Need You for Keeps (Heroes of St. Helena, #1)(77)

Jonah didn’t move or speak, just kept staring at her as if trying to figure out how he’d been so wrong. The longer the silence stretched on, the closer she came to tears. But she’d made this mess on her own, so she’d cry about it alone.

Jonah looked over at Warren, who looked like he was already filling out the paperwork, then shook his head. “You could have come to me and this would have all been avoided.”

“I know,” Shay said, her voice shaky. “I wish I would have, but that was me trying to do the right thing. I’m not sorry for saving the kittens—they would have died—but I am sorry you got caught in the middle.”

“I’m not caught in the middle, Shay. I’m f*cked.” His voice was shaking too and that made the tears come closer to the surface. Jonah was the strongest, most sure man she’d ever met, and she’d rocked his belief in her—and himself. “You broke the law and made me an accessory. If I arrest you, you will go to jail while the fine is being set and you’ll probably lose the rescue. If I don’t, I’m not doing my job.”

A job that meant the world to him.

The shelter meant the world to her too, but he meant more. Once word got out that she was dealing in stolen animals, the fallout would be bad, but she would recover. It would be devastating and heartbreaking, but she’d handle it and move on. She’d done it a million times before and she could do it again.

What she couldn’t handle was Jonah going against who he was for her. Personal experience told her there was no coming back from that.

“I know,” she said quietly, then held her hands out to Jonah, angry that they were trembling. “I guess I finally get to see your cuffs. It wasn’t how I imagined it happening, but I guess that’s the problem with imagining. In the end it’s kind of like wishing—nothing ever turns out the way we want.”

He didn’t reach for his cuffs. “Why are you doing this?”

That was easy. “Because I protect what I love.”

“That’s just it, Shay,” he said quietly. “I don’t think you know what love is.”

She looked at him for a long time, playing over and over what he’d said, praying she’d misunderstood, then the tears finally spilled over.

“This time I thought for sure I had figured it out.” Thought that she’d finally experienced what was so easy for her to give, yet so impossible for her to receive. “I guess I was wrong.”





Jonah rolled up into his drive an hour shy of midnight, beyond exhausted, and trying to shake off the gnawing in his gut. Just like he had every night that week. A few steps up his driveway he froze and knew shaking it off wasn’t an option tonight.

Sticking out of his mailbox—like a big f*cking neon sign telling him that the ignore what you can’t fix method he’d adopted as of late was leading to a dead end—was an envelope with very familiar writing.

Shay’s.

The envelope was light, but it was clear there was something solid and absolute inside. And the six simple words scrawled on the outside . . . those made it clear that everything he’d been avoiding was about to take him by the throat and drag him under.

In case you changed your mind . . .

That was it, no signature, no demand, no blame, nothing else inside except his house key—and a shit ton of emotions he wasn’t sure he had the capacity to handle.

Two days ago, Shay had pled guilty to unintentional theft, was booked then released the same night on her own recognizance. Until now, they hadn’t spoken. Mostly because he’d done his best to avoid her. He should have been relieved that she’d given him an out, only relief was so far from what he felt.

Jonah was already so far in, he wasn’t sure he’d ever get out—no matter how hard he tried to convince himself otherwise.

Every time he found a moment of quiet or closed his eyes, he saw the look on her face, and it was like he was back in the station, reliving the whole thing.

The regret and genuine sorrow in her apology had broken his heart, because he knew that Shay was just being Shay, acting first and thinking later. But the absolute despair that had filled her eyes at the end . . . that he’d never forget.

Angry and hurt, Jonah had said the one thing that could have shattered her world. And he’d said it on purpose, which made him all kinds of f*cked up. The worst part was, it was a lie. Shay absolutely knew what love was. She showed it every day, in her life and in her work. She also showed it in the way she cared so selflessly for others.

But Jonah knew that some people’s caring wound up hurting the exact people they were supposed to love. He’d seen it enough with his dad and stepmom to understand that sometimes two people were just too different to make it work.

So he did the best thing he could do—for the both of them. He took one last look at the darkened windows across the street and, fighting the urge to go over there and tell her that he hadn’t changed his mind, that he still wanted her, he pocketed the key and headed toward his front door.

He stumbled into the house and considered turning on the lights, but his eyes were too sensitive to focus, so he walked blindly to his bedroom. He hadn’t slept since the arrest. Hadn’t really breathed either. So he locked his gun in the safe and shrugged out of his uniform, hoping that would help, because what used to be a part of him now felt constricting.