Total pages in book: 44
Estimated words: 41687 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 208(@200wpm)___ 167(@250wpm)___ 139(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 41687 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 208(@200wpm)___ 167(@250wpm)___ 139(@300wpm)
All I wanted to do was throw myself at him, launch into his arms and bury myself in him for the rest of my life. But I’d done that before and had emerged to an empty room in an empty house, with the man I loved about as far away as the next galaxy.
“I need time,” I whispered, my throat burning with the lie. “I need to think.”
He nodded once, sharp and decisive, before standing. His presence was too large in the small room, and he took up all the oxygen in the room, leaving me breathless and dizzy. “I was already planning on giving you time. But Robbie? I meant what I said. I love you. That’s not going to change, whether you decide you want me or not.”
Kit was already walking out the front door when I called out, “How long are you staying on the island?”
He paused with his hand on the doorframe. “I’m not. I have a shareholder meeting in New York in the morning that I can’t miss.” His smile was sad and small. “I did it that way on purpose so I couldn’t stay, no matter what happened between us. I need you to be sure, Robbie. No matter how long it takes. And I didn’t want to rush you.”
No flash mobs for Kit. No pressure. No assumptions. Kit knew what I needed, as always.
“When will you be back?” I asked, suddenly feeling desperate to keep him here, as if this was my only chance and it was slipping through my fingers.
“As soon as you need me. I promise.”
Before I had a chance to say anything or even touch the man, he was gone. The SUV pulled out of my driveway with a crunch of gravel, leaving me standing alone on my porch in old pajama pants and a coffee-stained T-shirt, feeling like I’d just been hit by a hurricane.
I sank down onto my front steps and buried my face in my hands. The careful peace I’d built here felt shattered, every defense I’d constructed reduced to rubble by three simple words.
I love you.
He loved me. Kit fucking Evers loved me… and I’d let him drive away because I was too scared to reach for what I’d wanted my entire adult life.
The salt air carried the sound of his engine fading into the distance, and I finally understood what people meant when they said your heart could literally break. Mine felt split wide open, aching with possibility and terror in equal measure.
The washing machine buzzed to indicate the end of its cycle, but I couldn’t seem to move from my front steps. Couldn’t seem to do anything but sit there and replay his words over and over again, trying to figure out how to breathe around the hope that was unfurling in my chest like a dangerous flower.
I love you.
The truth I’d been running from, the truth I’d been too afraid to believe, was finally out in the open between us.
Now I just had to decide what the hell to do with it.
9
KIT
The airplane’s leather seat, which usually felt like a second home, now felt like sitting on broken bricks. I shifted for the third time in ten minutes, trying to find a position that didn’t make my skin crawl with restless energy. The quarterly reports spread across the polished table in front of me might as well have been written in Sanskrit for all the sense they made. Numbers that usually commanded my complete attention blurred together into meaningless columns.
Brinn’s voice crackled through the intercom. “ETA to Teterboro is forty-five minutes, Mr. Evers. Weather’s clear for landing.”
Kelly reached for my water glass to clear it, asking if I needed anything else.
“No, thank you,” I managed, though my voice sounded foreign to my own ears.
I leaned back in the seat and closed my eyes, but that only made it worse. Behind my eyelids, I could still see Robbie standing in his living room in those ridiculous Minecraft pajama pants a student had given him years ago, looking like I’d just offered him a live snake.
What the hell had I expected?
That he’d throw himself into my arms? That declaring my love after all this time would somehow fix everything I’d broken between us? The man had built an entire new life in South Carolina, for Christ’s sake. He had a job he loved, a house that suited him, probably new friends who didn’t come with decades of complicated history.
And I’d shown up like some kind of romantic gesture from a bad movie, thinking my feelings mattered more than his peace of mind.
The worst part was the look in his eyes. Not anger—I could have handled anger. It was the hope I’d seen there, quickly followed by fear, that was eating me alive. Hope meant he still felt something for me. Fear meant I’d already hurt him too much for it to matter.