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“Hold up, talk to me.”
Her brow lowers, the lines appearing. “Not here. Outside.”
I nod and tug the bag away from her, lowering it to the floorboards. She wants to fight me, but she lets me leave it behind.
Once we’re outside, I pull her around to the side of the steps, out of sight of the door. I immediately twist my hands into her hair and kiss her. She lets out a sad little whimper that breaks my heart, so I hold her closer, an arm around her waist and holding her to me.
When she breaks away from me, the lines between her eyes have only deepened, and she looks up at me, her eyes the picture of heartache. “I can’t do this,” she says, shaking her head. “I can’t hurt him like this. I told him it needs to be over, but I can’t just be with you. You’re his brother—it would crush him. Not to mention, I don’t even have a place to live or a sustainable job right now. I can’t fuck things up between you two when I don’t even know…”
She trails off, letting out a breath that sounds laced with overwhelm. Her gaze comes up to meet mine, and it’s a knife to the gut.
“What you want,” I finish for her, my throat tight and voice low.
Before she can try to deny it, the funeral march starts playing from her phone. When she pulls it out, I catch the name on the screen. She ignores the call from her mom and shoves the phone back in her coat pocket.
It’s then I remember what she said the night of the storm. About her parents and Archer not being good enough for her. I look down at my button-down, the dressiest I get, while my brother wears it on a daily basis. How the fuck would they react to me if my golden-boy brother isn’t good enough for them?
“Is that what this is about?” I ask. “It’s them?”
“No,” she says quickly, but something in her eyes says she’s not sure.
It crushes me, grates apart my insides to think she might not trust me to be enough for her.
“Talk to me, baby. Tell me what you need.” I cup her face in my hands, gentle as possible. “You want safe? You want stable? Say the word, and I’ll be in finance or business or whatever your little heart desires.” I can feel her slipping away. If I thought last time was forever, then I have a feeling I’m about to learn the true meaning of the word.
“Come on, baby. I’m what you want. I’ll be everything you need.”
“Please,” she whimpers out the word, her eyes filling with tears until they begin to run down her face and roll down my thumbs and wrists. “Please don’t make me do this, Benji. I can’t. I can’t hurt him like this.”
The pain in her voice only amplifies inside me. My gaze moves to the window where the shadows of everyone dance behind the curtain. I can pick out my brother’s, feel the warmth of his smile, the love and trust he’s always given me.
She’s right. It would crush him to know while he was gone, I was slowly working my way to being with his girl—even if it feels like she’s always been mine.
I either let her break me or we break him. And with the way she shakes her head and leans into my touch, I know. The way she buries her cheek into my palm is goodbye. I have to let her say goodbye. Even if I know it’s not what she wants.
“Where will you go?” I ask, dropping my hands to my sides.
She wipes away the tears staining her cheeks. “I don’t know.”
I force a nod and a half-smile at her, my eyes burning as I do the right thing and tell her, “Be happy, CJ. Whatever happens, be happy and do everything you can to find what you truly want. That’s all I’ll ever ask of you.”
Then I turn around, and I walk away. I walk away from the house, my friends, my brother, and I walk away from the one thing I swore to myself I would never walk away from again.
I never saw Charlie coming the first time, never dreamed she’d be within grasp again. Losing her then changed me, but now…
Not sure I’ll ever recover from losing her again.
CHAPTER 12
CHARLIE
A week later…
* * *
“Consider this an intervention.”
I look over from my painting, surprised to see all three Nymphs staring me down. Bianca has her hands on her hips, Jaelynn’s arms are over her chest, and Cys has the look of a concerned mother.
