I shake my head.
“I had to explain to her why she has her last name, and I have another,” she says.
“So adopt her.”
“I’m going to.” She lifts her chin. “I’m going to give her the stability I never had.”
“Which is what you should do. What we should do.”
She smiles sadly. “If you want to be in her life, that’s fine. I won’t forbid you from seeing her. I’m not cruel. But …”
My jaw tenses. I brace myself for an impact that I don’t feel ready for.
“But what?” I ask.
“But I don’t think you’re ready to handle Rosie and me long-term.”
I tug at my hair. The roots pull from the shafts. The pain feels like a relief in comparison to what’s going on inside my body.
“You are out of your mind,” I tell her, fuming. “You don’t trust me?”
“It’s not that.”
“Oh, yes, it is. That’s exactly what this is. You think I’m going to go all Shawn or whatever the fuck’s name was who made you feel unworthy. So you don’t just think—you expect that to happen with me.” I narrow my eyes. “Thanks.”
She doesn’t move a muscle. “Boone—”
“Has it occurred to you that you trusted me more when I was an absolute stranger standing across from you in the kitchen?” I raise my brows. “You got in my car and let me take you to the police station, and you’d spent no time with me prior. I could’ve been a legit nutjob, and you trusted me. But you won’t trust me now?”
The words hang in the air between us. I’m not sure which of us they hurt the worst.
She wipes her cheeks with her eyes because the tears are back again. I clench my jaw so I don’t lose my control.
My family has always had so few expectations from me. I’m the fun guy at dinner. I show up when needed. I sit in meetings and go through the motions and surprise everyone on occasion with something brilliant. But contribute? Even though I’ve shown I can, they’re still surprised when I do.
And now, when I step up in the biggest way possible, even Jaxi, who barely knows me, thinks I’m incompetent.
Untrustworthy.
“I don’t know why I expected you to believe in me,” I tell her. “But I did. I thought out of all the people in the world, you were different.”
“I do believe in you.”
“Not from where I’m standing.” I gulp a breath of air to help steady me. “I thought today was different, you know? Wade was actually nice to me and let me take the lead. We used my game plan. And we got a contract on a piece of property that could end up being one of, if not the biggest, deal in our company’s history, and it was my thing.” I take another deep breath. “And I wanted to come home and tell you.”
She reaches for me, but this time, it’s me who pulls away.
“No one expects anything out of me,” I say. “I’m the goof. I’m the playboy. I’m the one who no one depends on. I thought it was different between us, and I really fucking loved it.”
She uses the end of her shirt to try to dry her face, but it’s futile. The tears come faster than she can catch them.
It breaks my heart. It tears me up inside. Adrenaline pushes through my veins and keeps me going enough that I don’t pass out.
“I’m just trying to do what you want,” she says, her voice muffled through her shirt. “I realized what your plan was today that you were talking about when Danny showed up, and I thought it would be easier than if you tried to pussyfoot around it.”
“To pussyfoot around what? Danny was here to show us—”
I thought Anjelica said it was an apartment complex, so I came prepared to discuss that. You probably thought I was crazy asking to meet with you over an apartment rental.
And Jaxi is going to sign a lease tomorrow so she can move out.
She thinks I sent Danny over here to subtly convince her to leave.
Shit. Shit, shit, shit.
I knew that about her the first day I met her. It’s something I had to work around every day. She’s always waiting for things to go bad and holds a piece of herself back just in case she needs to run.
And she’s running.
“I …” I open my mouth to tell her that Danny was coming over so that I could buy the entire complex, not an apartment. That I wanted her to see if she liked managing the apartments, not living in them.
But I don’t. I don’t tell her that.
If I did, it would fix things. At least for now. But the problem isn’t this misunderstanding.
The problem is that she has wounds and scars and fears that run so deep from years of abuse and neglect. She can’t turn it off. She can’t ignore the bells going off in her head because she didn’t put them there. It’s a survival mechanism when it’s all boiled down.
I could try to love her through it. I could try to be the man I think she wants and needs. But can I do it? I can’t even go to the office every day for a week and stay all eight hours.
My shoulders fall as the reality of the situation slams into me, breaking my heart.
Jaxi needs more—more than I can give her. Even if I try.
So, even if I clarify this and explain what happened, it won’t matter in the end. We’ll be right back here over something else, and I’ll be scrambling to be something that I’m ultimately just not.
My energy slips away, my will to fight gone. My ego and pride are wounded, and I know, without a doubt, that I’ll never match the past few weeks that I spent with her and Rosie.
“When do you sign your lease?” I ask.
“Tomorrow.”
I nod. “Stay here until then.”
“Boone, no.”
I take her in for the last time. The beauty of her eyes, the slight slope of her shoulder. The mole on the inside of her elbow that she presses her thumb against when she’s nervous. The way her lips plump when she’s crying and how she stands with her toes slightly pointed toward each other.
“I’ll stay with my brothers. It’s easier.”
I close my eyes and pray that when I open them, something is different. But she’s still standing in front of me with a stream of tears and a look on her face that tells me that nothing has changed.
“I love you, Jaxi. I always will.”
Her lips part, and my heart skips a beat.
But she doesn’t speak.
And neither do I.
There’s nothing left to say, nothing I can do.
I gave her everything I have.
I don’t know why I’m surprised that it wasn’t enough.
Twenty-Three
Boone
“Why doesn’t he get any decent channels?” I roll my eyes at Oliver’s shitty options before turning the television off.
I don’t want to watch TV anyway. I just want a distraction. I want one so badly—need one so badly—that I even texted Ford Landry to see if he was looking for a workout partner tonight.
If anyone can distract you … and punish you, it’s Ford. He’s a beast of a man.
My text to him went unanswered.
I start to get off the couch to search for alcohol when Oliver’s garage door opens. I wait until I hear my brother enter the kitchen.
“Hey,” I say, walking around the corner.
Oliver jumps a mile. “What the ever-loving fuck?” He blows out a breath. “Why are you here? In my house?” He looks me up and down. “And in my fucking clothes?”
He slams his briefcase down on the counter.
“Easy there, Ollie. You’ll break something.”
“If I do, it’s mine.” He jerks his tie off and tosses it on the counter too. “Answer me.”
“What about?”
He looks at me as if I should know.
I march past him and open the liquor cabinet.
“Help yourself,” he says, sarcasm dripping from the words.
“I plan on it.” I grab a bottle of whiskey and twist it open.
“If you drink
from that, I’ll kill you.”
“Promise?” I look at him and raise my brows in a challenge.
He plants both hands on the counter and takes me in. I consider testing him. I think long and hard about opening the top of the bottle and gulping a few mouthfuls down but decide not to risk it. I don’t think Oliver could kill me fast enough. I’d probably end up in more pain than I am now.
If that’s possible.
The hole in my chest—the spot where my heart used to be—has deepened over the evening. As night set in and the sky got dark, so did my spirits.
How the hell did I get here? How did my life disintegrate in the blink of an eye? Is this what happens to adults? Is this why everyone who takes anything seriously ends up in misery?
“Enough bullshit,” Oliver says. “What’s going on?”
“I have nowhere else to go.”
“You have a house. I’ve been there.”
I think he’s trying to wound me.
I walk around the counter and sit on a barstool facing him. He must take pity on me—or the fact that he had a pink shirt in his closet and now I know, so he wants to play nice so I don’t tell anyone. Either way, he gets two glasses from a cabinet and slides me one.
“Rosie is at Mom’s,” I say. “Or she was. Holt and Blaire are too uptight, Coy and Bellamy are too … in love,” I say, choking the words out. “And then Wade.”
“What about Wade?”
“I’m not going there,” I scoff and pour us each two fingers of whiskey. “I’m trying to find the will to live tonight.”
Oliver takes one glass off the counter. He looks at me curiously.
“Take a drink,” he says, raising his glass to me, “and then tell me what the fuck is going on.”
We both take a hefty gulp of the amber liquor. It burns as it coats my throat.
Oliver hisses through his teeth, breathing out the heat of the drink.
“Now,” he says, setting his glass back on the counter, “fill me in.”
I do. I ramble for half an hour straight, telling him about the apartment complex, and Danny, about how I was late because I was looking at puppies for Rosie tonight. How I was trying to decide this afternoon if marriage should realistically be on the table this fast and how I was erring on yes, but now my relationship is over.
I hang my head.
“You were really thinking about marrying her?” he asks.
“Yeah. And I know we all made fun of Holt behind his back when he was all gung-ho over Blaire, but I get it now.” I pause. “When you know, you know.”
“And you knew.”
“Well, I still know, but she doesn’t. So I guess I knew. Not know anymore.”
Oliver laughs and pulls the bottle away from me. “No more whiskey for you.”
The heavenly warmth delivered by the drink fills my veins. It’s a Band-Aid covering the gaping wound in my heart, but I’m fine with taking the easy way out tonight.
Oliver sits beside me, wrapping his hands around his glass. We sit quietly.
“I think I’m done being an adult,” I say sadly. “It was a good ride.”
Amusement washes across Oliver’s face. “You can’t just quit.”
“I already did.”
He laughs. “You did not. Stop acting like a baby and grow some balls.”
I look at him aghast.
He laughs harder. “Fine. Some real talk then.” He downs the rest of his whiskey and sets the glass down hard. “If I had to get into a bar fight, which brother do you think I’d take with me?”
“Not Wade.”
He shakes his head. “Definitely not. I’d take you.”
“Makes sense. There’s a badass under this pretty face.”
He ignores me. “If I had to go to Vegas, which brother—”
“Me. This one is me. One-hundred-percent.”
“Who do you think I’d leave my kids with someday, if I ever have them, which isn’t likely?”
I immediately think of Rosie. My chest constricts. Hard.
“You,” he says. “And who do you think I know will come up with some out-of-the-box solution to solve a problem that the rest of us can’t work out?” He leans closer. “You.”
I lean back until the stool gets wobbly.
“What’s your point?” I ask.
“My point is that you don’t give yourself enough credit.”
“Why are you saying this?” I ask. “What difference does it make if I leave here feeling like we had a kumbaya moment? Not that I don’t appreciate it. And not that I’m not going to use it against you someday.”
He grins. “I’m bringing it up, asshole, because this isn’t who you are. You don’t roll over and take shit. You don’t cry because you didn’t get your way.”
“Yes, I do.”
“Well, sometimes.” He smiles at me. “Is this girl what you want?”
I nod.
“Then make some Boone magic and figure it out.”
It sounds so easy. And I do like the sound of Boone magic. But it’s not that easy, and quite frankly, I don’t know if it’s smart.
He sighs. “You’re doing the same thing she is right now.”
“How do you know that she’s contemplating mixing whiskey with tequila?”
“Stop making jokes. I’m being serious.”
I twist in my seat. “I’m being serious too.”
His hands fold in front of him, catching his watch in the light. It, too, reminds me of my girls.
My girls.
A sting zips through me again.
“What is your reaction based on?” he asks. “Why are you reacting this way?”
“Because this can never work out, and I can’t fix it. That fucking sucks, if you didn’t know.”
“Bullshit.”
I gape at him. “What do you mean bullshit?”
“You’re just being a crybaby. Typical baby of the family reaction,” he grumbles.
“That’s bullshit.” I rub a hand down my face. “No one expects anything from me. Not you, or Holt, or Mom—except that I’ll be over for dinner. And even that’s a shitty expectation.” I throw my hands up. “She … I thought she needed me and … I was somebody to her, you know? I really thought that maybe I could pull through and be the man. But I was wrong.”
Oliver sighs. “We all see it in you, Boone. As much as I hate to admit this, it’s you that closed the biggest deal in Mason history and probably the Greyshell one—if it’s not the biggest now. You don’t think we expect shit from you?” He rolls his eyes.
I need to think about this, but it’s not the point. I brush it off and hope I can remember it later.
“I tried my hardest to … be the best to her, and it wasn’t good enough. That’s why it hurts so much.” Hearing that out loud singes something deep inside me. It burns my core, chokes me out with smoke—has me cringing from the pain of the fire.
There’s nothing worse than realizing that you are the problem. Not a habit or a hair color or a way you do something. You. The very fiber of your being.
I lean up and grab the whiskey. Before Oliver can object, I pour myself more.
“Now, let’s play a game,” Oliver says. I can tell he’s going to be a dick by the tone of his voice. “What do we think Jaxi’s reaction is based on?”
I sip my drink and try not to think about it.
He hums the Jeopardy tune. I glare at him.
“Fine,” he says, sliding the bottle toward himself. “I’ll tell you.”
“I figured you would.”
The whiskey splashes into the glass.
“Jaxi is basing her reaction to this situation off what’s always happened to her.”
“I know this.”
“Then fucking listen.” He sighs, frustrated with me. “Everyone in her life has let her down. She reacted this way because this is her making what she thinks is inevitable happen. And here you are, rolling over like a damn pansy, and letting it happen because you’re scared.”
Either way, I nod. “I am scared.”
“Probably not half as scared as she is.” Oliver gets off his stool. “You need to get her back, little brother. Not tonight. Tonight, you won’t be going anywhere. Not after drinking and not in my shirt.”
“It’s pink,” I say, my words not quite as crisp as I’d like them to be.
A warm haze clouds my brain. I get off my stool too.
“Let her have the night,” Oliver says. “Let her think about things. A little time apart never hurt anyone.”
“Then what?”
“Then, tomorrow, you Boone swoon that shit.”
“Boone swoon that shit,” I repeat. I try to grin, but only half of my lips work.
“I’m going to order some food and then grab a shower,” he says. “You okay?”
I nod again. How do I Boone swoon that shit?
He clasps my shoulder and takes off downstairs. I hear his footsteps fall against the hardwood.
I lean against the bar and pour myself another drink.
I don’t know if he’s right.
I don’t know if he’s wrong.
But I know he probably made sense.
If I can remember what he said tomorrow, I’ll ponder it.
If not, I’ll be miserable forever.
Twenty-Four
Jaxi
Rosie throws her arm across my chest.
It’s the sixth time she’s done it tonight, and I give up trying to remove it.
I count stripes on the comforter. I made it to forty-seven the last time before a shadow crept across the room, and I lost my place.
My heart is so heavy. I now know what that saying means. It feels like it could tumble right out of my body and roll across the floor.
I wonder if it did, would it hurt any worse than it does right now?
“It’s not possible,” I whisper into the night.
Reckless (The Mason Family Series Book 3) Page 20