Relief washes over me, but I try to ignore it.

“So you don’t feel the same way about him?” I ask carefully as I pull the car in front of the clubhouse.

Jacey sighs, staring into the night sky. “I wish I did. It would make things a lot easier. Brand would never hurt me. Not ever. He’d rather die. And that’s the kind of person that I need. Sometimes I feel like I should just be with him, that maybe I could grow into loving him like that. He’s definitely someone worthy of that kind of love. But then again, because he’s so worthy, he deserves more than I can give him.”

“I know that feeling,” I admit, and I’m startled when I say the words. Jacey stares at me, and her voice is hesitant.

“What does that mean?”

“It means that I find myself liking you… more and more each day. I don’t want to, because I know what happens when you open yourself up to someone. You get hurt. Or you hurt them. The world is full of people hurting each other, Jacey. And I don’t want to do that. Not anymore.”

I don’t know why I brought our conversation to this dark and serious place. What happened to acting casual and normal? But truthfully, deep down, I think I just can’t stand the inevitability of it all.

I can’t stand pretending that everything is fine when I know that one day, very soon, everything is going to implode.

Right now, even I can hear the emptiness in my voice, and Jacey hears it too.

She stares at me. “Who hurt you, Dom?” she asks gently. “Was it Emma?”

Like always, her name forms a vise around my heart. I close my eyes, refusing to answer.

“I know Emma hurt you,” Jacey continues, refusing to back down. “I don’t know how. But I know she did. You’ve got to open up about it, Dominic. If you don’t, it will eat at you forever.”

I open my eyes and stare at her bleakly. “It will eat at me forever anyway.”

“So you’re just going to keep closed off to be safe, then?” Jacey asks, and she sounds sad and distant. “I know that whatever happened with Emma has defined who you are, from your sex life to your career. It’s why you keep to yourself, why you’re so distant. You want to protect yourself by never opening yourself up again. You shouldn’t do that, Dom. It’s not healthy. I know from experience. Do you want to know how I know?”

She stares at me, waiting, so I finally nod.

“Today’s my birthday, and neither of my parents bothered to call me. No card, no call, no gift, not even a ‘Hey, we brought you into the world on this day twenty-four years ago, so have a good day.’ They didn’t contact me at all. That’s why Gabe came here… because he knew they wouldn’t. And just like always, he wanted to protect me from that. But he can’t. Because even though he came and it was awesome, it doesn’t take away the fact that they didn’t even call. But even though they’re horrible parents and they hurt me all the time, I know that I can’t close myself off. That would only end up hurting me, Dom.”

I feel bad for her, because honestly, I can’t imagine what it must be like to have parents who don’t give a shit. And even though Gabe clearly doesn’t like me much, I’m glad that he’s such a rock for his sister. Even still, I don’t know what parallel Jacey is trying to draw.

“What does that have to do with me?” I ask woodenly. “What point are you trying to prove? Are you trying to show me that your parents fucked you up, but you’re trying to get past it? Because good for you.”

Jacey shakes her head.

“I want you to see what I learned… because you need to learn it too. It’s taken me a while to learn it, and honestly, I’m still trying to deal with it all. But even though our situations are different and we react to our situations in different ways, we’re dealing with the same kind of pain.”

She pauses, and I stare at her dubiously.

“It’s true, Dom. People have hurt us. But the lesson for us both is that people will hurt us in life, and we just have to get over it. We have to keep going and keep opening ourselves up to people. Will we get hurt again? Maybe so. But maybe we won’t. Maybe we’ll end up with something real.”

I don’t say anything, so Jacey continues.

“If something doesn’t change, you’re going to end up sad and alone, Dominic. I don’t want that for you. It doesn’t have to be this way, you know. There’s something between us… and I know you can feel it too. We have the opportunity for something real, Dom, even though we’re pretending that we don’t. We really do.”

A sharp rap on the window interrupts her, interrupting the moment at the same time. A worker hands me the clipboard to sign out, and I scrawl my name. I fire my engine back up and drive toward Chicago and try to ignore my pounding heart.

There can be no more pretending now. Jacey just confronted things head-on.

We’re quiet now. Awkward. Tense.

I can feel Jacey staring at me from time to time, waiting for me to react to what she said, but I don’t say anything and she doesn’t either. As I pull up to the curb, I make no motion to get out.

“I’m sorry,” I tell her tersely. “I can’t do this right now. I’m tired. Good night, Jacey.”

I’m once again trying to delay the inevitable.

She starts to get out, but pauses, looking into my face. With a cool hand, she traces my cheekbone, and I fight the urge to close my eyes and lean into her hand. But I don’t. I remain rigidly in my own seat.

“Dom, if you ever want to talk about it, I’m here,” she says quietly. “I’ll never breathe a word to anyone, I’ll just listen.”

Her face is so sincere, so genuine… it’s all I can do to remember to breathe. She doesn’t ask for anything, she’s just concerned about me.

“Thanks for the offer,” I tell her. “But…”

“I know,” she interrupts. “But you’ll pass. Why don’t you come in, Dom? We don’t have to talk. We can just watch a movie or something. I don’t want you to be alone.”

I don’t bother telling her that I’m always alone, even when I’m surrounded by people. Instead, I just shake my head.

“Not tonight. I think I’ll just go. Happy birthday, Jacey. I’m glad you got to see your brother.”

Jacey hesitates, then gets out, closing the car door. She stands there, gorgeous and quiet in the night. As I stare at her, I know what I have to do. I swallow hard. If I don’t do it now, it will be too late and I’ll have crushed her.

For once in my fucking life, I’m going to do the right thing.

The decent thing.

“Jacey, I can never give you what you want. You want someone who can open up and discuss feelings, someone who will be an active participant in your life. That’s not me and it never will be. We need to pull the plug on this thing now, because once again, you’re falling for the wrong guy.”

Jacey sucks in her breath and she’s frozen for a second. But then she leans down, staring in at me, and there’s something pained in her eyes.

“What are you afraid of, Dominic? Really? What are you afraid of?”

I stare at her, long and hard, before I answer.

“Everything,” I admit.

And then I drive away.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Jacey

How is it that I’ve fucked up so badly once again?

I’ve opened myself up to someone who is emotionally unavailable and has more baggage than he can even keep track of. He’s detached. Distant. Unable to give me what I need, and, what’s worse, has never tried to hide it. He told me all along.

But still, I fell for him.

Still my heart breaks because he’s gone from me. Because I honestly thought that he was different. That deep down, he was a good guy and I could save him. Once again, I thought I could save someone who is apparently unsaveable.

I’ve done this to myself.

I grab a pair of boxing gloves and start swinging at a bag. I catch the attention of Jake and Tig and they come over to observe. Tig watches while Jake holds the bag.

My foot is still sore, so I can’t kick, but I take can out my aggression in punches—so that’s what I do, until I’m dripping with sweat and I’ve taken all of my frustration out on the bag. When I’m finally spent, Jake stares at me.

“Anything wrong, Jacey?” He’s hesitant, and I have to smile.

“That apparent?”

“Uh, yeah,” he answers. “I thought you were going to punch the bag off its hook. I’m just glad it was the bag and not me this time.”

I chuckle, but I don’t answer as I pull off my gloves. There isn’t a women’s locker room, so I have to wait to shower and change until I get home. After I grab my bag, I pass Dom and Joe in the hall.

“You heading out to California this weekend?” Joe asks Dom. Dom nods, and my heart breaks again because it’s a reminder that we’re truly separate now.

Separate lives. Separate people. We’re nothing to each other.

“Yeah,” Dominic answers. “And I know, don’t be late on Monday or don’t bother coming back.”

Joe chuckles, and part of me is happy that he is finally warming up to Dominic. But the other part of me is crushed because Dom barely looks at me. It’s been two days since my birthday, two days since Dominic broke things off. He’s been virtually silent ever since.

No texts, no calls, and almost no communication at work.

He’s like a wall… vast and silent.

Joe continues into his office, but Dom doesn’t turn around to talk to me.

Again.

Surprising myself, I decide I have to let it go. One thing I’ve definitely learned in life is that you can’t make someone love you. Or like you. Or want to be with you. It’s a lesson I’ve learned hard and well, but it doesn’t take the sting out of the rejection.

When Dominic almost reaches his car, I call out to him.

He turns around. He doesn’t say anything, but he looks directly at me, a question in his famous green eyes.

“Fuck you,” I tell him stoutly. Because even though I know I have to let it go, it still fucking hurts.

The corner of his mouth twitches, but he doesn’t answer. He just drops into his Porsche and drives away, leaving me standing here alone.

It seems fitting. It pisses me off even more that I can’t be mad. Dominic told me from the beginning not to get drawn in, not to get attached.

I’ll crush you without meaning to, he’d said. How he can’t see that Sin wrote that song about him, I’ll never know. He must be fucking clueless.

I sigh and head home to get ready for Saffron.

As I drive past a tiny little bar on the way, I glance at it, briefly tempted to stop. Not to get a drink, but to soak in the attention that I know I would receive there.

Seeing the eyes on me, the guys who would inevitably hit on me… it never fails to bolster my self-confidence and make me feel better.

But not this time. My hands grip the steering wheel and I force myself to drive past.

I’m going to break old patterns. I don’t need another guy to make me forget Dominic.