AllFreeNovel
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She navigates as I drive, but with each mile, the tension emanating off her hits a new high. Reaching over the center console, I take her balled-up hand and give it a shake like the one she gave me last night.
“Want me to come in with you?” Christ. That’s not part of the plan. We’re saying goodbye. “Or if you’re not ready, we can drive around some.” Go back to my place.
“No. I can’t put Misty off forever. We live together. And… she can be intense.”
“Figure out what you’re going to say?”
She nods, looking out the window. “As little as possible. I just… I can’t tell my family about this. Us. Misty knows something happened with you in Vegas last year. So no getting around that. She knows we kissed.”
“Just not the part about the kiss starting at the chapel, nearly getting us arrested on the way back to the hotel, and then practically burning the room down around us?” Christ, I can practically feel the rise and fall of her chest against mine as I pressed her to the hallway wall. The tug of her fingers in my hair as I carried her over the threshold to my room. The agony of stopping… because she was drunk, and I didn’t want to risk doing something she’d regret in the morning. Somethingelseshe’d regret.
She gives my hand a squeeze, and I realize our fingers are threaded together.
“Yeah. Not that part.”
Another mile passes, taking us farther out of town. “Do you have to tell them at all? I mean, it’s not really anyone’s business but ours. So, we kissed. Big deal. Say we hung out, bonded. I wanted more, but you— You’d just had your life turned upside down and weren’t ready to start something new.”
She turns in her seat, watching me. “It’s almost the truth.”
“When I saw you yesterday… I lost it a little.”
“Hmm. A little less of the truth.”
I grunt. “Not really.”
We drive in silence a few more miles.
I ought to leave it, but— “Look it’s none of my business. I just— The way you talk about your company. Your family. I fucking hate that Ray gets to keep something you love like that. Something that’s every bit yours as much as his.” Because he’s too much of a pussy to do the right thing. “Is Seattle really what you want?”
“Want?” She shrugs. “It’s a fresh start, and I think that’s what I need.”
I get it. If I could wipe the past clean by moving, know Jess and everything that happened wasn’t there, hanging over my head? I’d go in a heartbeat. Pushing those thoughts away, I take the next turn.
We’re almost there.
I’m going to drop her off. Say goodbye. Text once we’ve got our lawyers lined up, and then let them handle the rest.
Becausethis isn’t going anywhere.
There’s too much history between us to make a friendship work. Too many strings to make something casual even an option.
No, I’m going to do what I intended when I planned that return to Vegas. I’m going to let her go and set her free.
Stormy might not think she’s ready, but this woman deserves the happily ever after the fuckwit stole from her. Just with someone else.
I cut a look her way.
She’s going to be fine.
Her family’s house is situated at the end of a long driveway about a mile down a secluded lane, and when we pull to a stop, we both take a breath and turn to each other.
“So, this is it,” she says, her smile bittersweet.
“This is it.” Fuck,this is it.
I brush a dark wave from her face, tucking it behind her ear, and let my hand slide to the back of her neck. “You’ll let me know when you get a lawyer. I’ll do the same.”
She nods, those blue eyes soft as they hold with mine. “They’ll handle the rest.”
