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“Go drive around,” I said. “See what’s open.”

“I can’t leave. She’s gonna know what I’m doing. She’s gonna think I forgot to buy her a fucking Christmas gift and now I’m that guy running out at the last minute to get her something.”

“I’ll come with you. Just tell her I need to go shopping,” I said.

“She’ll want to come.”

“Maybe not. She’s hanging out with Becca and Samantha.”

“But what if she does?”

I squeezed my eyes shut.

So now she wasn’t going to have anything to open. Everyone else would have their gifts, except her.

“Fine. I’ll go on my own,” I said. “I’ll see what I can find.”

He gave me a grateful expression. “Thanks, man. You’re a lifesaver.”

I nodded at the box. “Give those to Donna—when you get home. Don’t let anyone have them here. It’ll get almond crumbs all over the place.”

He nodded. “Right. Good call. Seriously, thank you.”

“Yeah.”

I snuck out the back so nobody could ask me where I was going and nobody could see my face because I was pretty sure I was about to have a panic attack. I got in the car, backed out to the end of the drive, pulled over on the shoulder along the highway, and parked.

My breathing was getting shallow, and I cracked the window and wrenched off my seat belt, gasping.

He didn’t keep her safe.

She was in danger with him, her boyfriend, out of his own fucking carelessness.

What if she didn’t know macarons were made with almond flour? She was always really good about checking, but what if she trusted that Mike had checked and she ate one?

He could have killed her.

EpiPen or no. It could still kill her.

I hadn’t checked her EpiPen. Did she even have it? What about Benadryl? I’d been trying to create better boundaries for myself around her and now all I wondered is whether her pen was expired or if she accidentally left it at home. We were in the middle of nowhere. It was an hour-plus to a hospital. How fucking stupid did you have to be to—

I doubled over and tried to steady my breathing.

If this had been Becca, if the allergy was hers and Jesse had done this, I would have been disappointed. I would have shaken my head and told him to be more careful. But I wouldn’t have felt the unbridled fear and bubbling rage that I felt when it was Larissa.

When it was Larissa, something primal in me came out.

I had no control over how I felt. None.

Love is self-sustaining. It doesn’t get weak and die when you don’t feed it. Even when I put it away, locked it up, shut in the deepest recesses of my heart, I still loved her in the dark. I could love her from a distance. I could love her in silence. I could love her without even wanting to.

And I did.

I would spend my existence silently cherishing a woman I’d never have. Someone I’d never kiss or even hold hands with. This was my curse. The future I was condemned to. To never truly be happy—or to be happy for him. Because he did not. Fucking. Deserve. Her.

I scrambled from the car, leaning on my knees trying to catch my breath.

The cold air stung my face and made tears squeeze from my eyes and the whole time all I could think about over the doomsday scenario of her getting hurt was that tomorrow was Christmas and she was going to have nothing to open if I didn’t get my shit together and go look.