“Skyler—”

Her eyes blazed with determination as she cut him off. “I can call my stepfather. Clay works for the—”

“This isn’t just about Mitch,” Gage interrupted. “I’m trying to protect you from me.”

She faltered, blinking in confusion.

“I’m not good enough for you.” His throat closed up. He’d never felt this helpless in his life. “Don’t you get it? I’m a punk from Southie who grew up to be an emotionally detached bastard. You deserve better.”

Skyler’s jaw tightened. “There you go again, telling me what I need. I can make my own decisions, Gage—and I choose to be with you.”

“I won’t let you.” He set his own jaw, and ignored the resulting ache that pulsed through his face.

One eye was still out of commission, but the other worked just fine, and he clearly saw the cloud of despair darkening Skyler’s eyes. Lord, she was beautiful. Beautiful and vulnerable and sweet and strong. Stronger than he’d thought, sure, but she was owed better than a man who was tangled up with thugs, a man who couldn’t truly open up to her. Lowering his guard during sex was one thing, but the intimacy she needed—no, the intimacy she deserved? He wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to give it to her.

That sappy phrase suddenly floated into his mind, the one about loving someone enough to let them go. Well, he loved Skyler. He loved her strength, her intelligence, her endless compassion, and most of all, her light.

The light he’d eventually extinguish.

“I can’t be the kind of man you need.” His throat burned so badly he could barely get a word out. “You need someone who’s open and talks about important stuff, someone who smiles and laughs. That’s not me. I shut down years ago.”

“You’ve been opening up. I’ve seen it. I’ve felt it.” Desperation clung to her voice.

“It’s not enough. It’ll never be enough.” Gage staggered off the couch, light-headed and sick to his stomach. When Skyler took a step forward, he held up his hand to stop her. “No, I’m fine.”

Her eyes flashed again. “God. You can’t ever accept help, can you? Would it kill you to let someone help you?”

Frustration slammed into him like a sledgehammer. It was the same accusation he’d heard a hundred times before. “See?” he said miserably. “It’s happening already. If we keep this up, you’ll end up resenting me. I can’t be the man you want me to be.”

“I want you to be you,” she burst out. “I don’t want you to change—I just want you to trust me enough to show me the real you. The good parts, the bad parts, just you.” She stopped abruptly, realization dawning in her eyes. “But you don’t trust anyone, do you? You can’t trust anyone, not completely.”

Swallowing, Gage slowly shook his head.

“Then you’re right.” A defeated breath shuddered out of her mouth, her shoulders sagging as if they were carrying the weight of the world. “We don’t stand a chance.”

A fiery rush of pain slid through him, but he couldn’t argue with her. They hadn’t stood a chance from the beginning.

Goddamn it. He should’ve followed his own frickin’ ground rules. Keep things light, keep it all about sex. Maybe if he’d stuck to his guns, he wouldn’t feel like someone had ripped his chest open and was prodding at his heart with a pair of rusty pliers.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“Yeah. So am I.” Skyler looked so sad he almost charged forward and pulled her into his arms, but he forced himself to stay motionless.

After a long, agonizing moment, she came up and brushed a featherlight kiss on his lips. “Good-bye, Gage.”

His throat was too tight to answer, so he settled for a jerky nod.

He’d expected the pain, the accusation, the anger. But it was the disappointment in her eyes that ripped him to shreds.

That disappointment was the last thing he saw before she walked out of the room, and out of his life.

…

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

The chiding internal voice followed Skyler all the way out to her car. Somehow, her legs carried her there without buckling. Somehow, she got in the driver’s seat without collapsing.

God, she should have seen it sooner, but she’d convinced herself that Gage was letting her in. That slowly but surely she’d succeed in earning his trust.

But she hadn’t realized that trust was unattainable. She’d been chasing a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Trusting someone—really trusting them—meant letting yourself be truly vulnerable, and Gage had banished those emotions at a young age.

She’d been a fool to think something as silly as love would change that.

Her fingers shook as she turned the key in the ignition. She drove away from his town house with tears in her eyes, wondering where the hell she would even go. She didn’t want to return to her empty house, which made her realize just how much she’d enjoyed having Gage in her life, how much she’d loved having someone to spend time with, to talk to. She had two roommates, but she might as well have been living alone.

Hospital or museum. Those were her options. Lacey and May would let her cry on their shoulders and listen to her vent, something she desperately needed to do at the moment.

Ten minutes later, she found herself pulling into a parking spot that didn’t belong to either Boston General or the city’s modern art museum.