Page 37 of Rebel Heart
“Jules, please?—”
“You need to leave.”
“But I?—”
“What? Are you going to change your mind if you stay here? Are you suddenly going to decide you want a relationship? If not, there’s nothing left for us to discuss. Iwas an idiot. I made a stupid, stupid decision. And for the second time in my life, I’ve learned that I don’t know the first thing about picking out a good guy. It’s clear I can’t trust myself or my instincts. Now, please, get out of my apartment.”
For several silent moments, Beau didn’t move. But eventually, he stood and moved around the room, collecting his clothing and pulling it on. I couldn’t bring myself to watch, but I could hear everything that he was doing.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw his feet carry him to the bedroom door. I thought he’d walk through and leave forever, but he didn’t. He stopped and stood there. When I dared to glance up at his face, there was nothing but regret etched into his features.
“For what it’s worth, I’m so sorry. I think you’re a wonderful woman, and I believe you’re going to make some lucky guy very happy one day. Me not believing in love shouldn’t be the reason you give up on finding what you clearly want and deserve to have.”
A tear escaped and rolled down my cheek. Beau’s eyes watched it as it fell, the guilt etched into his features.
“Jules, I can stay for?—”
“I want you to leave.”
He jerked his chin down in understanding, even as the disappointment filtered in. “Take care of yourself.”
Without another word exchanged, Beau walked out for good.
And when I heard the door close, indicating he’d left my apartment, only then did I completely break down.
10
JULES
I thoughtI’d turned a corner.
And why would I have thought any differently when there was so much for me to be happy about.
It was my birthday, I was with my family, my nieces and nephew were both at the party, and more babies were on the way. Just being with the people who loved me the way my family did was enough to turn things around for me, but adding in the fact they all got together to celebrate my birthday made everything that much better.
I had no reason to be upset.
And I wholeheartedly believed I was going to come into this today and thoroughly enjoy myself.
But no matter how hard I’d worked to move on over the last week and a half since I last saw Beau and learned I hadn’t been anything more than a notch on his bedpost, it was all undone this morning when I woke to my phone ringing with a call from him.
I didn’t answer it, of course.
It was the third time he’d reached out to me since leaving my apartment that day. The first instance came in the form of a text message the next morning. Beau had apologized once again, letting me know that I could call him if I wanted to talk.
I never responded.
Two days after that, he sent a second text. He simply wanted to check in and make sure I was doing okay.
That text also went unanswered.
I’d debated blocking his number. I probably should’ve. But there was this one small part of me that hoped I’d get a call or text from him stating that he’d realized he’d made a terrible mistake and wanted to make things right. After those two texts, I’d determined that he was merely doing whatever he needed to do to ease his own conscience.
And that was only proven to be a correct assumption when the days passed, and Beau never made another attempt.
Until today.
Until he decided to call me on my birthday.
