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I should be ecstatic—she’s my first client away from Ruby Blue, and I found her on my own merit. Instead, I just feel sick and I want to cancel and crawl into bed. But that’s not how an empire is built. The last thing I’m going to do is step aside and let life pass me by because of a man who doesn’t know what he wants.
I know whatIwant, and I’m going to keep fighting until I get it. If I give into how I feel right now, then Blake wins, and everything I achieved by walking away from Luc goes down the drain.
And fucked if I’m going to let something like that happen again.
I’ve given up enough in my life. It’s high time I start putting myself first, no matter the cost.
I just didn’t think it would cost me everything when I set out on this journey. I didn’t have that much to lose back then.
It’s hard to think that Blake and only met a short while ago. It feels like we’ve been together an eternity, in a way.
But the fact is that it’s only been a few weeks. Nothing that should leave this much of a dent in my life. And no matter what, I end up losing because of the choices made. The most important thing is that I don’t lose myself.
That’s something I won’t be able to get back again.
Chapter 23
Blake
“You’re an idiot,” Emma says while she spots me.
I have a bar over my shoulders and I’m squatting weights. I slowly bend my knees, focusing on my breathing and my form before I slowly straighten out again. The weights are fucking heavy and I’m too busy focusing on being careful to roll my eyes at her.
“What was I supposed to do?” I ask when my legs are straight and I breathe twice before bending them again slowly.
“You were supposed to talk to her. It’s not rocket science, Blake. You want someone in your life, you open up to them.”
“I didn’t want to burden her.” My voice is strained because I’m talking as I lower myself.
“Yeah? Women want to be burdened by their lover’s problems.”
I straighten out again and take a breath. “That makes no sense.”
“We want to be there for the people we care about. We’re emotional creatures. And we want totalk.You should have told her. Why the hell didn’t you, even when she insisted she wants to be there for it all?”
I don’t know how to answer that. It’s not so easy to just put everything to words. Hell, I didn’t know how to process what happened with my mom, let alone explain it to Rachel.
“I didn’t know how to talk about it.”
“You talked to me about it,” Emma points out. “Another one.
I lower into a squat again, ignoring my thigh muscles and how they scream at me. Physical pain is easier to deal with than emotional pain.
“But you know my past,” I say. “You’ve been here for a decade. I don’t have to explain shit to you, and I don’t have to worry that you’ll run away.”
“Why are you worried she’ll leave?” Emma asks with a frown. “That’s the one thing she isn’t doing. She was here, trying to figure shit out with you. That’s the opposite of leaving. You can’t push her away and then be upset that she’s not around.”
Damn it, she’s right. Of course, she’s right. But fucked if I’m going to admit it.
I squat in silence, only my grunts and groans filling my home gym.
I fucking hate this. I finally found someone who wants to deal with all the crap in my life, and now I’m about to lose her. And it’s all my fault. Because I fuck things up—it’s how I play the game. Not with my business, of course. But with people. There’s a reason the only people who stick around are the ones I pay. The rest of them just don’t want to deal with my grumpy mood swings, my rough way of handling things, and my sullen responses to things other people would be delicate about.
I’m just not like other people. And apparently, it’s worked for Rachel.
Until it didn’t.
The set is finished and I push the bar up onto the clips before I grab my water bottle and squeeze it, squirting the water into my mouth.
