Page 5 of Brawler
“I thought we were going to California together,” she said, like that was the appropriate response.
He moved into the kitchen, loosening his tie. The coffee machine beeped and hissed as he started it, the sound filling thesilence like static before a storm. “That was supposed to be after I passed the bar. Six months ago, Em.”
“I just need six more months.”
“You said that six months ago.” He faced her fully now, leaning against the counter, arms folded. “Are you dragging your feet on this dissertation for a reason you won’t talk about?” His eyes stayed on hers. “Not that you tell me a goddamn thing.”
Her pulse jumped. She didn’t answer because, yes, finishing meant stepping into the future he’d mapped out for them. California. Marriage. Roots sunk so deep she couldn’t run if it went bad. The project…it wasn’t just research. Every page carried her sister’s shadow. Closing it would feel like closing her. She wasn’t ready. Maybe she never would be.
“I just need more research,” she said, keeping her voice even.
He scrubbed a hand through his hair, that old tell of his temper fraying, and turned back to pour creamer into his coffee.
“Well, you go back to Bolivia?—”
“Ecuador,” she snapped, the correction anchored in months of maps, climate models, and jaguar routes.
He waved a hand. “Whatever.”
He walked past her toward the bathroom, and that’s when she caught the faint, cloying sweetness of perfume. Not hers. Expensive. Chanel. The scent hit her first, twisting her gut.
“What’s her name?”
Ben froze mid-step.
She smiled, tight and cold. “Come on, Ben. Who?”
His exhale was rough. “Vanessa.”
The name landed like a slap.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” she whispered. “The bitch who tries to poach all your clients?”
“At least she sees me,” he said, peeling off his shirt. “When she says she’ll show up, she does. She listens. She opens up. She’s there.” He stepped closer, voice sharpening. “You sayyou’ve got a life, but it’s just an unfinished dissertation, a locked-up heart, and a compulsion to run from anything real. We had a future, Em. I believed in that. But I’m done. I’m going to London. When you get home, this apartment will be empty.”
He shut the bathroom door.
She stood there in the hall, unmoving. Water hit tile a moment later, a steady hiss that couldn’t wash away the weight in her chest.
She should feel something—sadness, betrayal—but all she felt was exhaustion.
Relationships were supposed to feel like a partnership. This one had become a courtroom. Ben argued, and she defended. Somehow, she always lost. She couldn’t remember the last time they’d laughed in the middle of an argument. Or the last time a fight had left her heart pounding for any reason other than anger.
She turned away, walked back into the living room, and grabbed her backpack. One strap, then the next. Phone. Keys. Passport.
She opened the door, stepped out into the morning haze, thinking this whole relationship had been a waste of her time. Why did she always pick the wrong men? She and Ben never meshed, but she just hung on like…she deserved that. Like good things weren’t meant for her. They should have said goodbye a long time ago.
Twenty-five minutes later, Emily slid into a seat by the window at the gate, backpack tucked beneath her chair, coffee cooling between her palms. The terminal buzzed with low conversations, rolling luggage, and the distant clatter of a food cart. Her phone buzzed, and when she saw the name, her shoulders eased.
“Aunt Mo,” she said, smiling into the phone.
“Just wanted to hear your voice before you disappear into the jungle,” Moira replied, her tone warm and unhurried. “You still have that ridiculous sun hat I bought you?”
“It’s Ecuador, not the Sahara,” Emily teased. “I have what’s called a Boonie hat.”
Moira chuckled, that husky, throaty laugh that always made Emily feel like she was in on some private joke. Emily could picture her perfectly in her mind, dark hair streaked with silver, loose at her shoulders, a linen shirt smudged from her garden, and those dark, thoughtful eyes that always seemed to noticeeverything.
Summers with Moira had been the only time Emily felt she could breathe, bare feet on warm grass, the smell of tomatoes ripening on the vine, the two of them swaying in the porch hammock while cicadas hummed. Moira had always been there when Emily needed to get away from home, and she never asked for reasons. She just made space.
