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I prop myself up on my elbow to get a better look at him. “My assistant found them,” I explain. “Somehow they ended up in a thrift store in Santa Monica.” I can’t help but laugh. “Crazy, huh?”
“Your assistant?” he asks as he grabs onto my hips and I squeal.
“You have an assistant?” he teases. Everything else is forgotten when he starts to kiss the sensitive skin between my breasts. He presses his pelvis into me and I audibly gasp, feeling my body ache. Time may have passed between us, but my body never forgot how he made me feel, as if every nerve ending in my body is suddenly switched on.
Just when I think the jeans have been forgotten, he flicks my nipple with his tongue and asks, “How much did you pay for them?”
I inhale sharply, the loss of his mouth on me more than I can bear. I arch my back, pushing myself into him further, anything so I can feel more of him.
“Stop talking,” I demand as I squirm under his touch, and he slowly pulls my panties down. “Ah God, Jack.” I grip the sheets as his mouth finds my sex, and I am utterly lost in the feel of him. It’s as if my broken wings are slowly knitting themselves back together again. My belly quivers at his touch, and the sensation travels down to my thighs.
I have never felt more alive than when I am with Jack.
I’m tired of fighting the inevitable; let the world burn around us if that’s what’s meant to happen.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Epilogue
EPILOGUE
Five Years Later
“I hate you!” I scream at Jack while throwing the glass across the room. It hits the wall and shatters like an explosion of tiny diamonds. The sound of a boom as it makes an impact with the wall causes me to jump. The look on Jack’s face as he realizes how close the glass came to hitting him scares me, and I scramble into the living room to use the couch as a shield between us.
“Don’t come near me!” I scream as tears fall down my cheeks. I watch as he moves slowly, clumsily, as if his feet are made of lead, which only confirms that he has been using again, and I fucking hate him at the moment for doing this to us.
“Mia, please,” Jack begs as he approaches me, his hand outstretched, remorse etched on his face like words on a piece of paper. It’s too late; the damage is already done, and the crack is exposed.
“Why, Jack?” I plead with him.
Jack has a way of destroying everything good in his life, and I can’t watch it happen again. It kills me to watch him destroy himself. These demons of his will never go away.
“You’re not even coherent enough to fight back!” I wave him away, disgusted. “Kill yourself. I don’t care.” Exhausted, I slump against the back of the couch, a slow and steady burn at my back.
“I’m sorry,” Jack whispers as he crawls across the floor towards me. The action is full of desperation, and it rips me open inside.
“Just leave me alone,” I plead with him, but my conviction is waning.
“I just…” he starts to say but hesitates. His excuses are not good enough, and he knows it. Broken promises lay scattered across the floor between us, and this time, we can’t glue them back together. There are too many pieces.
“Is this how our life is going to be?” I beg. “You just go off the rails because you feel shitty about Hayley or something that fucking Amber does and you don’t give a shit about how it affects me?” Perhaps I was selfish to think that I could be a part of Jack’s life and it wouldn’t affect his relationship with Hayley or Amber. It was a factor I never considered.
Instead of facing the problem, he lets it fester and self-medicates when the strain is too much. He’s weak and I’ve always known this, but I thought I could be strong enough for the both of us.
I was wrong.
“Don’t bring Hayley into this,” Jack says, raising his voice to me.
“She’s already in it, Jack!” I yell back. “For the past five years, because of me, Amber has made it a point to do whatever she can to undermine your relationship with her.” I thought Amber would have moved by now, but I was wrong. She uses Hayley to get back at Jack for being with me. Once again, I am causing destruction in my wake, and the evidence is staring me in the eyes.
I don’t want to be the cause of Jack’s suffering.
“She’s going to be an adult soon and I won’t have to go through Amber anymore,” Jack tries to explain, but it doesn’t matter.
“What about now?” The problem doesn’t just go away. It doesn’t matter if Hayley turns eighteen or not, the damage is already done. Amber will never let him go. She’ll punish him for not loving her for the rest of his life.
“I’m handling it.”
