Now
CHAPTER
THIRTY-TWO
Jackson
Evie is seated at the high counter that separates the kitchen from the living room, which is where we usually eat. She’s finishing her breakfast, two pieces of baguette with butter and strawberry jam, which she dips in a mug that’s more milk than coffee.
“I have to rush, I’m late,” I tell her, pressing a quick kiss on her cheek. “Oh, I saw you were out of sleeping pills. Do you want me to take your prescription and get you a refill?”
“No, I’m okay.”
I’m already by the door that leads to the garage when she says, “Jackson, wait.”
I stop and turn around, looking at her get down from her stool and walk to me. Consciously, I have no idea what this is about. But my subconscious must have caught on, because I can feel the way my heartbeat hastens just a little.
There’s something determined about her, like she’s made a decision. Like she knows what she needs to do now.
Completely immobile, I watch her come so close her body touches mine, her pretty hazel eyes looking up at me through her lashes. Something in them unravels me. She hasn’t looked at me like this for five months. Not since the day I returned from Melbourne in a rush.
Then she slips a hand around my neck, soft, gentle. Encouraging. I follow its timid lead and bend down as she stretches up.
The moment our lips touch, a powerful and overwhelming sensation wrecks me, coursing through my whole body.
She hasn’t done this either since that day.
Kissed me of her own volition. I’ve received no more than a few grazes, sometimes accidental.
We haven’t even slept together since, because she moved to the guest room and never came back.
But now she’s kissing me. A long, sweet kiss. And I’m too fucking stunned to register it properly before she pulls away.
“Have a good day at work, Jax,” she says, a modest smile bending the corners of her lips.
All I can do is nod, dazed. Am I dreaming? Did this really happen?
When her eyes descend to my lips and hers part just a little, I can’t stop myself from taking what I so desperately crave. Affection. A sign, anything, that tells me she still loves me, still wants me here.
She doesn’t fight or recoil when my mouth returns to hers. In fact, her fingers on my neck tug me in. My hand stops hovering in the air, and I bring it around her, pulling her into me with a firm press on her back.
Five months. Five months of missing my wife. Of missing her. Of worrying that our marriage couldn’t be fixed. Of thinking I’ve lost the one thing that truly matters. Five months of agony.
But finally, I feel like it might come to an end. We’ve found our way back to one another.
Our lips part at the same time, and our tongues are shy at first, scared to go too far and too fast. But they grow bolder with every second that passes until we’re making out with passion, as we used to.
I’m completely lost in it, entirely subdued by the moment and what it means, when she rips herself away. “You should go,” she breathes out. She’s still in my arms, flushed, panting, beautiful.
“I can stay.”
She shakes her head. “No, you have to go. You can’t skip a simulation day.”
“Right. I’ll see if I can get an earlier train so we can have the evening together.”
She seems a little distant as she nods. She allows me to give her another peck, and as I let her go, I say, “I love you, princess. See you tonight.”
“Goodbye, Jax. I’ll miss you,” she answers with a melancholic smile.
“I’ll miss you too, princess.” After one last look down at her, I rush into the garage.
For the first time since we lost Ophelia, I have the feeling we can pull through it. I can’t contain random smiles during the drive to the train station. All I can see is hope. That kiss has my mind flooded with it.
We’ll make it. I know we will.
By the time I return home early in the evening, I’m still not over what happened.
I’ve replayed that kiss the entire day. Her smile, the way she looked at me, her words …
Something shifted in Evie, something I’ve been waiting months for, and every time I think about it, hope blooms so violently in my chest it almost hurts.
We’ve stagnated for five fucking months. Walking in circles around each other, loving each other wrong, hurting each other. But this morning felt different. Softer. Honest. Like we’ve finally found our way back. And I know we have. I can feel it in my bones.
As the garage door closes behind me, I grab the bouquet from the passenger seat. I took a detour on my way home to get it. It’s the biggest arrangement they had, overflowing with pink and white flowers, exactly the kind she loves.
I thought about bringing her flowers before, gifts, jewelry, dumb little things that made me think of her. But every time, it felt wrong. Like trying to buy her forgiveness, to guilt her into letting me in.
But tonight, it feels right. This isn’t a bribe or a bargain. It’s a thank you. Thank you for finally allowing me back into her space. Thank you for showing me she still loves me. That she still wants me.
I’m smiling when I walk into the house.
“Evie?” I call out.
Silence greets me. The room is dark. Too dark. I didn’t notice when I pulled in. But the lights are off. It’s not normal.
My smile falters.
Maybe she fell asleep. Maybe she’s embarrassed about this morning, and this is how she decided to handle it. By being asleep when I came home, so she wouldn’t have to face the consequences of that kiss.
I place the bouquet on the kitchen counter and head upstairs, dismissing the uneasiness tugging at my gut. “Evie?” I call again, louder this time.
Nothing. Every light upstairs is off, too.
I reach the guest bedroom and stop in the doorway, my gaze immediately falling to the floor beneath it. I can still see the blood sometimes if I look long enough. Dried and smeared across the threshold. Enough of it to make me sick when I came home from Australia and saw it that day.
Enough to nearly lose her. I could also have lost my wife. My Evie.
I force the memory away and push the door open. Darkness stares back at me.
“Princess?” I call softly. When she doesn’t answer after a second attempt, I flick the lights on.
The bed is untouched.
An unpleasant sensation creeps under my skin. An awareness I’m not ready to let in yet.
I check the bathroom first. Empty. Then our bedroom. The balcony. The downstairs rooms. The back patio. Every empty room I move through feels wrong somehow, like the house itself knows something I don’t.
“Evie!” My voice echoes this time.
I make it back upstairs as panic fully sinks its claws into me. I head straight for the walk-in closet we still share, reaching for my phone to call her when I notice it. One of the large suitcases is gone.
At first, my brain refuses to process it. It notices alarming details instead. Empty hangers. Whole shelves cleared out. The spaces where her favorite shoes used to be.
No. She wouldn’t do this.
Not like this.
Not without talking to me first. Not without giving me a chance to fix it. Not without saying goodbye.
My chest tightens so hard it burns. And then, slowly, horribly, reality settles into place. She did say goodbye.
That kiss.
The way she grazed my face afterward. The way she looked at me like she was trying to memorize me. The sadness underneath her smile that I was too fucking happy to question.
She knew. She knew she was leaving me when she kissed me this morning.
A sharp laugh escapes me then, humorless and broken. This morning, I thought we were finally healing. The whole time, she was saying goodbye.
My legs suddenly feel unsteady beneath me. She’s gone.
I walk back downstairs, my pulse in my ears so loud I can barely hear my own thoughts. That awful instinct keeps growing inside me, spreading through my ribs like poison.
By the time I reach the kitchen again, my eyes catch on a folded piece of paper partially hidden beneath the bouquet. My breathing stops. I already know before I open it that whatever is written inside is going to ruin me.
“I need some time alone. I’m sorry. I love you.”
That’s it. Three fucking sentences. No explanation. No anger. No promise she’ll come back.
Things between us must have been far worse than I allowed myself to believe.
I look down at the note again until the words begin blurring together. They break me, each one adding another gaping rip through my heart as I read them.
There will forever be a before this moment and an after.
I’ve just let the love of my life walk out the door. I didn’t see the signs. I didn’t pay enough attention. Now she’s gone, maybe forever.
And I have no fucking idea where she is. Even if I did, she doesn’t want me to find her. She’s asking for time. I should respect that. I should trust that she’ll find her way back to me because, no matter what those past months put us through, we’re each other’s forever.
If she doesn’t come back, she’ll never feel complete again. Just like I know I won’t. We need each other. More than we need air. More than I need racing.
She’ll come back. She has to.
The postrace jitters have fully died down as I walk to the white couch in the press conference room.
I sit in the middle of it, at the center of the curve, while the other two take their places on each side of me.
The couch has us slouched back, per usual, but it’s the kind of rest we need after the race we just had.
This is one of those moments where I have to be mentally present, though, so I force myself to focus on the room and its occupants.
“A warm welcome and congratulations to our top three finishers of the FIA Formula One Las Vegas Grand Prix,” the moderator says before introducing the other two drivers and their finishing positions.
“And in first place yet again, Jackson Reyes, who continues on with his very impressive run. With today’s victory, you’ve officially set a new record for most wins in a single Formula One season, beating your old one. How does that feel?”