Page 17 of Embracing the Change

And he damn well knew that.

I took a sip of champagne, regarding him around my flute, fashioning my retort.

When I’d swallowed, I rejoined, “It wasn’t me sulking the last week after this trip was decided instead of extending an olive branch so we could navigate this holiday without issue.”

“I’m sorry, did I miss a phone call? A text?” he asked.

I put my hand lightly to my chest in genuine affront. “You think I should have been the one to make the first overture?”

“I think you aren’t in a position to throw that in my face when you didn’t do what you accuse me of not doing.”

“Because it wasn’t my place,” I shot back.

Blue fire lit in his eyes, but he pulled a sharp breath into his nose to gain control, and he said carefully, “I understand where your hurtful words came from.”

Oh no.

We were not discussing that.

We were absolutely not discussing how I’d revealed how deep my feelings ran for him after that kiss, and he hadn’t missed it.

I didn’t get the chance to inform him of that fact.

He continued, “What I find upsetting is that you don’t seem to understand where I was in that moment.”

My God.

How had I missed he was this self-involved?

I was such a fool. He was a man. It should have been a given.

“Believe me, Jamie, I could not escape where you were at…for decades. Even if I had tried.”

More blue fire before he struggled for control and unsurprisingly (this was Jamie Oakley) succeeded.

“So it’s to be exchanging barbs and avoidance for the next week?” he inquired on a sigh.

With studied nonchalance, I took another sip of champagne before replying, “I’m game if you are.”

He shook his head with disgust. “I can’t even begin to comprehend how I managed to overlook how utterly immature you are, especially since it was right up in my face the entirety of our friendship.”

“Well, we share something in common, considering I managed to overlook how self-absorbed, and I’ll add, entirely clueless you are.”

He got closer and his anger rose palpably nearer to the surface before he growled, “You’re the first woman I kissed after my wife died.”

You’re the only man I truly loved in my entire life, and you managed to overlook that as well, even if it, too, was right up in your face the entirety of our friendship, I did not say.

“This is not news,” I hissed.

“And you have no empathy for where my heart and head were in that moment?”

“There was another person there in that moment, Jamie, and I’ll take this opportunity to remind you that other person was me.”

“So it’s all about you and what you were feeling, and you accuse me of being self-absorbed?” he fired back.

“No, it’s all about the fact you want it to be solely about you when it’s not. When we were both there, feeling deeply.”

“You mean something to me, Nora, so when you lashed out when I was feeling deeply, sharing you thought what we had was nothing, you kicked a man I thought you cared about when he was down.”

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