Chapter 49 Forget about It
Chapter forty-nine
Forget about It
Beau
“Jo, what are you doing here?” I ask as she pulls me into the breakroom. “Is everything okay?”
“I don’t know. I mean, physically, I’m fine, but today hasn’t been a good day.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
She thinks for a second. “No, I want to forget about it.”
Before I can say a word, she leans up to kiss me and starts unbuttoning my jeans.
“Jo,” I say between kisses. I have to grab her hands to get her to stop. “We can’t do that right now.”
“Come on,” she presses. “We’ve fucked in the shop before.”
“Right. We did it when no one else was here, but right now, we are in the breakroom, and there’s a whole bay full of guys out there who could walk in at any moment.”
“Fine. Let’s go to the bathroom. We can have more privacy in there.”
“Baby, what’s going on? I highly doubt you came here just to have a quickie in the bathroom.”
“No, I came here because I was having a shitty day, and I want to do something to help me forget about it. I figured I could come here, and my boyfriend could help me with that.”
Her tone is laced with attitude, and it’s clear that she’s frazzled. As much as I want to calm her down, I don’t think us running off to the bathroom to fuck is the answer.
I’m about to try to push to get something out of her. Maybe if she starts talking, she will feel better, but she doesn’t give me a chance.
With a wild look in her eye, she says, “Let’s get out of here.”
“What do you mean? You want to leave and go back home?”
She shakes her head. “No, I mean let’s get out of Lilly Leaf Falls. We can have a little getaway for a few days.”
“Jo, I can’t just leave. I have a job and responsibilities.”
“And I don’t,” she says in barely more than a whisper.
“Hey, that’s not what I meant. What I’m saying is if you want to plan a trip, we can, but if I just leave right now and not come in for a few days, I may not have a job when I get back. Plus, I won’t just leave Jack hanging like that.”
“Come on,” she wraps her arms around me. “It’ll be so much fun.”
“I’m sure it would be, baby, but I have news for you. All of the problems that you are trying to run away from will still be here waiting for you when you come back.”
“Then, let’s just not come back. We can start over somewhere new.”
“Are you listening to yourself?” I ask. “You’re being crazy.”
She lets go of me with an offended look on her face. “Oh, yeah. That’s me. Crazy Jo Lawson.”
“Come on, Jo. That’s not what I’m saying. But you know that you aren’t making any sense right now.”
She doesn’t respond, so I keep going.
“Jo, I have a house with a mortgage and a dog and a ton of other things I can’t just leave behind. And guess what? Eventually, any problems we have would follow us wherever we decided to go.”
As if something finally clicks in her head, she says, “You’re right. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have come here.”
“You never have to apologize for coming here. If you need me to leave for a little while and walk you home, just let me go talk to Jack.”
“No, that’s okay. I’m fine. I was just having a moment. I’m going to go try to clear my head for a bit. I’m sure I’ll feel better by the time you get home.”
“Are you sure?”
“Totally.” She wears a small, tight smile that makes me not believe her, but before I can say another word, she’s out the door.
I decide that this time, I’m going to go after her, but when Jack peeks his head in and tells me something else that needs to be done, I decide that my talk with Jo is going to have to wait.
Tonight, we will hash all this out, and I’ll figure out what’s really going on with her.
***
As busy as I keep the rest of the day, time seems to drag.
I know it’s because I am anxious to get to Jo.
I have no idea what would have happened today to make her freak out the way she did, but I sure as shit want to find out.
I’m pretty used to her freak outs, but this one seemed way worse than usual.
I decide to stop at the bakery on the way home to get some of her favorite donuts, and then, I make another stop at the market to get some flowers. I don’t think donuts and flowers will make everything better, but I hope it’ll at least make her smile a little.
When I walk through my front door, I’m greeted by Mia, but Jo isn’t anywhere to be found. I worry that she is curled up in bed again.
I take a second to love on Mia and set the donuts down in a spot that she can’t reach them before walking into the bedroom.
No Jo. In fact, the bed is made, and none of her clothes are on the floor like they were this morning. She either cleaned up, or she left.
As much as I’m trying to hold onto hope for the first option, I think I already know which one is the truth.
It’s confirmed when I walk into the bathroom and see that all of her products are cleaned out as well.
Typical Jo.
She doesn’t get what she wants, so she runs away.
She told me she was fine. She said she would see me when I got off work, and we could talk, yet here we are. Well, here I am. She’s nowhere to be found.
I take out my phone to call her, but it doesn’t ring at all before going straight to voicemail.
“Jo, I just got home, and you’re not here. You want to give me a call back and tell me what’s going on?”
I hang up and start pacing. Didn’t we just have a conversation about having a fight doesn’t constitute a good reason to break up? I didn’t even think what happened at the shop could be considered a fight. It was more of me trying to talk her down off the ledge.
Apparently, I did the opposite. I pushed her right off and away from me once again.
Fuck.