Until We Touch (Fool's Gold #15)(55)

Jack thought longingly of life on a deserted tropical island. One with a couple of coconut trees he could use for food. Just him and the ocean. It would be a good life. Lonely, but he would survive.

“No,” he said firmly and opened the door to her office.

“Are you sure? Because we could do it right here.”

He slammed the door behind him and started walking.

CHAPTER TWELVE

“YOU HAVE TO fix this,” Jack said.

Taryn looked up from her computer. “No, I don’t. It’s your problem.”

Technically the problem was Larissa’s, he thought, but did that matter? He was stuck with the consequences.

“You created it,” she continued. “You and Larissa are enmeshed in some pseudomarriage, anyway. Neither of you is moving forward. The difference is, she had the sense to recognize it.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Taryn stood and walked out from behind her desk. She’d already kicked off whatever ridiculous shoes she’d worn into the office and was barefoot. She’d painted her toes purple. Who did that?

“Jack, you’re a good guy. A little too good. You don’t have a lot of annoying flaws. But you also don’t get involved.”

“Love is for suckers.”

“You don’t mean that.” She touched his chest. “Love is amazing.”

“I don’t want to hear about Angel.”

“Then I won’t say anything about him. My point is falling in love is part of the human condition. You’re trying to escape the inevitable and that’s not going well.”

“I don’t need to fall in love. I have all the connection I need.”

“No, you don’t. You have friends who love you, but that’s different. Don’t you want one special person who will always be there for you?”

“No.”

“Liar.”

“I like being alone.”

She shook her head. “That would be more believable if you were alone. But you’re not. You have Larissa. She’s the buffer who stands between you and the world. You get to play at things and not be involved on any level where you might get hurt. While that works for you, it’s no longer working for her. She’s in love with you and while she’s in love with you, she can’t find a man interested in forever and fall for him.”

Nothing he wanted to hear. “So her mother was right.”

“So it seems. Now this problem is yours. You’re going to have to figure out a way to solve it.”

* * *

BEING IN LOVE with Jack was less fun than Larissa had hoped. For one thing, now that he knew about her feelings, she rarely saw him. His ducking into offices and turning around and going the other way when he spotted her in the hall would have been funny—except it hurt too much for her to laugh.

She missed him, missed hanging out with him, talking to him. They hadn’t had dinner together, although Percy had come over with takeout twice. Takeout she was sure Jack had paid for.

Even worse, Jack hadn’t been in for any of his massages, which meant he had to be in pain. If he stood still long enough to listen, she was willing to explain that whatever her personal feelings, her work as his masseuse was separate from that. He needed help with his body.

She sat in her tiny office and tried to figure out how things had fallen apart so quickly. While she wanted to blame her mother, the other woman had only been speaking the truth. She’d seen what no one else had seen.

Which was great information but didn’t solve the problem.

Taryn walked into her office. Her friend looked nervous and wary—two emotions Larissa didn’t associate with her.

“What?” Larissa demanded. “Is someone hurt?”

“No,” Taryn said slowly. “Look, don’t shoot the messenger, okay? I’m telling you but I had no part in it. If he’d asked, I would have told him it was a disastrous idea.”

Larissa blinked at her. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“You will. Come on.”

Larissa followed her friend down the long hallway. They made a turn and ended up at the massage room. Larissa was about to ask what they were doing there, when she heard noises from inside. Noises that sounded suspiciously like music and conversation.

“Which of you is playing around in my personal space?” she asked as she opened the door. Because what she expected to find was Sam or Kenny doing something ridiculous. What she saw instead was Jack on her massage table while another woman worked on his shoulder.

The sharp pain of betrayal cut through to her heart. It wasn’t just that he’d gone to someone else, she thought frantically. It was that he’d violated what was theirs. He’d brought a stranger into a place that was supposed to be only for family.

The masseuse moved to cover Jack with the sheet. “Excuse me, we’re in the middle of a treatment. Could you please leave?”

Larissa didn’t recognize the woman. She must have come in from Sacramento. A long way to drive, she thought, still trying to process the ache filling her. Her whole body hurt and she had the strangest need to cry. Stupid tears, she told herself. Stupid man.

Larissa moved into the room. “You’re using the wrong music,” she said, her voice sounding like someone else was speaking. She wasn’t moving right, either. It was as if she were physically disconnected from her body.