Page 22 of Yours, Finally

"Yeah, and I don't actually want to give him more room in my life than I have to. I already deal with him a lot at work. So let's change topics— I've been meaning to ask. The flowers you got last week were from Andrew, right?"

I'd vented to Lina about my ex enough that she must have been surprised to see he'd sent me flowers.

I shrugged. "Yep. Andrew has been trying to convince me that we can still make it work. He texted me a few times even if I haven't responded. So unclassy. Get a clue, right?"

"What?" She sipped her coffee. "You didn't tell him that you know what he did?"

My stomach twisted. Andrew had lied to my assistant, Stephanie. He called her and said I wanted her to book a meeting for him with Max to discuss a business deal. Stephanie, the rockstar that she was, checked in with me. She had rightly suspected that I had never given such a thing the green light.

"I did." I scowled. "Both when I broke up with him and right before I blocked his number."

Lina chuckled. "Good riddance. I had hope for him at one point, but he had to go and ruin things. At least you're not too heartbroken?"

"I liked him well enough, but I think he felt more than I did— or really wanted to secure access to my network. Who knows? Before the break up, I could see that maybe, with time, I could feel more. At the time this all went down, though? No, I was hurt, but not heartbroken."

Sometimes I wondered if I could feel deeply enough to be heartbroken. Every time an ex had made a mistake— or I had— it had caused little more than a shrug from me. It didn't feel like more than a bump on my romance journey.

The thought that maybe I couldn't love the way I wanted settled like a stone in my stomach. I wanted to love that deeply, and to be loved as fiercely back. But maybe things didn't work quite right inside. There was a reason why my relationships failed so fast… and it terrified me to think that reason could be me. That scared me even more than the fact there were always mistakes being made.

If I believed in love it was because of seeing people like my parents make it through decades together, not because I trusted what I felt.

Like I could sense the way the air moved around him, the waves of Jake's presence registered in my brain. I sought him around me; I locked eyes with his big form on the sidewalk, striding past the café. He frowned and walked fast, not noticing Lina and I.

"That's Jake," I whispered, his name a spell on my lips.

I followed him with my eyes until I couldn't see him anymore.

When I returned my attention to Lina, I had to confront the suspicious look she gave me.

"I know," she said. "I've met him a few times."

"Oh. Pfft." I waved the involuntary reaction away, like it didn't matter. "It just surprised me."

Lina arched an eyebrow. "Right, right. That was just it."

I pursed my lips and glanced at my future sister in law. Her eyes glinted with mischief. Like she could see my heart beating faster than usual, or the years I'd been pining for her boyfriend's best friend.

It probably wasn't a good idea to spill my heart. To blabber about her boyfriend's best friend, and the one guy I had actually felt big things for.

"I've known him for a long time." I shrugged and shook my foot. "That's all."

"I don't know, I just think it's interesting how he reacted when he saw the flowers on your desk. And I thought there was a little dance between the two of you, figuring out if you might bring someone else to the anniversary party."

I wrinkled my nose and gazed out the window. People continued to walk by, but I didn't pay attention to them. This was the closest anyone had ever been to asking me what was between Jake and I, and my instinct was to hide it. Say nothing,and pretend there was nothing there. I didn't trust myself to make sense of it all, not after years and years of trying on my own, only to be stuck in the same place.

Yet words built in my throat, desperate to come out and be finally heard.

"We don't need to talk about it if you don't want to," Lina said. "But you lit up when you saw him."

I bit my lip. A universe of quieted thoughts and unfinished moments expanded in my chest, begging to be let out for once. If there was someone I could talk about this with, it was Lina. And yet…

"He's Gabe's best friend." I shook my head. "My parents see him like a son."

Lina leaned forward, her eyes peering closely at me. "What are you telling me? The reasons why you've kept your feelings to yourself… or the reasons why you don't want to feel the way you do?"

A spark burst between my lungs, my own personal supernova, but I boxed it with mirrors. It was my best hope at keeping the light contained. Yet some of it escaped, demanding the barest of acknowledgements.

I slumped, and had to hold my head in my hands not to fully collapse on the table.