Page 20 of Broken King

Jessie’s in rare form today. I force a smile and turn to see her expression one of complete judgment. “What? I’m sorry. I was lost in thought there. What did you say?”

She folds her arms across her chest and lets out a sigh that sounds like a huff or a harrumph. “Okay, what is this about? Are we still on Mr. Dreamy from high school?”

“We dated after high school, you know,” I say, but my attempt to correct her falls flat.

“Fine, you dated after high school. How is it you haven’t talked about this guy but a handful of times in the past six months when I was with you twenty-four seven, and now youcan’t even have a normal conversation without getting lost in thought about Ronan?”

She’s right. I hadn’t thought about Ronan King in forever, it seems. I think I only mentioned him once or twice when we were in Italy, and we just spent six months together, day in and day out.

“I don’t know,” I answer, staring off in the distance. “He’s hurting, and I don’t like that.”

That gets me another harrumph. “Sounds like the problem is you do like him. So what are you going to do about it?”

Jessie is very much one of those people who always feels there’s something to do about any situation. Whatever the issue is, some kind of activity or movement is always called for, according to her.

I’m just not sure that’s the case in this situation.

“What is there to do about it? He wouldn’t even talk to me. I ran out of the room crying.”

“That cad!” she says far too loudly, making the four people at the table next to us turn and give us dirty looks.

Leaning over toward her, I grab her arm. “Shhhh! And who says cad anymore? It’s the twenty-first century, Jessie.”

But nothing I say stops her, and she raises her voice again to say, “First of all, cad is a great word and should have never gone out of style. Second of all, we’re on a busy street in Brooklyn, for God’s sake! Why do I need to keep my voice down?”

Humiliation covers me, and I turn my head so none of the other diners can see my face. “If I promise to go where you want, will you please keep quiet? They’re going to throw us out of here if you don’t.”

She rolls her eyes but agrees to do as I ask. “Fine, but exactly where are they going to throw us out of? They already have us on the sidewalk, Kate, and paying the same price as if we were sitting inside, I might add.”

I can practically feel the angry glares coming from the people around us. I love Jessie and how strong she is, but when she decides she has something to say, God help anyone who isn’t interested in hearing it.

“Please. Everyone is looking at us,” I say, nearly begging her to keep cool.

She waves off that silly idea and shakes her head. “Nobody cares, honey. This is New York. I could run down the street screaming at the top of my lungs, and I bet not a single person would stop me.”

I cautiously turn my head to see if she’s right that nobody’s looking at us, and thankfully, I see everyone sitting outside of the restaurant has returned to their meals and their own conversations. I breathe a sigh of relief and slowly sit up in my chair.

“Okay, I need you to promise me that you won’t get loud like that again. I’ll do whatever you want. Just keep it down, okay?”

“I think you should go see him again.”

Clearly, we’ve moved on from the public embarrassment portion of our time here and now we’re talking about Ronan again. Odd since I didn’t think she wanted to discuss that topic anymore.

“Jessie, he told me to go away. He wasn’t trying to be subtle. He doesn’t want to see me.”

She twists her face into a strange expression and doesn’t say anything for a long moment. Then she asks, “Do you think this is because you broke up with him? Men do have a hard time with rejection.”

It doesn’t take me long to decide that isn’t the problem. “No. He’s not like that. He understood why I broke up with him. I saw him a few times before the accident, and he was always the same sweet guy I always knew. He got that he hurt me when he slept with that girl.”

“Okay, it’s not a rejection thing. So what is it?”

I hold up my right hand in front of her. “He lost his hand, Jess. The guy wanted to be a baseball player. He was a great shortstop. All he ever wanted to do was play professional baseball, and he lost his hand in that accident. His dream job isn’t a possibility anymore. That’s why he’s unhappy.”

She doesn’t seem impressed with my explanation. “Okay, I get that he can’t do what he always wanted to do, but the guy’s a billionaire, isn’t he? Or am I getting him confused with someone else?”

“He is. Ronan’s family is wealthy, and he is too. I don’t think that matters when all you ever wanted to do was play ball, and now you can’t. Money doesn’t buy happiness.”

That gets me a look that tells me she thinks that’s ridiculous. “Only people with money think that. The rest of us know the real truth. If you’ve got money, you’ve got it all. So Mr. Moneybags isn’t happy. I think the answer is you have to change that.”

---