“I won’t lie to you, Jude,” I whispered, choosing not to lie to him which, by admission, made me hurt him.

Now I really couldn’t stay in this room any longer. Rushing towards the door, my legs feeling like they were going to cave under me with each step, I bit back the tears.

“Don’t go,” he whispered.

His request worked on me like it’d been a demand.

I heard the floor groan as he walked over it, slowly coming up behind me.

“Stay,” he asked, stopping behind me. I could feel the warmth rolling from his chest he was so close.

“I can’t,” I said, focusing on the shiny brass of the doorknob. It was both the gateway to my escape as well the path to my personal hell.

“I know,” he said, the floorboards whining as he took one more step towards me. His chest ran against my back, but he didn’t touch me anywhere else. “Don’t stay because you want to. Stay because I want you to.”

Damn it. My heart couldn’t break one more time before it became impossible to fit back together.

“Come on,” he pleaded, his heart bursting into my back, “think of it as an early Christmas present.”

I closed my eyes.

“I know I’m not entitled to one, but I want one. I need one.” Jude had just enough pride not to beg, but it was the closest I’d heard him to it. “Stay.”

And that was my undoing. The boy who made mothers cross the streets with their children when they saw him walking down the sidewalk; the boy who didn’t have any one else; the boy I loved, begging me as he only knew how to stay with him.

“Okay,” I said, reaching my hand behind for his.

His fingers laced through mine, kneading them like they were capable of giving him strength. Turning me around, he lifted his hand to my face and didn’t do anything but look into my eyes.

Letting out the breath he’d been holding captive, he folded me into his arms and Jude Ryder hugged me. He hugged me like I was everything he wanted and everything he could never have. He hugged me without the expectation of one embrace leading to something else.

It was the most intimate moment we’d shared. Fully clothed, vertically aligned, mouths separated, and I was drowning in intimacy.

As his arms started to unwind from me, I grabbed one of his hands and led him to the bed. Laying down, I patted the space next to me. He crawled into it, the mattress rolling me around as he settled beside me. Winding my arms around him, I tucked my chin over his head, knowing in the morning, I’d have to let him go. But not now. Not tonight.

It made me wish that tomorrow would never come.

“I love you, Luce,” he whispered, sounding like sleep was going to find him in the next breath.

I swallowed, pushing down the pain rising in my throat. “I love you, Jude.”

I hadn’t slept this well in weeks. Three weeks to be exact. Of course I knew what, or who, was responsible for the solid eight hours of sleep. Jude was still asleep in the exact same position as he had fallen asleep in last night, except the lines had smoothed out of his face.

I almost kissed those parted lips before I caught myself.

Sliding my arm from beneath him, I rolled to the side of the bed. My body was stiff, like I needed to lubricate my joints to get them to move properly. Glancing over at Jude to make sure he hadn’t startled awake, I slipped my boots on and stood up.

This feat hurt worse than it had last night, making me hope I still had that trial sized bottle of pain relievers in the glove box. Giving myself to the count of three, I let myself look down at him. This was how I would choose to remember him when my heart ached with every beat after I left him. At peace, content as I slipped out of his life.

Turning away, I moved across the room as quietly as a stiff jointed person could. The door whined open and my adrenaline spiked as I looked back at Jude, sure he’d be bursting awake.

But he was asleep, enjoying a few more minutes or hours of peace before he woke up and found I’d slipped out on him without a goodbye, but maybe that’s what last night had been. A goodbye.

Our goodbye.

Once I was down the hall, the stairs presented a challenge as each one made me feel like the muscles in my legs were going to burst through the skin. A few party stragglers were decorating the couches and carpet, but once I made it past them, I was home free.

The Mazda hadn’t been towed, beyond every miracle of traffic cops everywhere, so sliding inside the driver’s seat, I turned the key over and hit the gas the next instant. Now that I’d succumbed to the inevitable, I couldn’t get out of here fast enough.

It was a couple miles down the road, when I hit the first red stop light, that a folded piece of paper resting on my dash caught my attention. I kept my car clean, almost anally clean, so I knew it couldn’t have been some random outline or class notes. Grabbing it, I unfolded it, immediately recognizing the handwriting.

I just wanted you to know I’d be chasing after you right now, na**d if need required it. But because I’m respecting your need for time and space, I’ll force myself to lie here in bed and pretend I’m asleep.

It wasn’t signed, but it didn’t need one. Knowing Jude had some time in the night woken up, knowing I’d leave him without a formal goodbye, to scribble down a note and tuck it inside my car, made me curse the day I’d let doubt enter my life. The moment, somewhere along the way, I’d let doubt wedge its way between me and Jude until it had built a wall so high there was no way I could see to scale it.