Chapter Twenty-Six
Gabrielle
My heart pounded in my chest. My father and James both stood frozen, locked in some battle of the wills as they stared each other down.
I couldn’t believe that Olivia had tricked me into coming here. I seethed with rage and tried to keep my entire body from shaking. I wanted to wring Olivia’s scrawny neck, but I pushed that to the back of my mind.
The only thing I could focus on at that moment was James. His answer seemed to be taking an eternity, but it was probably no more than a few seconds.
His expression was unreadable; it was as if he could only see my father. I could only see James.
It wasn’t the ideal way for my father to have found out about us, but somewhere along the line, it had become inevitable that he would. I wanted to be with James. For as long as he wanted to be with me, too, there was nothing I wouldn’t be willing to do to make that happen.
I would have faced a horde of murderous Vikings if that was what it took. James only had to face my father. Sure, he was pissed as all hell, but he would get over it. Eventually. I was sure of it.
My heart felt like it was made of glass, sitting in James’s hands. Was he going to let it drop and shatter, or protect it and keep it safe in his strong grip?
James’s expression changed almost imperceptibly. If I didn’t know him as well as I’d come to know him, I would never have noticed it.
He’d made his decision. My heart kicked into a higher gear and sputtered to a stop at the same time. I trembled visibly. I didn’t care. I needed to hear his answer. It was the moment of truth.
“No.” His voice was firm. Decisive. Steady. “Gabrielle and I barely know each other. There has never been anything going on between us.”
My stomach dropped. Blackness rimmed the edges of my vision. I was pretty sure I swayed on my feet as his words washed over me.
It felt like a battering ram with ten Navy SEALs behind it had slammed into my chest. The man that I loved hadn’t simply dropped my glass heart. He had taken that magical throwing arm of his and launched my heart into a fucking oncoming freight train with all of his considerable strength.
I forgot how to breathe. I was aware of angry voices around me and Olivia scurrying out of the office, slamming the door behind her. I had no idea what they were saying.
My ears buzzed. James’s denial repeated so loudly in my mind that I wasn’t sure if I’d ever be able to hear anything else.
How can he stand there, completely unaffected, and deny our relationship after everything that we’ve been through together? After everything that we’ve shared with each other?
My survival instinct kicked in. Whatever happened, there was no way in hell that I could allow either of those two men see me falling apart.
Get out of here! The scream came from the back recesses of my mind.
My fingers dug into the back of the seat responsible for keeping me standing somehow. My knuckles were white.
“Gabrielle?” My father’s voice only barely registered. “Are you okay? You look ill.”
It was only then I realized that both men stared at me, wearing expressions of expectation and annoyance. “I asked you a question, Gabrielle.”
Shit. He didn’t mean the “Are you okay” one. He must’ve asked something while I’d been trying to keep my knees from buckling and my heart broke into a million pieces in my chest.
I cleared my throat. I had a voice. I just had to find it. It had to be in there somewhere. It had been fine when I’d announced myself to the soul-sucking bitch out front a minute ago.
My eyes locked briefly with James’s. No more than a heartbeat passed, but all I saw in those hazel eyes that had fascinated me every time I looked into them was determination. And a silent plea.
The plea wasn’t, “I made a mistake.” It wasn’t, “I’m sorry.” It wasn’t even, “Forgive me.” It was, “Back me up here!”
Did he really think that I was going break down and confess everything to my father like a broken porcelain doll after he’d just denied that he’d had any feelings for me whatsoever? Not likely.
Worse yet, did he think I was going admit it out of spite? Maybe he had never truly known me if that was the case. Even if it had felt at times as if he knew me better than anyone else had ever known me, or would ever know me.
White-hot rage spread through my veins, temporarily overpowering the gut-wrenching pain and infiltrating the black space where my heart had been but minutes before.
I wasn’t a pawn that was going to do his bidding. I wasn’t some fucking weakling who was going to admit that I was head over heels for him when he clearly felt nothing at fucking all for me.
It took everything that I had in me, but I met my father’s expectant gaze and found my voice amidst the storm of emotions raging in me. “I’m okay. Olivia tricked me into coming here. I was at the library. I’m just tired, and I don’t have time for this bullshit.”
“Bullshit, huh?” My father’s gaze burnt into me like he was trying to see straight into my mind and unlock my deepest darkest secrets. To see the place that James had taken up residence in.
“Yes, don’t ask me to apologize for cursing. I won’t. I have to get back to the library. This was a total waste of time. Please ask your receptionist to mind her own business. If you’ll excuse me, I’m leaving now.” I didn’t wait for either of them to answer. I spun out of the office and practically sprinted to my car, tears pricking at the backs of my eyes.
I just had to make it to the privacy of my car before they could be unleashed. If I could manage it, I desperately wanted to make it home before the tears came. I knew that once the sobbing started and the feelings swimming around inside me came to the surface, it wasn’t going to end quickly.
A sob threatened to rise in my throat.
There. I could see my car. Only a few more yards and I’ll have made to through step two. Step one: get the fuck out of there.
Step two: make it to my car without screaming, crying, or collapsing. Possibly all three at the same time.
I dug blindly around in my bag for my keys when James’s voice called out to me. I bit back a fresh sob.
Every fiber in my being wanted to turn around. To face him. To sink into his comforting arms. To let him hold me so tight that my heart wouldn’t be able to shatter in his grasp. To let him explain and let him wash the pain away with soothing words.
Instead, I managed to find the unlock button on my key fob and hurried into the car, locking the doors as soon as I sank into the driver’s seat.
James appeared at my door just as I slammed it shut. It reminded me of the way that he had so casually strolled up to my door on the night of our first date. I had known that night that he was trouble. I just had no idea how deep I was about to get into it.
“Gabbi, wait. Just give me a second to explain. Please. I promise you that I can explain.” I could hear him through the panels of my car. For just a second, I imagined that I saw my own hurt reflected in his eyes. In his voice. Then I remembered his expression back in the office.
No. He felt nothing. He’d made that abundantly fucking clear not five minutes ago. That hadn’t been the expression of a man choosing between his career and family and a woman that he loved. It was the expression of a man who simply did not give a single fuck.
“I think you explained quite enough back there.”
I cranked my radio to drown out whatever he was trying to say. I wasn’t going to give in. I wasn’t going to let him feed me some bullshit lines.
On autopilot, I strapped myself in and gripped my steering wheel, and I tore away from the only man that I’d ever loved.
It felt like I was leaving a part of my soul behind. I glanced back in my rearview mirror. James’s shoulders were slightly hunched, and his hands stuffed into the pockets of his jeans.
The part of my soul that was permanently glued to his called me back. I ignored it. Even if the pain of doing it was so unbearable that it felt like I was being split in half.
I rounded the corner out of the parking lot, and the first tears sprung free when James disappeared from view. Tears ran down my cheeks, warm and heavy and salty. I wasn’t sobbing yet though. Images from our time together played in my mind.
Our first dinner together. Jet skiing and walking on the beach. Talking until the sun either set or rose, depending on which memory I pulled up.
The way that he knew my body better than I did. Lunch at the Spanish place. His complete support and constant pep talks about law school.
A hundred different moments. A hundred different memories that would haunt me for the rest of my life. Not to mention how much I would miss the feeling of being wrapped up in those sculpted arms. Seeing his eyes light up at a joke. Hearing his voice on the other end of the line.
The more distance that I put between myself and James, the angrier I became. The worst thing was that the anger wasn’t directed at him. I was pissed off at myself.
I channeled the rage instead of the pain. I would deal with the pain when I got home.
Until then, I berated myself for ever letting my heart get involved. For allowing myself to fall for him despite everything that I knew about football players. Players in general. I fucking knew better. I did.
In a cruel twist of fate, perhaps a fitting one, a popular song blared through my speakers about a girl knowing that a guy was trouble when he walked in, but how she fell for him anyway.
She was right about one thing: the blame was on me. I had known that he was trouble the moment he walked into my father’s office on that first day we met. I had known that he wasn’t looking for something serious.
What we had was never even a real relationship.
That pain that threatened to split me open and consume me in a blaze of fire? The pain I would never recover from? It was all my own damn fault for allowing myself to fall so hard for James in the first place.