Page 63 of Redemption

“What?” I gasped. “No.” I shook my head. “You can’t…” You can’t leave me. Not again.

“I have to.” He didn’t even have the decency to look at me.

“Why? Because of what happened last night?” I asked, anger and fear surging through my veins.

“Yes, and because it’s eating me up inside—knowing you’re with someone else. Wanting you for myself.” He placed his fist to his chest, pounding the space over his heart. “It’s tearing me apart.”

I gaped at him in disbelief.

“I don’t want to leave, but you’re still my principal. Hudson’s client. It’s my job to protect you, and I can’t do that if… I just can’t. I’m sorry.”

“Can’t or won’t?” I demanded.

“Sloan,” he growled. “Don’t ask this of me. Don’t ask me to betray all my principles.”

“I thought we were friends.” I crossed my arms over my chest, remembering how he’d suggested friendship only a few days ago.

He scoffed. “Oh, come on, Sloan. We could never be just friends.”

I flung out my hands. “Then why’d you say it if you didn’t mean it?”

“It wasn’t—” He turned away, grabbing the railing and making his muscles pop. “It wasn’t that I didn’t mean it. I do want to be your friend. But I also want things a friend shouldn’t.”

“Like sex.”

He turned to face me. “Yes, but not just sex. I don’t want this to be like it was before. But that’s—” He let out a frustrated groan. “That’s just not possible.”

Just not possible.

It felt too close to “inevitable.” Which was exactly what he’d said when he’d ended things fourteen years ago.

Perhaps I should’ve told him that Edward and I had broken up, but I wanted to see what Jackson would say first. Were his objections confined to Edward, or was there something more?

“Why?” I asked.

“Why do you think?” Jackson asked. “Because of Edward, and my job, my sister, and…”

“Excuses,” I spat the word, anger zinging through me like a bolt of lightning. And all the old pain came rushing back in. “Always with the excuses. If you really wanted to be with me, you’d find a way. You would’ve found a way back then. And you would find a way now. If you’d loved me, you wouldn’t have let anything stand in our way.

“If you loved me.” I took a deep breath, as if that would help me find the air I needed. The strength. “Our breakup wouldn’t have been inevitable, but unthinkable.” I hurled the words at him.

By the time I was done, my heart felt ragged, and yet nothing had changed. Not really. I’d wanted to believe it had, that we had. But deep down, we were still the same people.

Jackson was one of the bravest men I knew. If there was a situation that needed to be handled or a safety concern, he was your guy. But when it came to vulnerability and taking emotional risks, he couldn’t be relied on. He couldn’t be trusted.

“It’s fine,” I said, some of my anger shifting to hurt, exhaustion. “Honestly, I probably should’ve expected this.” But that didn’t take away the sting of my disappointment.

I turned and headed for the stairs. How could a night that had been so magical turn into…this?

“What is that supposed to mean?” he asked, his tone low, lethal.

I faced him, unable to let it go. If this was it, I wanted to speak my mind once and for all. “Don’t you remember what you told me when you ended things? That our breakup was inevitable.”

“I was trying to spare us both from more pain.”

“That’s bullshit, Jackson. And you know it.”

“It wasn’t bullshit. Surely you realize that we’re from two different worlds.” He gestured to the boat. The ocean. Whatever.

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