Page 137 of Tell Me It’s Right

He leans closer, his gaze boring into mine. “What else?”

I shake my head.

“You know, I can probably think of a few things,” he says. “Your books. Being a vegetarian. Photography. You know whatelse I think feels right to you? Us. And I think that scares you. I know it scares the hell out of me.”

I bite my lip, and he moves closer.

“Tell me what you want, Gracie,” he says lowly. “Not what you think you’re supposed to want, not what everyone says you should want. What doyouwant, Gracie?”

I throw my hands up, hot, frustrated tears filling my eyes. “I don’t know.”

“I don’t buy that. I think you do know. What do you want?”

“I don’t know!” I repeat, louder this time, but Liam doesn’t back off. He leans in closer.

“What do you want?” he pushes. “Come on, Gracie. Stop overthinking every little thing. Stop trying to find the perfect answer. The first thing that pops into your head—what do you want?”

“I want to come home,” I croak, and as soon as the words hit the air, it’s like all of the tension in my shoulders deflates. “I want to come home,” I repeat in a whisper. “But if I do, I’ll feel like I failed.” I roll my eyes against the tears and the cracks in my voice. “Again.”

And Liam, like a complete psychopath, as he watches me crumble into a million pathetic pieces at his feet, smiles.

“Why are you smiling?” I demand.

“Because I’m a selfish bastard and I want you here, but also because I can tell you meant that. So now all that’s left to do is for us to find a way for you to get what you want without you feeling like you failed. We’re going to work this out. You and me. So break it down for me. You don’t like the job.”

“I hate it,” I whisper.

He nods thoughtfully. “What would make you like it? What is it missing?”

“It feels like…filler. Like filling time just for the sake of it. Wasting time. I feel like I could be doing so much more. Eventhe small tasks they occasionally throw my way feel so…lifeless. Like I can’t remember why I enjoyed designing in the first place anymore.”

“But you didn’t feel that way working for me?”

“Liam,” I sigh.

He holds up a hand. “I’m not trying to get you to come back to the shop. I’m trying to understand why it’s different.”

I pause, turning the words over in my head. Whyisit different?

“I guess when I look around at other people in the company—the people higher up than me, the jobs I could have one day if I stick it out and pay my dues—there isn’t a single job there that I want. I think I’d have the same complaints.”

He runs his thumb over the back of my hand. “Is it the company? Do you think you’d like it somewhere else if you were more passionate about what they were selling?”

“I don’t think so.”

A slow smile stretches across his face as he looks at me.

“What?”

“Come on,” he murmurs. “You have to see the answer. It’s right there in front of you.”

I frown.

“You liked working at the shop because you had free rein,” he says slowly. “You were never waiting around for approval or having to clear your ideas. You just got to jump in, get your hands dirty, and figure out what worked on your own.”

Well, yeah. But I don’t see how that?—

“Gracie.” He chuckles and smooths his thumb over the tension between my eyebrows. “It’s not that you don’t like design anymore. You don’t like working for someone else.”

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