Losing Him (Mitchell Family #8)(25)

“I don’t want to lose this. I don’t want to lose you. I just love you so much, Jessie. I know you don’t feel that way about me. I’ve ruined our chance to be happy.” She kept crying harder and harder. There was only one thing left to do; one thing that could calm her down so she could savor the moment. “I’m not going anywhere.”

She shook her head. “Yes you are. You said it yourself. You only came here to help me deal with things. This isn’t real. You just feel sorry for me.”

I pulled her hands away from her face and intertwined our fingers. My lips were covered in her salty kisses as I tried to convince her that I was being serious. “You’re worth fighting for. Our family is worth fighting for.”

Finally she calmed down enough to hear what I was saying. “So, you want us to be a couple again?”

I shrugged. “Nothing is keeping us from being together. I don’t know about you, but I feel like a weight has been lifted off of my chest. I feel like I know the real you.”

For the first time in a long time, I was sure that I wanted to try.

Chapter 13


Heather


I lay in Jessie’s arms, holding on to the moment, because I knew it was about to come crashing down. He wasn’t going to settle for just what I told him. He deserved to know the whole truth. If he really loved me, maybe he could forgive me. Although, he’d said before that it had nothing to do with love.

This was the pivotal moment where I knew I was inexplicably saying goodbye to us ever being together again. I was basically ending our relationship by telling the truth. Nothing had ever hurt so much than thinking that he was going to hate me.

I ran my hands through his hair one last time. He opened his eyes and looked at me. “What’s wrong?”

“Jess, there’s more to the story. I wish there wasn’t, but it would just be a lie. I did something horrible that night that Ty came to my house and I need you to hear me out.”

He sat up on one elbow and looked at me. “So tell me.” While running his fingers through my long hair, I kissed the knuckles of his hand.

“I know you’re going to leave me.” I was already shaking. Jessie could only take so much and hearing what I’d done would send him over the edge.

“Just tell me. You have me naked in bed, for Christ sakes. Where am I going to go?”

I sat up straight and took a few deep breaths. “The night I drugged Ty, I didn’t just tell him that we’d slept together. I made sure there was proof of our encounter.”

“You said you didn’t sleep with him.”

“I didn’t! I swear! I called my friend and she came over. We took off his clothes and I did the same. Then she took pictures of us in bed together. You can use your imagination with that. They’ve all been destroyed, so there’s nothing for me to show you, not that you’d want to see that anyway. It wasn’t my proudest moment.”

He just sat there playing with strands of my hair. “So, that’s what you did to make him think it really happened? Damn, that’s evil. I get why he needed his brother-in-law to help clear his name. I bet his wife was pissed.”

It made me sick thinking about how I had acted. Jessie wasn’t understanding the complexity of the situation. He’d only seen me getting retribution. I opened my mouth to tell him about Miranda and the babies, but he leaned over and kissed me. I pulled away. “Don’t you want to hear the rest of the story?”

“I’ve waited all these years for you to trust me enough to tell me your darkest secrets. Now that you have, I’m tired of pretending I can just walk away from you. Hearing the truth has only made it more apparent that this is exactly where I need to be. I don’t condone what you did, Heather, but I can’t deny that I don’t want us to try and work it out. I’m tired of fighting with you. I’m tired of telling myself that the only way out is to walk away. What kind of man would I be if I did that to you, after everything you’ve been through? I’ve sat back and listened to you say how you didn’t deserve to be loved. I heard you tell me a story of a woman that revolved her life around someone that never wanted to be with her. I could hear the pain in your voice. I know he hurt you. I’m not going to be like him. I just want to know that you’re not going to keep anything else from me ever again. Can you promise me that?”

I heard him saying that he wanted to be with me, but the truth still stood between us. He didn’t know the extent of my actions. Somehow, seeing a light at the end of the tunnel twisted my arm. If I wanted a life with the father of my child, I had to drop the subject and bury it in the past. This was my chance at a new start with Jessie and Jacob. It was a risk that I had to take, because being in his arms was like nothing else that I’d ever experienced in my life. I wanted to hear those three words again coming out of his mouth. I was so close to having it. So, I did what the old Heather would have done. I smiled and pretended to be content with still having a lie between us. “Okay, I promise.” I leaned in and kissed him passionately, letting my tongue side over his briefly. “Now, where were we?”

As much as I wanted to focus on being in bed and naked with Jessie, my heart was torn between the truth and living another lie, after I’d promised that there wouldn’t be anymore. It was hard to admit to myself that I had a chance at being happy. I’d lost my mother and hope of being able to raise my son with his father. Now, if I played my cards right, I could have something to hold on to.