One Bossy Offer (105)

Hot tears flare down my face, my heart breaking for him, for us, simultaneously.

“Miles...”

“For reasons I’ll never understand, Dad knew enough to call me on their landline, but not to call 9-1-1. He didn’t even understand what was happening. Every voicemail was worse than the last, asking why she went to sleep. Why she wouldn’t wake the fuck up.” He inhales like he’s breathing nails. “My mother was still breathing for over an hour. Then she wasn’t. By the time I got the voicemails the next day, the police found them. He was sleeping next to her, holding her like they were just taking a nap. Mom, she was—you already know. So there. There’s the whole ugly fucking truth that turned me into this. Happy now?”

His eyes glint with a stabbing pain I’m not sure I’ll ever understand.

And I’m sobbing so hard I haven’t formed a response when he starts talking again.

“And now...now, the bitch-queen responsible for my mother’s death wants to obliterate my father’s reputation from beyond the grave and tear apart his company—his legacy.”

I don’t know what that means.

I don’t care.

I’m beyond broken.

“God!” I step closer. “Miles, I’m sorry. So sorry. I wouldn’t have interrupted if I’d known. The way you left, you scared me.”

He holds up a hand to stop me.

“We couldn’t have talked this out with Simone anyway. Still, you ruined my last chance to warn her off before this escalates. I need you to go back to Pinnacle Pointe, and this time, stay there.”

I’m speechless.

Hurting or not, he’s never been this frigid with me. This empty, unloving thing I’m struggling to recognize.

“I get that you’re hurting, but you... you don’t own me. I’m not some little minion you can order around. If you can’t understand that—”

“If you can’t wrap your head around what I need to do, then you should definitely go. Stay there, Jenn, and stay away from me.”

Gutted.

I barely wipe my eyes with my sleeve before I whip around, stepping down on my foot exploding with a thousand tiny pinprick knives that stab up my heel.

“Ow!” I throw my arms out, trying to hold my balance so I don’t fall over.

“Damn. You’re hurt.” His voice softens, far too close to me. “Let me give you a ride.”

“No!” I shake my head until I can’t see.

“Jenn, you can’t walk on that foot. You’ll just make it worse.”

He’s totally right and I still ignore him.

I just stumble along in halting steps, feeling what’s left of my shattered heart crunching underfoot.

“Jenn, please. Let me get you home safe, or at least call you a car.”

He’s just a blurry silhouette when I look back through tears, hissing, “Don’t bother, asshole. Go finish your meeting and sort out your life. You don’t have time for me.”

“I’ll make time,” he growls. “Let me get you to your parents’ house. You can figure out the rest from there.”

“Jesus, it’s too late, okay?” My voice breaks.

“Too late?”

How can he not understand?

There’s no coming back from this.

I wipe the tears from my eyes, still slurring my words. “I... I have no idea what you want, Miles, but it’s not me. And I’m... I’m better than that. I deserve more than a man who can’t decide, who can’t make up his fucking mind—”

“You knew I had a fucked up past,” he bites off.

“And you let it define you. You never trusted me. You just left me behind. Then you—only you—turned me away.”

His mouth opens, but he closes it again.

If I ever thought I’d take any joy rendering Miles Cromwell speechless, it dies on the spot.

“You don’t trust me, and you think you’re better off alone—and maybe you are. You don’t love me.” My voice catches on that shredded L-word.

I need to leave.

Get out of here right flipping now.

“That’s not true, and you know it,” he says finally, his voice so raw.

“What’s true is that you don’t trust me enough to care about you in spite of your mistakes. You won’t trust me when you’re hurting. You couldn’t tell me the truth until you chased me out of a coffee shop in a rage.”

“Jenn—”

“S-sorry. I shouldn’t have been stupid enough to fall for a man too afraid to show me who he really is and who thinks he can order me around.”

“Jenn,” he growls louder, dragging himself forward like he’s been shot.

“Miles, stop. Let me go. Let me give you what you want one last time—I’m going, and you’ll never speak to me again.”

He’s quiet as I limp away, this time with no looking back.

I’m too pummeled, black and blue down to my soul.

But that’s the problem.

I’m not overreacting.

This is the reaction I should have had sooner.

Then tearing myself away from him wouldn’t have to hurt like this.

Whatever else I do, I can’t look back.

A single glance might catch my tattered heart on thorns of doubt.