Page 98 of The Chance

Get it over with.

Rip the band aid off.

It’s all I can think of as I sit there with chilling skin and that same sinking feeling that has plagued me as long as I can remember.

This is how it always went. Get to the fucking part only to skip right on to the line where letdowns come and shit you can’t take back is said.

I can already hear it in my head, all the things he’ll say to get out of this. To get away from me and my life. All the ways he’ll talk about being friends, but everyone knows you can’t be friends with someone you’ve slept with. Someone you love.

Especially when only one of you isinlove.

Pushing to my feet, I square my shoulders and face him.

Because if he thinks I’m going to make it easy on him to reject me by keeping my back to him, he’s wrong.

“Say it,” I demand stronger than I feel.

Please don’t say it.

Jordan’s chin lifts, his own shoulders tight and straight as he looks right at me, almost through me like he can see that little thought tumbling around inside my head.

His throat moves with a swallow and his jaw flexes.

And then he knocks the fucking wind right out of me with two simple as fuck words.

“I quit.”

The world tilts.

An all too familiar whooshing sound takes over my ears and the darkness descends around the edges of my vision.

I was right all along.

Chapter Sixty

Jordan

The way the colordrains from Mac’s face has that festering wound inside my chest breaking wide open.

Fucking fuck, this is all messed the hell up.

Why didn’t I talk to him first?

“Mac,” I croak out and stand, pulling the sheet with me as he jabs his feet into his pants and zips. “Just listen to me.”

“No,” he says with enough vehemence to have me pausing. “I have listened to you for too long.”

Everything in me freezes. “What?”

“And every fucking time, I end up breaking my own heart.”

Stalking to the door, he whips it open so hard that it bounces off the backstop and into the smack of his palm.

“Now get the fuck out of my life,” he all but growls and my head spins.

The tick in his jaw, the intensity staring back at me, all settles in my gut like a punch.

I knew better.

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