Stay with Me (Wait for You, #3)(138)

I glanced around the room, feeling my cheeks heat as my friends watched with avid interest, including Cam and Avery.

“But I know that’s not why you’re sitting in this hotel room instead of in my bed right now.”

Oh. My. God. My face went completely red.

Teresa pressed her lips together as her eyes lit up.

Time to nip that direction of conversation in the bud. He wanted to have this out in front of my friends, we were going to have this out. “You own Mona’s. You’ve owned Mona’s for over a year, and you never thought you should tell me this?”

His chest rose. “I planned on telling you. I was going to—”

“Is that what you were saying while I was in the hospital, about needing to talk to me about something? You’ve had time to tell me. Tons of time before that, like when I first showed up and was rummaging through the office!”

Jase’s head swung back to Jax, as in, the ball was now in his court.

He didn’t respond immediately, which was okay, because now I was gearing up for a whole onslaught of words and questions and maybe a little bit of cursing, but when he spoke, for the second time in one night my entire world was rocked.

“I’ve known you for over a year,” he said, and the tension drained out of his shoulders, as if some kind of weight were lifting off him. “I’m not talking about knowing you through what Clyde or your mom has told me. I knew you. I’d seen you before you even knew I existed.”

I opened my mouth as confusion poured into me. “What?”

“The first time I saw you was last spring, over a year ago. You were outside of your dorm, walking to class,” he said, and I suddenly felt like I needed to sit down. Everyone in the room had faded to the background. It was just him and me. “I was there with your mom. It wasn’t the last time. Every couple of months, when Mona would be sober for a day or two, she wanted to see you. So I would drive her down to see you, because I know . . . I know what it’s like to not get that second chance. You know that. So I’d bring her down. Once you were outside of another building talking to her.” He jerked his chin at Teresa. “You were there with another guy. The three of you until Jase showed up.”

Oh my goodness, my legs felt weak. My thoughts cycled back and there was a good chance he was talking about Brandon.

“The last time was in the spring. You were sitting on a bench by yourself outside what I think was the library. You were reading. And each time I brought your mother down there, she never followed through. She didn’t have the courage to try to make amends for any of the shit she pulled, but she wanted to. It just never panned out, because you always looked so happy.” He exhaled slowly. “You always looked so damn happy. Smiling. Laughing. Your mom didn’t want to mess with that.”

I took a step back, finding it hard to stand still.

“Each trip, she talked about you and it was real, you know? She wasn’t high or messed up. It’s how I knew about everything. It wasn’t Clyde and it wasn’t when she was drunk, even though sometimes she would talk about you then, too, but she really talked about you when she was sober. She found out you were majoring in nursing and she wasn’t surprised by that. She told me once that you’d grown close to the nurses when you were in the hospital.”

I closed my eyes against the unsteady rush. That was true, what Mom had said. I had grown close to the nurses, and now I knew how Mom had known about my major. She’d been to Shepherd, with Jax.

“All those times she came, she came to talk to me?” I asked, and my voice sounded incredibly small.

“Yeah, she did. She recognized her faults and f*ckups more than I think anyone gets,” he said, and when I opened my eyes, he was still watching me. “She never wanted the bar life for you. She knew that the likelihood of her being around for a while wasn’t good. When she knew I’d take the bar off her hands, would make it good, she sold it to me. She didn’t want you to even have it as an option.”

I really needed to sit down.

He wasn’t done. “I didn’t tell you about this, because I didn’t know how you’d feel knowing your mom had come to see you. You two weren’t on great terms, and explaining this makes me come off as a creep, so it wasn’t something I was really looking forward to doing, but I was.”

“Totally not a creep,” whispered an awed Teresa.

His lips twitched for a moment and then he refocused on me. “Each time I saw you, I felt like . . . I felt like I knew you a little bit better. I never talked to you but seeing you always smiling or laughing . . . or being peaceful . . .” He shook his head, and my heart spasmed. “There’s something about that . . . it drew me in, Calla. Fuck. I fell for you before you even knew my name.”

Oh, holey moley. Tears rushed my eyes and his face blurred.

“And I should’ve told you about Mona’s. I was going to that day in the office, but when you’d said you’d sell it, I didn’t think you’d care. And then when I realized that even though you never said it, I knew the bar meant a lot to you.” He took a step forward, his progress tracked by everyone in the room. “I didn’t know how to break that to you. I’ve honestly been struggling with the idea of keeping it. The place gave me purpose when I got back home after drifting, but it didn’t feel right. Not with you here. Not with me really knowing you.”