Max stood outside her apartment door and took a deep breath. The ride from the airport to her place had him nervous and sweating bullets. He had no idea what he was going to say. Max knew he should have called, but he couldn’t say it over the phone.

It was a face-to-face kind of confrontation.

A face-to-face kind of confession.

After several deep breaths, he knocked on her apartment door.

Silence greeted him.

Max decided to knock again. This time, the contact made by his knuckles against the door was harder, hoping she’d hear it and answer the door.

Footsteps met his ears, and Max straightened his spine as the door opened.

“Mate,” the pissed-off unknown man said. “I was eating a sandwich.”

He was just taller than Max with blonde scruffy hair. The stranger had a slight bend to his nose from what Max suspected was a previous injury and dark, almost black eyes.

“Can I help you?” he asked.

Max clenched his jaw, worried that this man was someone significant to her. He would be stupid to believe she couldn’t move on. She was the kind of woman that men, including Max, couldn’t forget.

“Is Josephine here?” Max finally asked once he had cleared his throat.

The guy’s eyebrow arched, and he appeared amused and curious of Max. “Josephine?”

“Yes. Is she home?”

He shook his head. “Nah, she’s not here.”

“Do you know where she is? I just saw her like an hour and a half ago.”

“Nah, I don’t.”

“You actually don’t know, or you don’t want to tell me?” Max asked through clenched teeth. He was getting angry with the lack of answers he was getting.

He chuckled. “I’m guessing you’re Max. I’m West, Stella’s boyfriend.”

Relief rained over him.

Josie hadn’t moved on with another man.

He couldn’t believe he thought she would.

But he hoped she hadn’t.

“Yeah, I’m Max.”

West nodded. “You’re an asshole, Max. And to answer your previous question, I know where Josie is and I’m not gonna tell you where. Loyalty means everything to me and my girlfriend. When I started dating Stella, I knew I would be getting Josie as a sister. Because that’s what they are; they’re sisters. And there is no way my girlfriend would ever let you near Josie. So that means I won’t let you near her. So until Josie gives me the okay to tell you where she is, you’re not going to get anything out of me. Now, I’d like to return to my sandwich. Have a good day, Max. I hope I never see you again.”

And then the door slammed in Max’s face.

Fuck.

Max covered his face with his hands and let out a grunt of frustration. When Max got himself under control, he spun around and made his way to the elevator. He would have to go home and think of another way to contact Josephine.

He would continue to call and text.

But he knew he had to see her and tell her how much of a mistake he had made.

There was no reason to go to Boston when he had everything he ever wanted with her. He would find another way of seeking forgiveness from his best friends.

Right now, all he cared about was earning Josie’s love and trust back.

“Thanks,” Max said as Rob wheeled his suitcase into his apartment.

When he approached the woman behind the Qantas desk, he told her that he had a family emergency and couldn’t board the plane. He had to wait for them to remove his suitcase from the plane before he could leave the airport with the guidance of one of the airline’s customer service officers. When Max made it back into terminal two of Melbourne Airport, the woman who had guided him out of the gates wished him and his family well.

It wasn’t quite a lie.

It was an emergency.

He had to see Josie and plead for a way back into her life.

He’d earn it.

He’d do anything and everything it took for her to forgive him.

“No problem. So you didn’t get on the plane,” Rob said with a grin on his face as he set the suitcase by the apartment door.

Max led Rob into his apartment’s large kitchen and set his phone and keys on the marble bench. After he turned his back on the plane, he called Rob and asked for a lift. On the way home, he asked Rob to stop by Josie’s apartment so Max could see her. Unfortunately for Max, he had met Josie’s roommate’s boyfriend instead. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I don’t know why I didn’t just chase after her at the airport.”

“But you did go after her in the end,” Rob added as he set his arms on the counter and leant against it. The gold band on his finger was like a spotlight, drawing Max in.

“When Ally left you, what did you do?”

Rob’s hands clenched into tight fists, his veins protruding and his knuckles turning white. “I let her go. I should have chased after her, but there was no way I could convince her. She had already made the decision to go back to Sydney. Stevie and Julian had told me to give her time, but I couldn’t take it anymore. I made a choice that I didn’t want the Olympics because it kept hurting her. I also decided I would be what she needed, and that was just being myself. So when I had finally had enough, I went to Sydney. Didn’t turn out the way I wanted, but I still went after her.”

“And now you’re married.”

Max watched his best friend’s fist unclench. Then he glanced up to find the contented smile on Rob’s face. “Yeah, we are. And honestly, Max, the best thing I ever did was go after her.”

“So I give her time?”

Rob chuckled. “Nah. You’ve already given her four days. I say you go after her.”

“But she’s not answering my calls.”

“That”—Rob said as he pushed off the counter—“requires some time. Just don’t give up. You should also call Andrea. Her flight has probably already landed in Sydney. You should tell her now not to expect you on the other side.”

“You’re right.” Max swiped his phone off the counter and unlocked it. “You wanna stay for a drink or something?”

Rob shook his head. “Nah. Thanks, though. I’ve gotta head back to work. Quinn’s waiting for me to go through some procedural stuff.”

Max’s eyebrows furrowed. “Does your boss know that you’re the Men’s Single Scull World Champion?”

His best friend chuckled. “Yeah. He does.”

“Your wife is also a millionaire … so what the hell are you doing still working?”

“Allison’s the millionaire, not me. We might be married, but that’s her and her family’s money. I like working as a sales manager at Endurance Sports. Gives me something to focus on when I’m not training. Plus, rowing isn’t like swimming, where I have a ton of endorsements and don’t have to work. We can’t all be lawyers.”

“I’d rather be a rowing world champion with a beautiful wife,” Max said with a grin.

“Ah, but you haven’t had to deal your wife’s persistent father.”

“Any regrets on eloping?”

Rob shook his head. “None. I’ve gotta run. If you need me, just call.”

“Thanks again, Rob,” Max said.

“No worries. I’ll let myself out.” Rob made his way towards the hallway, then paused and spun around. “You made the right decision, Max. I know you want Noel and Alex to forgive you but going to Boston to torture yourself wasn’t the way.”

Max nodded appreciatively and watched as Rob made his way out of his apartment. When the sound of the apartment door closing echoed, Max walked over to the leather chair in the lounge room and sat down. He took two long and deep inhales and exhales before he pressed Andrea’s phone number.

He heard two rings, then she answered.

“Max, I’m so glad you called,” she said.

“Andrea …”

“Is your flight delayed?”

He sighed. “Andrea.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I didn’t get on the plane,” he explained.

“What?”

“I told you I hurt someone for you, and I can’t live my life knowing that I have.”

He heard chatter in the background as Andrea fell silent.

“I want to go to Boston and help you because I know it’ll help Noel out. But I can’t do it, Andrea. I can’t do it and know that I’ve screwed up everything I had going here. I found someone—”

“You … love?” she interrupted.

“Yeah,” he breathed. “I love her. And I hurt her trying to get rid of all this guilt I have.”

“That’s why you didn’t answer my emails. You were seeing someone.”

He nodded, knowing quite well that she couldn’t see him. “Right now, I can’t put someone else above her. I found her on my own, Andrea. I fell in love with her honestly. I didn’t have to play games to be with her or for her to notice me. I thought I knew what pain was because of you needing space, but I knew hell when I chose to seek forgiveness with you and disregarded her love. She won’t wait for me, Andrea. I can’t take the chance that when I come back from Boston, she’ll have found love with someone else. I love her. I’m so in love with her.”

Andrea let out heavy sigh. “I guess I deserve this for taking so long to realise that I had better with you in messages and calls than I did with Noel.”

“You’re not mad?”

“I’m upset that I let another guy fall in love with another woman. I had you, Max. You chose me, and I didn’t appreciate that enough, so you moved on.”

I did.

I fell in love with a woman on a bridge.

“I can still help you with those contracts, Andrea. Just email them to me and I’ll go through them,” he insisted.

“Yeah, I’d like that,” she said in a small voice.

Then their conversation hit a wall, and they didn’t speak.

Goodbye was in the air.

He felt and sensed it.

And he was sure she did, too.

We need this goodbye.

“I should have known,” Andrea finally said. “When you didn’t reply to my emails, I thought you might have, but I didn’t want it to be true.”

Max let out a sigh as he combed his fingers through his hair. “Andrea, do we have anything in common except for us being lawyers and sharing that one kiss?”

“I … uhh … I guess we have … nothing.”

“Maybe we just wanted each other because the people we did want didn’t want us? Maybe that connected us? I really wanted to be with you, Andrea. But she showed me that I didn’t have to compete with my best friend or belittle myself for love. She was the better thing in my life, and she made me fall in love with her so easily that it wasn’t even scary,” Max confessed. “It felt right … It felt real.”

“Then we should end this call,” Andrea stated. “Goodbye, Max.”

With a faint smile, he finally said, “Goodbye, Andrea.”

And when he ended their call, he felt content with his decision.

Goodbye to Andrea had finally been said and done.

But most importantly, he meant it.

Now Max had to find a way back into Josie’s heart and prove to her that he loved her more than any other woman imaginable.

That he would put her first.

Someday, Alex and Noel would truly forgive him.

But that day would have to wait.

Because he had to earn back Josephine Faulkner’s love.

 

 

It had been over a day since Max left for Boston, and she had said goodbye to him at the airport.

And it had been almost thirty hours since Josie called her father in Berlin. She wasn’t sure how her father managed to understand her since every time she replayed their conversation in her head, she could only remember mumbling and sobbing. But she was sure he understood the important words.

Terminal.

I need you.

Her father knew the severity of her call. Josie had too much pride to contact him for something other than life or death. Her mother having terminal cancer and being on life support meant Josie couldn’t let her pride win. Her mother was too important to her. Her pride and feelings did not matter.

Because her mother deserved the best goodbye.

And that meant Josie’s father knowing.

Because he, too, had loved her.

He might not love her the way he once had, but he loved Emily Faulkner. Whether it was as long and as true as Josie’s mother had him, it was there. Josie had seen it in old family videos. But as her mother put it, “sometimes love isn’t enough to make someone stay and make them love you more.”

Her mother wasn’t wrong.

Her love for Max wasn’t enough.

And in the end, she felt second best to another woman. Yet she still put Max’s needs and wants before her own.

Because that was how true her love was for him.

But it didn’t matter, he was probably already in Boston.

He had gone after the love he had always wanted.

And that wasn’t her love.

He might have loved her for a moment, but he didn’t love her for eternity.

Last night, Josie had thought of him. Thought of him in Boston. Thought of him in his new office. Thought of him with Andrea. Pain had immediately pushed on her chest when she even thought about him touching her.

She was almost violently ill at the thought of his fingertips trailing down Andrea’s curves. At the thought of him whispering his love for her. At the thought of him making love to her. Unable to stop the vivid images, Josie had pulled the covers back, got out of bed, and searched the kitchen until she found the bottle of tequila in the cupboard.

Josie drowned the thought of him making Andrea orgasm with a shot.

Giving her pleasure he never gave Josie.

Kept from her.

That and his heart and love.

He had given Josie an inch and given Andrea the entirety of his sun.

The essence of his life.

The burning of the liquor was just what she wanted.

What she desperately needed.

She craved the physical burns.

The torture it blessed her with.

And just to be on the safe side, she gulped down another shot at the thought of Andrea making Max come.

Giving him pleasures Josie couldn’t.

Along with the heart Max had been in desperate need of.

It was disgusting how much it had affected her, but she couldn’t stop her mind from imagining Max and Andrea intimate.

Her brain couldn’t stop punishing her with images of Max and Andrea being together and reaching a connection far greater than Josie had with Max.

Torturing her for being stupid enough to even fall in love with a man she knew couldn’t love her entirely.

For forever.

She should have stayed well clear of Maxwell Sheridan.

Been with men who would never tarnish her heart.

Who never made her heart swell.

But at the end of the day, Josie got what she deserved.

And that was nothing.

She never deserved love.

After all she had done in life, she deserved the way love ruined her for her stupidity and belief in Maxwell Sheridan.

Sometime later, she fell asleep on the couch with memories of them at the ballet.

When Max tortured her with his love.

She had been so willing.

Her phone ringing in her hand had her taking her eyes off her mother and taking in Max’s name. Josie’s thumb hovered over her screen, and she let out a bothered sigh as she leant forward and set her phone on the table. Though she wanted to know that he got to America safely, she didn’t want details of his reunion with Andrea. Him calling was all she needed to know that he was safe.

It was over.

They were over.

Everything she believed they had, had reached its end.

Josie leant back into the chair and got comfortable. It was lonely without Stella and West, but she had sent them out to lunch. She appreciated their support and was so thankful to have a best friend like Stella.

Stella let her cry and made sure she showered and was fed. But knowing her father would be landing soon, Josie needed to be alone with her thoughts. The small headache she had pounding away at her temples was what kept her company as she waited for Jeff Faulkner.

A knock on the door had her craning her neck to find Stella’s boyfriend, West, walking into the room with a takeout cup in one hand and a brown paper bag in another. He approached her with a smile and then handed her what he held.

“I got you a cup of tea and a chicken sandwich,” he clarified as Josie glanced down at the brown bag.

“From the café downstairs?”

West chuckled as he sat in the seat next to Josie’s. “Yeah, I think I like you too much to make you eat that stuff,” he teased. “I got it from the café across the road.”

“You’re too kind.” Josie set the bag on her lap and carefully sipped the hot English Breakfast tea. She hummed with appreciation that he hadn’t forgotten her preference of two sugars with her tea.

“When does your father’s flight land?” West asked.

Josie removed the sandwich from the paper and began to remove the cling wrap from around it. “Soon, I think. He messaged me before he boarded and managed to get the first flight out.”

“So he’s flying economy?”

Picking up half of the sandwich, she raised her brow at West. “Hell, no. He’s a diplomat, West. There’s no way my father would ever fly economy when he has immunity in like a hundred countries.”

“So your dad can commit crimes and he can never be prosecuted?”

Josie took a bite of her sandwich and let out a soft moan. It had been hours since she last ate. Or days. She couldn’t remember. The last time she had eaten was when Stella had forced her to. Her days were now blended and blurred. It could have been days ago or this morning. But now, as she swallowed her bite of the chicken and spinach sandwich, she realised just how hungry she was. “He could. Though there are some loopholes. I don’t know all that kind of stuff, but yeah, he can get away with things.”

“Cool. Maybe I might be a diplomat,” West said with stars in his eyes.

“Stella would never let you,” Josie said, putting an end to his dream and taking another bite of her sandwich. Then she sipped her tea to wash down the chicken and set the cup on the table next to her ringing phone.

West noticed it, too, and stared at it. “You gonna talk to him?”

Josie shook her head. “Nope. I don’t want to discuss him or with him … or have anything to do with him. My part in his life is over now, West, and so is his part in mine.” Her voice lowered, “He’ll be happier. And someday, maybe I might be, too.”

Her best friend’s boyfriend sighed. “What if I told you he—”

“No.” She dismissed him as she took a bite and then another until she’d eaten that half of her sandwich. Josie dusted her fingertips of breadcrumbs and picked up the uneaten half and set it on the table. “I don’t want to discuss him, West. He’s the last person I should be thinking about.”

He pressed his lips into a tight smile and nodded. “I understand.”

“Thanks,” she said. “Where’s Stella?”

“Oh, she’s still in the gift shop. I got tired of her trying to decide on flowers, so she sent me up before your tea got cold.”

“Thanks, West,” Josie said appreciatively as she sat back in her seat and rested her head on his shoulder. “I don’t think I could have done this without your and Stella’s support.”

“It’s what we’re here for, Josie. You’re like a little sister to me. You’re also a pain in my ass, but I like you. Do you want to make a bet?”

She tilted her chin back to see the smug expression on his face. “For money or apricot chicken?”

“Money.”

“Okay. What’s …” She paused for a moment and let her phone ring once more. When it had ended, she asked, “What’s the bet?”

Don’t let it involve Max.

Don’t let it be about Max.

Don’t be stupid right now, West.

“I bet Stella won’t come back for another ten minutes,” he declared.

Josie sat herself up and rolled her eyes on him. “You are so easy to hustle money out of. Fine. I bet she takes longer.”

“Fine,” West agreed, not realising that he would be a sore loser in eleven minutes’ time.

Josie was the loser.

The ultimate loser.

Not because her best friend had returned in fifteen minutes and made her the winner of the bet.

But because West Montgomery had handed her winnings over in five-cent coins. He had gone to his car and returned ten minutes later with his workbag. She should have known not to make a bet with a man who worked in banking. In total, Josie had four hundred five-cent coins in ten small plastic bags. Stella thought it was hilarious, and Josie suspected that the couple had plotted against her. That West had all those coins waiting to pull a stupid joke on her. The couple who she believed had conspired against her and all ten bags of five-cent coins were on their way back to Josie’s apartment to pick up her laptop so she could catch up on the lectures she had missed in the past few days.

A knock on the door stopped her from setting the flowers Stella had bought. This time, Stella had bought dandelions. Bright and yellow. Josie knew her mother would love them. The door opened, and she was stunned to find her father walking into the room. Josie’s heart ached. Shockingly, her father had come through with a promise. He was here in Melbourne. She told him she needed him, and he was here.

For the first time in years, he had fulfilled a promise to Josie.

“Dad,” she breathed as she set the flowers down and turned away from the bedside table.

Her father didn’t answer her. Instead, he stared at her mother lying on the bed with tubing in her mouth and hooked up to several machines. Jeff blinked ferociously as if he couldn’t make the vision in front of him go away.

But it was very real.

It was now his reality as much as it was hers.

Unlike her father, Josie had seen her mother in the hospital more times than she could count. And she had the same disbelieving expression on her face as her father had. She knew he couldn’t cope with seeing her mother so lifeless and still. Emily Faulkner was bubbly and warm. She was the epitome of life and joy and happiness.

Right now, he wasn’t the man who had disappointed her so many times before.

He was a man staring at the woman he had once loved.

The woman who had carried and welcomed their only child together into the world.

So Josie let the past be the past as she made her way towards him and wrapped her arms around his waist. She felt her father flinch as she set her ear to his chest. His heartbeat was frantic, and his breathing was shallow as if he was struggling to breath. It had been a long time since she had last embraced him. Since the last time she had shown him any form of affection. Closing her eyes, she held her father as silent tears escaped her. Her pride might be shot, but this, this was priceless. Although her mother would never see her attempting to make amends with her father, Josie could live every day knowing that her mother was still alive when she decided to try to finally understand her father.

Then the most unexpected sensation enveloped her as her father wrapped his arms around her and held her.

This was her father’s embrace.

This was her father accepting her silent defeat for her mother.

This was Josie surrendering.

And this was Josie finally feeling as if she was her father’s daughter once more.

They stood wrapped in each other’s arms for some time.

Nothing had been said.

Words wanted to be said out loud, but it wasn’t the time.

This was a father and a daughter putting aside their differences.

“Josephine,” her father whispered as one of his hands reached up and cupped the back of her head. “My sweet Josephine.”

Just like her mother used to say.

Just like her father used to whisper as he held her so many years ago.

Then he pulled back to look down at her. At that moment, he wasn’t the Australian Ambassador to Germany.

He wasn’t a diplomat.

He was her father.

The father he was before he left her.

“Is there anything we can do for Emily?” he asked, fear and vulnerability echoing in his voice. He might love his German wife, but Josie knew he would always love her mother. They were childhood sweethearts, but his career and his country had needed him, and the only way to accomplish that was to divorce her mother.

Josie shook her head. “Dr Frederickson said she has a week if we’re lucky. Her lungs have stopped functioning, so she’s on life support. And …”

“And?”

She swallowed the large lump in her throat, hoping that sick knot in her stomach would leave her. She did not need to feel nauseous right now. Josie untangled her arms from around her father and took a step back. She squared her shoulders and straightened her spine. “Withdrawal of life support.”

“And you’ve made your decision?”

“Yes,” she confirmed in a small voice, not sounding as brave as she wanted. “The doctor said it was in her best interest. I want to end her suffering, not her life, Dad. I have power of attorney, so I can sign those papers, and she’ll finally be at peace.” Her tears now blurred her vision of her father. “But as her only daughter, I can’t sign them.” Josie’s hands covered her face as she sobbed into them.

With Stella, she never spoke of turning off her mother’s life support out loud. However, informing her father was brutal. It made her sound and feel like a monster. Josie wasn’t God or Death. These decisions shouldn’t be placed on her shoulders to weigh her down.

She felt as if she were drowning.

Drowning in her tears.

In her regrets.

In her fears.

In the heaviness of her decision.

She was drowning in life.

In the way life was making her choose.

Arms were around her and lips pressed into her hair.

“You’re so brave, Josephine. Your mother would be so proud of you,” her father whispered. “Whatever you decide, you’ll have my support.”

And for the first time in fourteen years, Josie felt her father’s love for her in his words and his embrace.

They had found a silver lining.

And how rare and bittersweet it was.

Josie stood back as she watched her father stand by her mother’s side. They had hugged for a while until he asked if it was okay for him to see her. She trusted her father with her mother, but Josie was too vulnerable to trust in having a proper relationship with him just yet. He had given her belief by showing up in Melbourne.

They were taking baby steps.

Her father slowly reached out and traced his fingertips along her mother’s temple. Josie felt transported back to when she was a child and she used to look up from practising in the lounge room. She would see her father lovingly trace the features of her mother’s face. Josie would always smile and then beg her parents to watch her practice her dancing.

Then the breakup of her family had happened so quickly that she got whiplash.

One day her father was home, carrying her over rain puddles.

The next, she was waving goodbye to him at the airport. He never turned around and that had devastated Josie.

Then disappointment after bitter disappointment.

“Oh, Emily,” her father whispered as his thumb brushed her cheek and tears rolled down his face. “How could you not tell me? You raised our beautiful daughter all your own, my love. I still love you. I’ll always love you, Em. Seeing you like this breaks my heart.” He bent down and pressed his lips to her mother’s forehead. “I’m sorry I let you down so many times throughout the years. I left you too soon, and now you’re leaving us too soon.”

Josie couldn’t take it anymore.

She turned and made her way out of the hospital room and closed the door behind her, letting her father have time alone with her mother.

Seeing her father crying hurt too much.

He was a strong, stern man.

He was a diplomat and hadn’t shown any emotion towards her since she was a little girl, so to see him so destroyed was too much for her to bear.

Josie walked down the hall until she was some distance away from her mother’s hospital room and broke down, falling to the ground and letting her heavy heart win.

Her father had regrets.

And he could never make amends the way he probably wished.

As for Josie, she had her own regrets.

And she had no idea how to free herself without losing herself.

After her tears stopped falling and she managed to get herself under control, Josie picked herself up from the ground and wiped the moisture from her cheeks. She was thankful she had broken down in an empty corridor where no one could see her at her weakest. Suddenly, out of the corner of her eye, she noticed someone familiar.

Just as Josie turned to see them clearly, the woman at the end of the hall was gone. For a second, she thought it was Katie Sheridan, Max’s little cousin. But Josie knew it wouldn’t be.

She was losing her mind.

Regret and heartbreak had her seeing things.

It didn’t help that she missed Maxwell Sheridan completely.

But she had to remind herself that he was now in Boston, and soon enough, he’d forget her, and she’d be nothing but a memory.

A memory he wouldn’t hold onto.