Chapter 86

Oh my god. Why would anyone want to cheat on him? I mean look at him. Why would she want to hurt him?

I shake my head as if I can’t believe it. I don’t want her to be the one.

Is she the reason he’s the way he is? Why he keeps women at arm’s length, and it’s just sex and fun? Did having his first love savagely rip his heart open make him unable to trust women in his life? Keeping them all at a distance, the way I do with everyone else.

“Why did you start seeing her again?” It’s out before I can stop it.

Do I want to hear him tell me how he’s never got over her? No, I don’t.

He shrugs and gazes at me intensely.

“It’s complicated.”

When is it ever not?

“Stop saying that,” I wail, instantly on my feet and I’m angry.

Why?

Because he’s my Jake. Not hers. I want him to want me, and only me; I know it’s never going to be that way and it ruins every part of me. Rages and burns that once, long ago she had exactly that and she threw it all away. She was a complete idiot!

“Emma … What do you want me to say?” he moves to me, and pushes me back to sit down, so he’s standing over me.

“You think I planned any of this shit?” he looks broken, eyes damp and face unreadable, yet somehow sad.

“Do you love her?” I ask of him, complete fear gripping me inside and I almost sob it out in desperation.

Don’t cry … Please don’t cry. Not here. Not now. Not in front of Jake.

Disbelief flashes across his face and I can’t read it. I’m scared of his answer, so I cover his mouth.

“Don’t.” I’m shaking my head. “I don’t want to know.” He grasps my hands and pulls them away.

“Emma, it’s not what you think,” he pleads, his body trying to cage me in against him, but I resist.

No? What do I think? … What could be worse than this?

“I can’t … I can’t right now … I just need to go.” I shove him away, lost in teen Emma mode and rejecting contact, while my heart is crushing in on itself.

“Stay, Emma, please. We need to talk.” He’s trying to pull my arms to him, but I’m pushing him off. Marissa is right there in the next room, she’s pregnant with his baby. She’s the first love of his life. She’s the reason he avoids relationships. What am I supposed to think? She’s the reason I’ll never have a chance with him.

“I need air … space … Jake … I need space.” I gulp down tears and panic, and finally throw his hands off me. He lets me go and moves back rejected, he’s letting me leave, but I don’t want to go anymore. I don’t know what to do. I hesitate.

He says nothing, just gives me his boyish wary look, his frown deepening. I can’t stay here, so I go into automatic pilot. I stalk toward the door, pulling up my hood, and don’t look back, knowing that walking out is the only choice I have. I don’t look back, even when I hear him call my name.

* * *

I run about three blocks before I stop and let the heart wrenching pain overtake me. I cry like I did the night he left me on that boat, and I think I may actually die this time. If my lungs don’t self-implode, I think my heart might. The pain is unbearable and raw, and I’ve never willingly exposed myself to enduring it this way, except that night.

I sit on a bench cradling my head between my knees and I think I may even throw up; this isn’t my life … My life is calm and easy and straightforward. My job, my apartment, my responsibilities. They all slot into place and I manage them all well. This isn’t really happening. I’m in a parallel universe, or I’m dreaming. I’ll wake at any minute and this will all have been one long, bad dream. Except I know that it’s not. Meeting Jake has slowly changed it all, he is too potent to be around, changing me, changing how I think and live, until I don’t feel like I am in control anymore.

Is this how we got here?

* * *

I finally start walking back to the hotel, I don’t know how long I’ve been, but I’m calm, and my tears have dried on their own, my face tight and swollen, but I don’t care anymore. I’ve been through so many emotions these past weeks; I think I’m slowly losing my mind. I’m definitely losing the grip on my control. I don’t even know how to claw it back.

The room is dark and empty, I’ve been gone for two hours according to the wall clock ticking loudly in the modern suite. There’s a light under Jake’s bedroom door. It halts me. Pain clenching in my chest that he’s in there with her.

Is this how it’s always going to be? There’s always going to be me, desolate, alone on one side, and Jake on the other side of a bedroom door with another woman?

Isn’t that what this is all really about? Except I know this isn’t all on him … I’m incapable of letting him get close to me, even if he actually wanted to try. I’m afraid of what that means, what that will feel like; too much has happened. Even if he told me he wanted me and only me, then how would that work? I don’t see how this could get any better, it’s better if we forget it ever happened, it’s better if we just act like we did before the kiss in the kitchen and go back to an easier time.

Can I do that? Can he? Can I bear it?

I’m going to have to if I want to keep my job, and I do. I love working with him, I love being his right hand, but surely that in itself is half the problem. We crossed the line and now I’ll never be able to just be what I was. Because I love Jake.

Shit. I love him. – I think I already knew that though.

I push the door of my room open and halt suddenly. Jake’s laid on my bed, illuminated by the lamp beside him with his laptop on his thighs. He’s been waiting on me, his cell tossed carelessly in the center of the bed, beside mine. I guess he tried to call me and found mine left behind. He flits his gaze from the screen, up to me and closes it silently, without breaking eye contact. He looks every bit like the CEO he was the first time I ever met him. Mature and poised. In control. It makes me ache so badly.

“We need to talk.” His voice is steady and deep, hoarse from tiredness as my inner confidence slides silently from deep within and makes a quick exit via the door. I swallow and take a deep steadying breath, suddenly coy and afraid.

I’m better than that and move coolly into the room to start removing my hooded top, all control being forced back in place, hiding my inner turmoil, hours of tears giving me some of my facade back. I can do this.

“Can I have a shower first? I’m sweating from my run.” That’s a lie as I barely ran anywhere, I just don’t want to do this. I want him to leave. I need space to function and deal with the unavoidable fact that I’m in love with a guy who can’t love me back.

“No … I’ve waited long enough.” He bristles, the feel his eyes on my back. I kick my running shoes off and slide them under the vanity with my toes, smooth fluid movement, giving nothing away about the tension and panic rising in my throat.

So, this is where Emma has been hiding … Finally. Great time to make a comeback.

“Fine, but be brief, I want to go to sleep.” The tone is cold. I can’t help it, PA Emma is my dominant self, who slides in effortlessly to protect me whenever she feels me falter, and tonight I have fallen so far from my tree. I have fallen in love with Casanova Carrero, and I am drowning.

I can tell by his slow, steady intake of breath his anger is still hanging around between us. He pauses, and I glance in the mirror slightly to see what he’s doing; he’s looking at his hands, on the bed, and frowning, contemplating his next move and he isn’t happy. I’ve rarely seen him lost for words; I feel hopeless watching the anguish rush across his brow, I can tell he’s trying to decide what he wants to say next.

“Is this how it will always be, Emma?” tone defeated, and I cave inside.

Why can’t I just be honest with him for once? Why can’t I tell him about the chaos that goes on inside my head? Why can I never just talk to him the way he talks to me? Why can’t I tell him that I’m being this way because I love him, and it kills me to know it’s unrequited.

“What do you mean?” I ask steadily and coolly, making slow, deliberate movements to untie my hair, maintaining that outward poise, despite the internal shaking and nausea. I want to wipe this day out and start again, go back to safer ground.

“One step forward, and six steps back,” he mutters quietly to no one in particular, a tone of deflation in his voice. I can still see him in the corner of the mirror, his body slumped in a non-Carrero way. I can’t help but long for the strong curve of his shoulders to return. He looks so vulnerable suddenly.

“I’ve called Ryan’s, the jet is being prepared to take us back to New York, tonight … Pack.” He slides from the bed, scooping up his laptop and cell and stalks to the door, stopping briefly. He stares at my back; I catch sight of him in the mirror and look away from the angry flash across his face. His body locked in a disturbing pose that says he’s beyond done with me.

“I used to think all you needed was time …To learn to trust me, but now I see that talking about this is pointless. You don’t need time, Emma … I was fucking wrong.” He storms out, slamming the door as a a wave of pain slides over me. I bite my lip to hold the tremble still and push down the threatening tears.

He has no clue how much I trust him, no clue whatsoever. I wouldn’t have let him do those things to me otherwise; it’s better this way, better that he’s pissed. Better that he never knows the truth. We won’t talk about what we did, maybe we can start over again tomorrow. We’re getting good at sweeping everything under the rug.

Out of sight, out of mind, right?

I can at least fool myself into hoping that’s how this will be. For now.