by J. C. Hayden
I wouldn’t let this break me. I wouldn’t become that person who was like a scared rabbit when it came to exes and the past. So, instead of breaking down, begging him not to go down there and stay here with me, I squared my shoulders and looked back up at him.
“I’m going to go.”
I moved to start gathering my things, and I felt him at my back.
“Please don’t go.”
I pulled Jack’s shirt over my head and reached for the black dress I’d worn yesterday for my costume, yanking it on.
“You should invite her up,” I said, despite the voice in my head screaming, What in the hell are you talking about?! “She’s obviously upset.” I slipped my feet into my black flats and walked into this living room to find my clutch. “You can’t leave her standing down there, and you definitely won’t be able to have a conversation in your lobby.” I could hear how flat my voice sounded, but I couldn’t change it. I couldn’t let my true feelings show.
“There isn’t going to be a conversation,” Jack said from behind me. I bent to the floor in front of the door where I had tossed my clutch when we’d come in the night before. “I’m going to tell her there’s nothing left to say and leave it at that.”
“Jack—”
When I turned to face him, he crowded into my space. I backed up against the door, and he brought his hands to my face, his eyes searching. Almost reflexively, I brought my free hand up to his hip and left the other with my clutch hanging at my side.
“Talia, please don’t go.”
“I need to.”
“Why?” he breathed.
I let my eyes flutter closed. “Because if I stay, I’m going to beg you not to go down there, not to talk to her, and that’s not fair.”
Jack rested his forehead against mine, and I inhaled deeply, breathing in the scent of his skin—soap and sex.
“I just want to make sure she’s okay,” he said quietly.
“I know,” I said. I liked that about him—adored how caring and kind he was.
He kissed me then, just a brush of his lips against mine, but I felt it like electricity all over my skin. The past day with him had been nothing short of perfection, and even though I hated that it was ending like this, I knew that it had to, knew that I was already at the edge of something I didn’t know if I could handle, the urge to flee like a brand on my skin.
“Let me call you a cab.”
“I can coordinate it with Patrick.”
After another kiss and a few more whispered words, Jack and I took the elevator down to the first floor of his building, his hand firmly in mine. When the doors dinged open, I tried to pull my hand out of his so Rachel wouldn’t see, but he just held on tighter. We rounded the corner where the bank of elevators was, and I saw her immediately. Even with a tearstained face, she was stunning, and even though it was a Sunday evening, she was dressed for the boardroom, towering and almost as tall as Jack when she stood in her heels.
She looked back and forth between us. Jack met her eyes, and when I looked up at him, it was almost like he was glaring at her. I had no idea how their relationship had ended, but based on the way they were currently staring daggers at one another, I had to guess it hadn’t ended well.
“Pat, can you call a cab for Talia?” Jack asked, turning to his doorman who sat behind a long wooden desk.
“Of course, sir,” he replied in his Irish brogue.
“And please make sure it’s charged to my account.”
Patrick gave a curt nod and picked up the phone.
Jack turned to me. “I’ll call you soon, okay? Text me when you make it home.”
I nodded, and he reached for my other hand so he was holding both of mine in his, his eyes beseeching mine. “I had an incredible time with you last night and today.” His voice was low, but there was no way that Rachel wouldn’t be able to hear it from where she was standing.
I felt a blush stain my cheeks. “Me, too.”
He turned us more so his back was to Rachel, and I glanced over his shoulder, seeing how furious she looked, before I looked back up into Jack’s eyes, the most beautiful, green, clear, sincere eyes I had ever seen.
“I have no expectations,” he whispered. “If you want to keep being friends, I’ll take this weekend and savor it for what it was. I want more with you, but if you don’t want that, I’ll respect that and give you whatever you need.”
I heard the sincerity in his voice and saw it all over his face, and I knew that if I told him I wasn’t looking for anything more than friendship and occasional sex, he would abide by it just like he had for so long. I was done fighting the truth of what I wanted—what I had wanted for nearly as long as I could remember knowing him. I wanted to be with Jack and no one else, and I sure as hell didn’t want him with anyone else, but how could I explain what the night before and this entire day had meant to me when I could feel his ex-fiancée’s eyes boring holes into me? How in the world could I tell him I thought I wanted more when I could see her wipe away a tear?
“Call me when you’re finished,” I said by way of response. He frowned slightly but then nodded, leaning in to give me a soft, brief kiss before dropping my hands and guiding me with one of his big, warm hands on the small of my back over to where Patrick was sitting, obviously trying to pretend like he wasn’t extremely uncomfortable with this entire scenario.
“Send me a text when Talia makes it into the cab, would you, Pat?”
Patrick nodded. “Will do.”
I stood there, smiling tightly at Patrick while he picked up his phone and Jack walked over to Rachel.
“Who is she?”
I knew she was trying to be as discreet as possible, but the large room carried the sound of her hiss over to both Patrick and me. I closed my eyes.
“We can talk about this upstairs,” Jack replied. Then to me he called out, “See you soon, Talia,” as I heard the sound of angry heels clacking across the tile in the lobby.
I couldn’t bring myself to look at him, so I just muttered, “See you,” with my eyes still closed as I braced myself on the counter.
I heard the elevator ding, and just before they closed, I heard Rachel ask again, “Who the hell is she?”
Chapter 15
Iwaited for the cab for two agonizing minutes, imagining all the things Jack and Rachel were saying and doing, each worse than the last, before something came over me. Something intense and powerful that I couldn’t let go of as it slowly began to consume me. My arms started to tingle with the weight of it, and I knew I couldn’t just leave. I knew it was crazy; I knew it was jealous and insecure, and had I been in my right mind, I would have gotten in that cab and left.
Instead, I stood up from one of the plush chairs in the lobby and said to Patrick, “Could you cancel my cab? I left something up in Jack’s apartment.”
Patrick gave me a knowing look and looked like he was trying to contain a smile, but all he said was, “Sure thing, Ms. Emery. The elevator is ready for you.”
I took a deep breath in and out as the elevator slid shut in front of me. I shouldn’t be doing this—I knew I would only regret it, but I couldn’t stop myself. It was like an invisible fish hook had latched into me, and it was slowly reeling me in the direction of Jack’s apartment, making me powerless to stop it.
As the elevator door opened on his floor, I could hear the sounds of angry voices seeping out into the hallway, which was exactly what I’d been hoping for when I decided to stay. It wasn’t until I approached the door, though, that I could hear what the voices were saying.
“—long have you been with her?”
“Rachel.”
Jack sounded frustrated and annoyed, but Rachel sounded furious.
“I think I deserve to know, don’t you?” The sound of her voice seemed to move as I pressed my ear against the door, which I assumed meant she must have been pacing the length of Jack’s living room. “Were you with her when we were together? Is that why you ended it? Were you cheating?”
It was strange hearing her voice like this. Granted, I’d never heard her voice before today, but from what little both Jack and Catrina had told me about her, she was cold and indifferent, almost emotionless. That’s what I expected to hear in her voice, not the vitriolic anger I heard drip from every single word.
“You know why I ended it,” Jack snapped. “Jesus, you know I wouldn’t cheat. Do you really think so little of me?”
“I know the reason you gave,” Rachel snapped back, ignoring the second part of what Jack said. “Some ridiculously noble thing about how I needed to find someone who could give their whole heart to me. But, Jesus Christ, Jack, that was barely four months ago, and I come to your apartment—the apartment that you never let me move in no matter how many times I suggested it, the apartment that smells like sex, by the way—and you’ve got some woman—”
“She’s not some woman,” Jack interjected angrily, making my heart thump. “I’ve known Talia since college. We’ve been friends for ten fucking years, Ray, she’s not just some woman. And I meant what I said. Would you really want to spend your life with a husband who didn’t love you the way he should?”
“Yes! I wanted to spend my life with you.”
“You wanted to spend your life with the idea of me,” Jack said, sounding annoyed and exasperated. “You wanted us to have that perfect, storybook life on the outside that was nothing but coldness and resentment on the inside, just like our parents. We were not good for each other. My god, you hardly smiled when we were together. This is the most emotion I’ve seen you show about our relationship ever. You weren’t even this upset the day I ended it. So why now?”
There was a long pause where neither of them spoke, giving me the chance to consider how ridiculous and psychotic I looked and probably was, my ear pressed to the door of my lover’s apartment, listening to him argue with a woman who, up until four months ago, he was going to marry.
“I… Seeing you last weekend, it just…” Rachel’s voice got quieter and I strained my ears so I could hear every word. “We worked, Jack. It was simple. We both knew what we wanted and what we expected from each other.”
“We worked because neither of us was willing to give anything to the relationship,” Jack said, his voice quieter than before. “We worked because we were both just existing in a relationship that neither of us was truly invested in.”
“We were invested in the important things,” Rachel countered. “We weren’t worried about the frivolous things. We were worried about what was truly important.”
“Like merging our families and creating a joint bank account?” I could almost see the incredulity on Jack’s face. “That’s not love Rachel. That’s a business transaction.”
“But it worked for us.”
“Did we make each other happy?”
I sucked in a breath, and then immediately covered my mouth, fearful one of them would hear it through the door.
“What?” Rachel’s voice was almost a whisper, shocked, and I pressed my ear harder.
“It was simple because there was no passion. There’s no way you were happy being with me when both of us were passionless.”
“You made me happy,” Rachel said, and I could hear the tears in her voice. “It was in our way, and may not have been like everyone else, but I was happy.”
Neither of them spoke for a while, but when Rachel finally did, I held my breath.
“Is she the reason you left me?”
“Rachel.”
“Just tell me, Jack. Is she the reason?”
I didn’t know which answer would be more devastating.
Which is why I didn’t stick around to hear it.
I took the elevator down to the lobby, and I saw Patrick perk up when I rounded the corner.
I wanted to scream.
My skin felt tingly and too tight for my body, and I was jittery with nerves and adrenaline.
“Is she the reason you left me?”
On the one hand, the idea that Jack left Rachel because the feelings he had for me had lingered after all these years made me feel an overwhelming joy and a profound connection to Jack. I knew he wanted me, knew he wanted to be with me—he’d done nothing but show me that since our lunch date at the Green Hornet—but knowing that his feelings went so deep to cross time and other relationships made me feel… light. It made me want to throw myself into his arms and never let him let me go. But there was this bigger part of me that felt an unerring pressure knowing that that might be the case. How could I possibly live up to six years of expectations about what our relationship would be like? Would we finally be together for real, and he’d realize, over time, that I wasn’t worth the hype—that he’d built me up in his mind to be this incredible person he’d longed for but who was really just a grown ass woman too terrified to even commit to a pet?
“Would you like me to call you another cab, Ms. Emery?”
I looked at Patrick and then back out at the street in front of the building.
He’d just asked a simple question, but it suddenly felt like the most important question anyone had ever asked.
Stay.
Or go.
I could go. I could let Jack finish is apparently unfinished business with his ex. I could ignore his calls, let him realize that I wasn’t worth the trouble in the simplest way possible. By ignoring him. I could decide that my insecurity about Jack’s relationship with his ex-fiancée far outweighed my trust in and care for Jack. I could end it with him before he got the chance to end it with me. I could protect my heart the way I had for a decade.
Or I could stay. I could trust Jack. I could let myself be open to a future with him, let myself be open to the hurt because whatever potential hurt there might be today or days, weeks, or years from now didn’t matter in the face of how happy I was when I was just sitting in the same room with Jack. I could admit to myself that the pain of leaving right now would be so much worse than the delightful ache of staying. I could go back to the way things were—I could be Talia, musician, friend, and woman who never settled down with a partner because men would screw you over every single time. Or I could be with Jack. I could stop denying that he was who I’d wanted for years, and he made me happier than I’d ever been. I could stay.
“Ma’am?”
“No, Patrick,” I said quietly. “I’m just going to wait down here for Jack to get done if that’s okay?”
Patrick beamed. “That’s fine by me, ma’am.” His grin took up his entire face, and I couldn’t help but return his smile. Patrick was totally Team Talia, and I adored him for it and wondered what Rachel had done when she’d come here in the past to make him root for me instead of her.
“Can I get you anything while you wait? We have water or coffee in our breakroom, and I’d be happy to bring you some.”
“No, I’m all right.” I sat down on one of the big, comfy lobby chairs, tucking my feet underneath me. I was going to take out my phone, but I realized it had died a while ago since I’d left it in my bag all night and day and hadn’t charged it since before I’d left for Catrina and Brody’s last night. So, instead I angled toward the concierge desk and spoke to Patrick.
“So, where’s home for you?”
“Southie, Ms. Emery. My family’s lived there for four generations. We came to Boston at the turn of the century and never left.”
I rested my chin on my arms on the back of the chair and listened to Patrick tell me about his family. I guessed he was maybe five to ten years older than Jack and me, while he told me about his ex-wife, who was an elementary school teacher and who had remarried a year ago. Patrick said he liked his wife’s new husband, which made no sense to me, especially when he told me it was his cousin.
“I didn’t really know him growing up. There are lots of O’Shaughnessy’s in Boston. It was a possibility she was going to marry another one of us.”
He had three kids—two girls and a boy, seventeen, sixteen, and nine—and he was beside himself with excite
ment when I asked if he had any pictures. His seventeen-year-old daughter was in her senior year of high school and was going to be starting at Boston University next fall, and his sixteen-year-old daughter was basically a volleyball star at their high school. His nine-year-old son was the spitting image of him, and Patrick puffed up with pride when I told him so. He told me that he and Maureen—his ex-wife—shared custody since they lived in the same neighborhood and it wasn’t too much of an adjustment for them to move from his house to their mom’s each week since they lived in the same school district.
We’d been talking for probably twenty or so minutes, and Patrick had just blushed when I’d asked him if he had a new woman in his life when the ding of the elevator interrupted his answer. Patrick slipped back into his professional demeanor, and I turned my head to see the tall, elegant, beautiful form of Rachel round the corner. She’d obviously been crying but still looked stunning, but when she saw me leaning against the counter that Patrick occupied, her face twisted into a nasty sneer and she scoffed.
She didn’t respond when Patrick told her to have a nice day, and she glided out of the lobby, her chin in the air without sparing either of us a second glance.
As soon as she was out of the building, Patrick turned to me and lifted one eyebrow but said nothing. I just shrugged and was about to ask him again about lady friends when there was a second ding.
It was like the heavens opened up when I saw him.
Jack looked harried and hadn’t even bothered to change out of his sweats and t-shirt. His hair was disheveled liked he’d run his hand through it several times, but when he saw me standing there and his face instantly lit up, he’d never looked more beautiful.