“Jenna!” I bellow. “Stop this. Come upstairs. Now.”
“She says she doesn’t want to. And she wants Truman back.”
My lungs feel like they’re collapsing.
“She can’t…” I look down at Truman with his big eyes and silky fur. “She can’t take that dog. Just tell her to come upstairs so we can talk.”
Anton blows out a breath. “Boss…”
I know what that means.
Fuck her.
“I can come get it if you—”
I end the call.
I tear through the house, collecting her things, which have been strewn everywhere—in boxes, on my bed, in the library, and in the sink, banana-yellow cookingutensils—waiting for her to come back. I stuff her clothes in a bag while Truman chases after me, thinking it’s a game.
“You tell her,” I say to Truman. “Tell her she’s crazy when you see her. Tell her she’s got it wrong. Tell her I… I love her.”
I stop suddenly. “I don’t want her to go. I’m not ready for her to go.”
I carefully place the spatulas in the dishwasher then gently set Truman in his bag. He licks my face.
“It wasn’t supposed to be like this,” I tell him quietly. “We were supposed to be together forever.”
“Did she say where she’s going?” I ask Anton dully when I open the front door.
“I think maybe her mom’s? But tomorrow. She missed the ferry, she said. So I don’t know where she’s going.”
He takes the laptop case from me and the quilted bag with some of Jenna’s clothes then slings Truman’s carrier over his shoulder.
I hesitate. I want her to come up here, to stop being stubborn. I’m suddenly worried that I’ll completely blow any chance of reconciliation if I go downstairs.
I grab a set of keys off the hook by the door and toss them to Anton.
“Make her take the car, okay? I know she won’t take it from me, but from you? Tell her I’m not giving it to her, I’m giving it to Truman. It’s going to rain, and he doesn’t like to get wet.”
“Sure thing, Mac.” He takes a breath like he’s going to say something, but I shut the door before he can, because there’s nothing he can say.
Truman’s bark echoes through the door.
I go back to my study with the men with the redXs on their faces.
“I win,” I whisper to myself. “I won.”
I send Jenna a text message.
McCarthy:I’d rather have you hate me and be alive than love me and be dead.
And it’s true. Because I would. I do.
I already miss her, the part of my heart she’d softened up already oozing and rotting.
“I’ll get her back. She’ll come back. Next week. You’ll see. She’ll be right here where she belongs, with me.”
That’s the child in me, the one still desperately hopeful that he’ll see that damn dog again.
