by Maise, Ella
“Rose—”
“I love him, Sally,” I admitted, cutting off whatever she was about to say. “I love him, but I’m not ready to act like what he did didn’t hurt me or that it wasn’t wrong. I need him to understand what he did. I need him to take the time to think it through, and if that means he wants to come and wait outside or something, he is free to do whatever he wants.”
“So it’s not over. It’s over for now, but it’s not over.”
I thought her words over as I watched Jack talking to someone on his phone. He didn’t see me watching him, taking in my fill, but his eyes were definitely on the coffee shop.
“I miss him,” I conceded into the silence.
Sally pushed her arm through mine and rested her head on my shoulder. “Owen?”
He looked at us over his shoulder.
“I need you to start being romantic now,” Sally ordered, and my lips tipped up. She still hadn’t given up on him, and I thought Owen secretly enjoyed her attention.
I cleared my throat before they started their usual back and forth. “If you happen to or decide to take coffee to Jack, don’t forget Raymond. Jack likes my—the lemon bars, and Raymond likes the triple chocolate brownies.”
Sally snorted. “Right. I give it a week before you cave.”
I gave her a murderous look. “Keep dreaming.”
An hour later, I wasn’t sure if I was more annoyed with myself because my eye kept wandering over to where Jack was standing, or if I was just annoyed with him for breaking my focus at work. I decided to head to Sally’s place so I could cook us dinner as a thank you for letting me stay with her.
The second I stepped outside, my heart started pounding in my chest. Jack straightened up the moment he saw me. I stood just a few feet away from him as we studied each other. If he had walked forward and said something, I wasn’t sure what I would’ve done. Maybe, like Sally had said, I would have caved, but he didn’t. So, I did…sort of, still leaving a healthy amount of space between us, enough for four people to easily walk through, actually.
“What are you doing here, Jack?” I asked, raising my voice just a little.
“Wanted to see you.”
I opened my arms at my sides. “Now you did. Goodbye.”
He was about to take a step forward when a group of girls walked between us, successfully blocking him.
“How are you feeling?” he asked when it was just us again.
“Oh, perfect. Just perfect. Having the best time of my life.”
“I meant your head, your nose. Are you still getting dizzy? Headaches? You look tired.”
I tilted my head to the side, narrowing my eyes. “Thank you. As you know, it’s my default to look bad. You look like hell yourself.”
His jaw clenched, a muscle ticking visibly. “You need to take better care of yourself,” he forced out, his eyes blazing, as if he had any right to be angry with me.
“No.” My eyes still on him, I shook my head. “Don’t do that. You don’t get to act like you’re worried about me, Jack.” I looked to the left and then the right. “There is no one around who knows us, so you can stop the pretending.”
We studied each other in silence. I wasn’t sure if this would be the last time I’d ever see him. He could just wake up the next day and say, The hell with it, she isn’t—or, even worse—she wasn’t worth the trouble anyway. I had my fun with the business deal marriage. Now it’s time to move on. The thought alone scared the bejesus out of me, but I wasn’t ready to ignore everything and act like he hadn’t hurt me either. Therein lay our problem.
“Go home, Jack,” I said quietly. “You have no reason to be here.”
In the great scheme of things, we were nothing more than two people who had passed each other while walking through their lives. Couples broke up every day, and we were not special in that regard either. You cried yourself to sleep then woke up and went to work. When you repeated the cycle enough times, one day you woke up and suddenly it didn’t matter all that much. New people walked alongside you and eventually you forgot the ones you left behind.
When he didn’t deny what I’d said, I let out a long breath, looked at his eyes for a moment longer to remember, and finally turned to leave.
“I don’t have a home to go back to anymore, Rose.”
I stopped, but didn’t look at him.
“You’re my home,” he finished.
My eyes filling with tears, I walked away.
And he let me.
So we ended as we’d begun, nothing but two complete strangers.
Closer to midnight, after Sally had gone to bed and I was getting ready to start another sleepless night, I opened the curtains and the window so I could breathe in the cold air. Someone was walking across the street and for a moment I thought it was Jack, but then he walked under the light and I realized it was just a stranger.
For a moment I was shocked, why would it hurt not to see him? Why would I be disappointed?
During the week, he came to the coffee shop around closing time twice. He leaned against his car, then when Ray left he leaned against the lamp pole. Every time he showed up he made it harder to remember why I was so angry at him. He paced and waited. When I came out with Sally but didn’t stop to talk to him, he left.
Then he disappeared for several days.
It was the eighth day of our break up and we were getting ready to close when he showed up again. All three of us were in the front. Owen and I were clearing out the dishes on the counter and taking them back into the kitchen, and Sally was stacking up clean coffee mugs and the to-go cups next to the espresso machine. We only had two customers in the shop, and both of them were regulars working on their laptops.
The bell rang, and I looked up to see someone bundled up in her coat and scarf walk in and head straight toward one of the customers, so I got back to work.
Sally was the first one to notice Jack.
“Rose.”
I looked at her over my shoulder.
“Yes?”
“He’s here,” she whispered urgently, and I looked around in confusion until my eyes landed on him. My pulse picked up and my heart started to get all excited, but something was wrong. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking from his facial expression, because if there was one thing Jack Hawthorne was good at, it was hiding his emotions. Dread and excitement over seeing him settled over me anyway as my heart betrayed me.
He stood on the other side of the counter and I did nothing but stare at him, my heart pounding in my ears.
I heard Sally clear her throat. “Hi, Jack.”
He didn’t take his eyes off me when he answered. “Hello, Sally. You’re good, I hope.”
“Yes. Great.”
Then it was back to silence again.
Feeling my chest tighten, I swallowed and wiped my hands on my jeans, managing to look away from his eyes.
I saw his hand tighten around a stack of papers he was holding, creating a tube.
“Uh, Owen did you take the—” I started in a low, rough voice, but Jack cut me off before I could finish my sentence.
“If I could talk to you in private, Rose?”
I looked back up at him, trying my best not to show that I had forgotten how to breathe like a normal person in the last minute or so. I cleared my throat and nodded.
“Kitchen?”
I nodded again and watched as he moved around the counter and walked straight back there. Sally bumped her shoulder into mine and smiled when I gave her a startled look.
“You miss him. Be nice. I think you’ve made him suffer long enough. You suffered enough as well.”
I didn’t respond, just turned to Owen. “I’ll, uh, I’ll be back in a minute. If you could just—”
“I have plenty of things to do out here. Go make up or whatever so we can breathe easy again.”
I hit him on the shoulder as I walked past him into the kitchen. I only had enough time to take a deep breath before I was standing across from Jack ag
ain, this time with the island between us. I took in his dark grey suit, crisp white shirt, and black tie. He was made to wear suits and break my heart.
I reached for a kitchen towel just to have something in my hands and looked away. While I was busy trying to find the right words to apologize for what I had said at his office, Jack spoke up.
“You can’t even look at me, can you?”
Startled by his words, I met his gaze. Was that what he thought?
“Jack, I—”
“It doesn’t matter now,” he continued. “I came to give you this in person.” He unrolled the file in his hands and put it on the island, right next to the triple chocolate brownies, then pushed it my way.
My eyes still on him, I reached for it.
“What is this?” My voice came out like a whisper.
When he didn’t answer, I looked down and turned the first page.
Shocked by what I was reading, my eyes flew up to his.
“Divorce papers,” he said calmly.
I was anything but calm. My mind in overdrive, my eyes tried to follow the words and sentences, but it was all a jumbled mess in front of me.
“You want a divorce?” I croaked out, the papers slightly trembling. I tightened my grip to hide it from his eyes.
“Yes. It’s the right thing…for you.”
My brows drew together and some heat started to come back to my limbs. I forced myself to drop the papers on the island and take a step back as if they would come alive and bite my fingers off.
This time I met his gaze straight on, the dread and excitement turning into anger. “For me. How about you? What do you get out of it?”
He tilted his head to the side, his eyes slightly narrowing in a calculating manner. “It’s the right thing for me too.”
A little dazed, I nodded. Barely able to speak through the tightness in my throat, I said, “I see.” Impressive word choices, I know.
I was so out of it that I didn’t even notice him taking out a pen from his suit jacket and offering it to me.
I stared at him as if he had sprouted another head.
“You want me to sign it…now.”
It wasn’t a question, but he treated it as such.
“Yes. I’d like to get it done right now.”
“You’d like to get it done right now,” I echoed.
“Preferably.”
That word—that one annoying word pushed me over the edge of worry and guilt into anger.
Preferably.
I decided right then and there that it was the most ridiculous and annoying word in the world. I didn’t touch the pen. I didn’t pick up the papers.
I crossed my arms against my chest. “The right thing to do would’ve been to be honest with me from the beginning.”
Cool as a cucumber, he pushed his hands into the pockets of his pants as red-hot fury licked over my skin.
“You’re right, which is why I’d like you to sign the papers.”
“No.”
His brows drew together as he looked at me from across the space. “No?”
“No.” I was very good at being stubborn. I was like a cow—if I didn’t want to be moved, you couldn’t move me, no matter who or what came.
“Rose—”
“No.”
He gritted his teeth. “Why?”
I shrugged, feigning nonchalance. “I don’t think I feel like signing anything today. Maybe some other time.”
“Rose, it needs to be today.”
“Really?” I asked, making a thinking face and then grimacing. “Ah, I’m so sorry. I’m busy today. Maybe some other time.”
He looked truly taken back. “Why are you doing this? I thought this was what you wanted.”
No wonder I had thought him to be a cement block in the beginning—not only did he not show his emotions, he didn’t understand them even when they slapped him in the face.
Something wet slid down my cheek and, appalled at myself for crying, I wiped at it angrily with the back of my hand. That’s when Jack’s face changed and his entire body tensed. He lost the frown, the anger, the disbelief and hid behind his mask again.
I wiped off another wayward tear and lifted my chin high.
He shook his head then rubbed the bridge of his nose. Next thing I knew, he was moving toward me. I did my best to breathe in and out normally and stayed put. Even when he was standing right next to me, his chest almost resting against my shoulder, I didn’t move. I stopped breathing too.
“Rose,” he started in a low voice, his head bent closer to mine.
I stopped trying to clear the tears away. They were only angry tears, and maybe stress, nothing more, and the same reasons applied for the trembling, too.
When I felt his lips against my temple, I closed my eyes. “You’re breaking my heart, baby, trying to hold on to something that should’ve never been. Sign the divorce papers, Rose. Please.”
“I won’t,” I whispered.
“Why?” he asked again.
“I won’t.”
I felt the gentle touch of his fingertips as he gripped my chin and turned my head. I opened my eyes and looked straight into the dark blue eyes of the man I had irrevocably fallen in love with.
I wanted to say so much to him.
“Do it. I’ll send someone to pick up the signed papers.”
He held on to my chin and seemed to map out my face in his mind as his eyes touched every inch. Then his hand slipped forward, cupping the side of my cheek.
My eyes closed on their own as he pressed a kiss to my forehead then the next second he was gone. I was too scared to open my eyes, to face the reality of the hell that had been my life for the last week.
He could send his entire firm to my door if he wanted to. I was not going to sign those damn papers.
“Rose? It didn’t go well, did it?”
I took a few deep breaths and opened my eyes, feeling more determined than ever.
Sally was standing right where Jack had stood just moments earlier. I picked up the papers, holding them out for her to take. “He wants a divorce.”
She seemed to choke up before she took the file from my hand. “But, he said…how would—did you sign them?”
I shook my head. “Nope.”
“Are you going to?”
“Nope.”
That evening when we closed the coffee shop, no matter how hard I looked, I couldn’t find Jack anywhere, and I took his absence as an invitation.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Jack
She hadn’t signed the papers.
I knew that because the guy I’d sent to pick them up had returned empty-handed. So, I headed out to face her myself—again—and when I found her, this time I wouldn’t walk away until I got a damn signature. The divorce had to happen, and it had to happen soon.
But before I could deal with Rose, I needed to make a quick stop.
I knocked on his door and hoped he’d be inside.
He opened after a few seconds and looked shocked to see me.
“How do you know where I live?” Joshua Landon asked with a furious expression on his face.
I smiled at him and blocked the door with my foot before he could shut it in my face and shouldered my way in.
“You couldn’t stay away from her, could you? Your greed will cost you, Joshua.”
“Listen to me you—”
I wasn’t there to have a nice long chat. I had better things to do so instead of wasting my time I grabbed him by his shirt before he could back away and ignoring his loud protests punched him straight in the face.
At least that managed to shut him up. He staggered and one hand gripping his nose, the other holding onto the wall behind him he barely managed to stay upright.
“You fucking son of a bitch,” he growled.
“This is your last warning. If I ever see you break her heart again, or hear about it, I’ll kill you.”
Before I could make good on my words, I turned around and forced mys
elf to walk away.
After my quick visit to Joshua I went straight to Madison Avenue, because I knew she’d still be at the coffee shop, working at four PM, but she wasn’t where she was supposed to be. Next, I tried the address Sally gave me, where she’d been staying this whole time. She wasn’t there either.
The apartment was on the first floor of an old building where anyone walking past could easily see inside and just as easily break in if they had a mind to do so. She would be the first thing they’d see, sleeping on the couch, right in front of the door, which made me impossibly angry. I already thought of myself as a damn stalker, why hadn’t I waited here at night? I would’ve officially earned that title at least.
Somewhere between worried and slightly pissed off, I doubled back to the coffee shop. When I walked in, both Owen and Sally snapped to attention.
Then they gave me more lies.
“She hasn’t come back since you left.”
“If we knew where she was we’d tell you.”
“Oh, I hope she’s okay—she didn’t look okay when she left.”
It didn’t matter how terse I was with them, they didn’t budge. Since I didn’t want to scare off their customers, I couldn’t very well demand an answer either. Good for Rose since it seemed like she’d made good employee choices, but not so good for me, unfortunately.
I even walked through goddamn Central Park just in case she thought hiding there in the freezing cold would be a good idea. It wouldn’t surprise me in the least. I couldn’t go to her other friends, at least not until I could have our investigator dig up their addresses for me, but I knew it wouldn’t come to that. She barely saw them anyway. No matter where she was hiding, she’d come back to her precious coffee shop in the morning, and if that meant I had to wait outside or in a car until she showed up before the sun was even up, so be it. As long as she showed up, I didn’t care what I had to do. I was going to get a goddamn signature on that paper.
With no other options, I had Raymond drive me back to the apartment.
“Good evening, Steve. Everything all right?”
He smiled at me. “Good evening, sir. Yes, it’s a good night. How was your day?”