Chapter Thirty - Daniel
CHAPTER THIRTY
Daniel
DANIEL SPLASHED COLD water on his face. It did nothing.
He stared at his reflection, watching the way the droplets clung to his jaw, the way his eyes looked sunken, bruised. Like a man unraveling one thread at a time.
He barely registered the sound of the door creaking open until he caught movement in the mirror.
James stepped inside.
He didn’t say anything. Just leaned against the tiled wall, arms folded, gaze unreadable.
Daniel braced.
But James didn’t look angry. He just stood there, watching him like he was trying to understand something that didn’t make sense.
Daniel couldn’t take it. He turned back to the sink. “You can say it. That I’m a piece of shit.”
James was quiet for a moment before he spoke. “I don’t need to say it. I think you already know.”
The words landed with more weight than Daniel expected.
James took a breath, still leaning against the wall. “I keep thinking about Mia,” he said, almost to himself. “About what I’d do if she looked at me the way Hannah looked at you tonight.”
Daniel flinched.
James went on. “I’m not trying to rub it in. I just—” He paused, then looked over at Daniel. “I would rather lose a limb than ever make Mia hurt like that. I’m not built for it.”
Daniel swallowed hard, throat thick.
“And I thought you had that, too,” James said, voice soft. “That kind of love. That kind of loyalty.”
Daniel stared at the sink. At the cheap soap dispenser. At anything but James.
“I don’t hate you,” James added. “I just don’t understand you.”
Daniel’s hands tightened against the edge of the counter.
He didn’t look up. Just said, low and rough, “ I hate me.”
Silence.
“I fucking hate me, James.” His voice cracked. “I wake up every morning and want to crawl out of my own skin. I can’t even look at her—can’t even think about her—without wanting to rip my chest open.”
He shook his head, breath catching. “She gave me everything. And I threw it away like a stupid, selfish, fucking fool.”
James didn’t move.
Daniel’s eyes burned, but he didn’t let the tears fall. Not here. Not now.
“I deserve to hate myself,” he said. “Because I had everything. I had her. And I pissed it all away for nothing.”
“I love her,” he said, voice raw. “And I’ll love her for the rest of my life.”
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Daniel didn’t go home.
He couldn’t go home.
Instead, he drove. Not to anywhere. Just away.
He could feel her ring where it lay against his chest, strung on the delicate gold chain. It nestled against his skin like penance. Like proof.
He wasn’t entitled to it but it was all he had left of her. So he wore it.
He wore it even though it burned.
He wore it because it burned.
Because it reminded him that there had been a time when he was loved by someone extraordinary. When her eyes lit up just for him. When she believed in him, completely, stupidly, beautifully.
And he had ruined it.
He gripped the steering wheel tighter, blinking against the sting in his eyes. The night blurred around him—headlights, streetlamps, neon signs flashing promises for people with clearer consciences.
He hated himself.
This was shame down to the marrow. Rot in the soul. A bone-deep knowing that he had touched something sacred and shattered it with his own hands.
He had had her.
He had held something rare and real. A woman who chose him every day even when he didn’t deserve it.
And he threw it away because a younger woman had shown any interest in him. Not younger than Hannah, younger than him .
Because he wanted to prove something—to the mirror, to the world, to himself.
God.
Daniel leaned forward, pressing his forehead to the steering wheel.
Hannah was gone. He understood that now.
She would go on to live a life without him—she would laugh again, rebuild, fall in love again.
And he would deserve none of it. Not her joy, not her healing, not even the memory of her.
But still—
Still, she existed.
She was walking around in the world, being the kind of woman who turned heads and held hearts and made people better just by being near them.
And that —that was worth becoming someone better for.
Even if she never looked at him again.
Even if she never spoke his name again.
He reached up and curled his hand around the ring, her ring, holding it tightly to his chest.
“I’m going to be better,” he whispered to the dark. “Because you’re out there. Because I got to love you once.”
He didn’t know where he was going.
But he knew what direction to move in.
Forward.
Away from the man he had been.
Toward something better.
Someone better.
For her.
Always for her.