it’s there. It’s so deeply buried he may never overcome it totally. But it’s not my place to offer comfort, to hold him and love him until its grip lessens. He doesn’t want that from me. He wants nothing but our professional relationship.
And I can do that. I won’t let my misplaced feelings jeopardise Bold. I kept it together after Sterling, and I can do the same with Hudson.
I just wanted more...
I round the corner of my street and check my phone for the time. I have thirty minutes to shower before I head to the office after a largely sleepless night. I tug off my ear buds and bound up the steps to my front door, where I almost collide with the man on the top step.
Hudson.
He’s wearing the same suit he wore on his last day in London, his tie stuffed in his breast pocket and his top two shirt buttons undone. He looks as though he slept on a park bench.
I’m so confused I just stand and stare, gaping and dizzy.
‘I thought you’d left for Singapore.’ I brush my hair back from my face, wishing I wasn’t carrying a bag of pastry and a hot takeaway coffee and could tighten my ponytail. I’m hot and sweaty and probably an attractive colour of lobster-red. But who cares? He doesn’t want me. I need to find a way to move on.
‘I did leave,’ he says. ‘Then I came back.’
Hope soars in my chest, squeezing out air. Why? What does it mean? But then I remind myself it’s humanly impossible he feels anything he didn’t feel forty-eight hours ago. He’s still the same man I begged to allow me into his life on the vague chance that he would, one day, reciprocate my feelings.
‘I see.’ I nod and step past him to my front door. I realise my mistake instantly, because I’m so close I can breathe in his scent and see the fatigue around his gorgeous eyes, which are bleak.
I shove the key into the lock, balancing my bag and coffee in one hand.
‘You look beautiful.’ The catch in his voice slices through my heart. ‘It’s so good to see you.’
Agony pulses along every nerve. ‘Don’t,’ I snap.
I don’t want his platitudes or compliments. I want what he can’t give me. I won’t comprom
ise, no matter how tempting. I shove at my front door and step inside, turning on the threshold to face him.
‘I’m late for work. I’m going to have a shower.’ I pull the door half closed behind me, filling the space with my body as a barrier. The last time he came through this door, I barely made two paces before I succumbed to my need for him. Allowing him inside now would be like ripping off my body armour, my last line of physical defence.
Correctly reading my reluctance, he steps back. ‘Can I see you after work? Please... I want to apologise.’
He’s so devastatingly handsome, even in slept-in clothes. I want to cry and cave and drag him inside and forget about work and my pride and the heartbreaking things he said. Most of all I want to forget that he threw my love back in my face.
But the memories are alive in the jagged tears in my heart, throbbing with every beat.
‘I’ll check my schedule when I get to the office and let you know a convenient time.’ This is what he wanted. What he begged me to promise him. That Bold would be safe. That nothing would change in his life. I don’t want his apology, but he’s my business partner. Even if I wanted to, I can’t ignore him or never see him again. And that amplifies my pain. There’s no escape.
He nods and backs down the steps towards the pavement.
‘Hudson,’ I call before I shut the door. ‘Get some sleep.’
Behind my closed front door my heart gallops and my hand on the knob burns to fling it open and chase him down the street.
I abandon my coffee, then shower and dress in a trance. I make it to work only three minutes late for my meeting. The day passes in a blur. It’s as though I’ve been drugged. Everything is fuzzy and distant, as if I’m existing under water. Three times I pick up my phone to message him a meeting time and place. Three times I chicken out. I have nothing more to say, and I’m not ready to hear his justifications and explanations.
I’m lost in thought as my driver drops me outside my home later that night. But, when I climb from the back of the car and bid him goodnight, Hudson is exactly where he stood this morning. He’s changed into jeans and a T-shirt but he still looks broken and haunted.