Chapter Thirty-Three
An engagement ring.
Chelsea couldn’t breathe—and she shouldn’t. She’d slept with her best friend’s boyfriend, the same man who’d bought the most perfect diamond for Julia.
Liam leaned against the doorjamb, and he whispered her name so hoarsely that her shock turned into repugnant self-loathing. Her stomach ached, and even as her lungs started to work again, she couldn’t face him.
“I’m sorry.” He shut the mirror.
Why? Because I saw the ring? She could’ve guessed that last year, a proposal would’ve been in their near future. An engagement wouldn’t have been a surprise. The only bewildering bombshell was how life twisted, and she had fallen for him.
“Please don’t apologize.”
They stared at the mirror. The jeweled color in his eyes deepened. She wished that she could read his mind. Chelsea didn’t understand their intensity or the way his jaw held tight, almost straining as if he were choking away something more.
She couldn’t comprehend how lost and lonely she suddenly felt. The only other time she could remember feeling like this was when Mac had told her what happened. Chelsea’s legs wobbled, and her vision blurred, not with tears but with shame.
Nothing could make her true feelings clearer. She had fallen for Liam. No rationale could explain what had happened. She never saw their physical connection coming. And the chemistry, it had scorched her common sense away.
“I have to go.” She spun under his arm, unwilling to slow down when he called her.
Liam caught up quickly and clasped her shoulder. She tugged. The hopeless desire to stay and curl into his chest made her want to weep. She didn’t know how to fix what didn’t feel broken or stop what made her happy.
He blocked her way. His throat bobbed, but nothing came out as he glanced painfully at the bathroom then over her shoulder. “Everything is…”
So different. But neither of them would offer such a pathetic excuse.
“I know.” She pinched her lips shut.
“You don’t.” His expression turned, unreadable and rueful. Liam angled back, not stopping Chelsea as she ran away.
The door slammed. A hollow echo resounded, and Liam was trapped in his apartment. If the bottoms of his bare feet weren’t weighed down by his conflicted remorse, he would chase Chelsea down. But he couldn’t.
Losing Julia had crushed his soul. Misery twisted him inside out until he’d gone numb as the months crawled by. He couldn’t even look at that ring and had stored it close but in a place that he never used.
It wasn’t that he forgot where the ring had been… Except he had. Sometime last year, the pain mutated into a daily bleakness—one that he’d been able to break from with the time spent lately with Chelsea.
He dropped his head back and pictured the anguish on her paling face as she registered the engagement ring. What was wrong with him? She’d run, and he remained like a lead-lined statue.
He pinched the top of his nose then walked toward the bathroom. The mirror forced him to stare at his reflection, and he didn’t like the regret and exhaustion facing back.
“She’s good for you,” he said, then opened the mirror and closed the ring box. Liam shut the door over his sink and turned toward the hall.
The apartment felt sad and empty, with darkness closing in. The farther away Chelsea got, the hollower he became until a simple husk of a man stared at the door she’d fled through.
Liam’s phone rang. Hope leaped through him, and suddenly alive, he hustled to take the call. But disappointment grabbed him by the balls when he read Chance’s name.
“Yeah?” Liam grumbled.
“Yeah to you too.” Chance laughed. “Just calling to see if you’ve had an opportunity to check out the equipment.”
Liam’s heavy eyelids sank. “More or less, yeah.”
“You’re welcome.”
He squeezed his eyes shut. “Sorry. Thanks.”
Chance let his concern show as he waited quietly. But Liam couldn’t explain the shithole of confusion he’d dug himself into.
“You good today?” Chance finally asked.
Yes and no, all depending on the time of day. “Fuck if I know.”
“I can find someone to cover for me, and we’ll go hit the range.”
He appreciated the offer to shoot targets but rather stay in. “Nah, I’m okay.”
Chance sighed. “I know your hands are tied, but I promise, brother. It’ll be okay.”
If Chance really had any idea the restraints that Sorenson laid on him, he wouldn’t be so sure. Liam rubbed his forehead, still thinking about Chelsea. “Do you ever think life’s a test?”
“Not really.”
He wasn’t so sure. “Like you don’t know if you’re supposed to pick A over B, because B wasn’t an option.”
“I don’t think it works like that.”
“Then what’s it like? Because I don’t get it.”
“What don’t you get?”
“She’s not coming back.” But who am I thinking about? Julia? Or Chelsea? Liam walked to a window and flicked apart the blinds. A quick search for her turned up empty.
“What are you talking about?” Chance asked.
Liam pressed the back of his head against the wall as the blinds swayed and clicked against the window. So much time had gone by that Chance didn’t realize who Liam might’ve meant. Restlessness tingled in his shoulders, and he needed to find Chelsea.
“Never mind—but, hey, I’ve got to go.” Liam ended the call without further explanation then called Chelsea.
She didn’t answer—big surprise—and he rushed out the door.
Mrs. Donovan was sweeping her front mat despite the late hour. She cocked an eyebrow but didn’t stop the back-and-forth movement of her broom.
Liam looked down the hall then at the closer set of stairs. “Did you see which way—”
“She used these stairs,” Mrs. Donovan shared without slowing the motion of the broom. “I haven’t heard any cars race off.”
“Thank you.” Liam skipped stairs as he ran down the flight and stopped at the edge of the sidewalk. He scanned the dark parking lot. A set of headlights illuminated the back row, and he sprinted that way.
The dull light from a lamp post showed her bowed head resting in her hands.
“Chelsea!”
She jolted at the sound of her name then quickly shoved her Jeep into reverse. Liam thumped his hand on her hood as she inched backward. “Hang on.”
But she crept slowly as if she didn’t see him or hear the slap on her SUV.
“Hey.” He walked to the driver’s window and knocked. “We need to talk.”
She stopped backing and the glass rolled partially down. “Sure, we should.” The fake perkiness in her voice was too much. “But later.”
“No—”
The window whirred up.
“Dammit, Chelsea.” The window stopped with an inch to spare. Her lips parted, and Liam shoved his fists into his pockets. If he didn’t, there was a good chance he’d hold the vehicle still until she spoke to him. “Let’s go. We gotta talk.”
She slowly shook her head. “I’ll text you later.”
“Later doesn’t work for me.”
“Too bad.” Chelsea glanced over her shoulder and reversed again.
Liam stayed with her window.
She slammed her brakes. “What? Because I’d really like to wallow at home. All right? Is that what you need to hear?”
What the hell do I want to say? He hadn’t planned that far out. “I never use that cabinet.”
She stared blankly then said, “You don’t need to explain.”
“That’s not…” He ran a hand through his hair. “Not what I need to say.”
“Then what?”
“I… don’t know.”
Seeming exasperated, she exhaled. “It’s been a hard day. Just go upstairs, and I’ll text you later.”
The Jeep inched back, and his irritation multiplied. She couldn’t leave! “Dammit, Chelsea. We didn’t talk after we fucked.”
She slammed the brakes again. Her mouth gaped, but he didn’t care. They’d breezed through the no-condom conversation and didn’t hit the important stuff. “So we’re sure as hell going to talk about this now.”
She slapped the Jeep into park, straightened, then jumped out as though she might wring his neck. “Are you insane?”
“Yeah, maybe.” He stepped into her personal space.
“You can’t say that out here!”
“The hell I can’t.” Now that he had her close, he wasn’t sure where to begin. “You know what I’m sick of?”
She glared.
“Do you?” he prompted.
Her furling anger softened, and at least now she didn’t look a moment from strangling him. Finally, exhaustion coated her voice. “What?”
“Expectations.”
“What does that mean?”
“What I’m supposed to do. You’re supposed to think. How we’re supposed to act.” He paced and shook his head. “Expectations and assumptions. They’re all bullshit.”
She didn’t respond.
He held a breath then tried to find a place to start. “I’m glad you came over tonight.”
She fidgeted. “Sure.”
He’d needed her—even if he hadn’t known at first. “I’m glad you’re still here.”
She shifted against the driver’s door as if suddenly needing more space. “But I need to go.”
“This you-me thing…” He took a step, erasing their small gap. “It’s hard to understand.”
“Hard to understand?” Sadness tugged at the corners of her eyes. “I don’t even know who I am.”
“You’re the same person you’ve always been.”
Her hand flew up, and her palm clapped against his cheek with a snap, causing a sharp sting. “I am not. Don’t you ever say that again.”
Liam took the hand that slapped him and ran his thumb across her knuckles.
She balked. “I don’t want to talk. Don’t you get that?”
Perhaps that was true of the both of them. He didn’t want to talk, either. Not really. He wanted everything to simply slip into the easy course he’d always known. “You don’t want to talk. I don’t want to fight.”
“What do you want, Liam?”
To fuck… Everything they needed to know was clear when they stripped away their clothes and didn’t hold back.
“I never hoped for this,” she whispered.
“You think I don’t know that?”
Pain creased her brow. “I would be so happy if she were here. If you two were engaged—” Her voice cracked. “I promise.”
“I know.”
Everything came back to the bullshit expectations. How they should feel and act. How they could behave or what they couldn’t do, where their eyes and hands wandered, how right it felt when they did, and what happened versus what should happen—but who the hell defined should.
He’d never been disloyal a day in his life. He’d never cheated and never wanted to. The notion of being with anyone else hadn’t occurred to him—until now.
Chelsea waited as if he had to say more. Liam wanted to hash their situation out until it made sense but knew that’d be impossible. He inhaled and held it until his lungs burned, not ready to say he didn’t still mourn Julia, or lie about his desire for Chelsea.
“You loved her. I loved her. How can you believe what we’ve done is okay?” she pressed.
“When we fucked,” he said. “Was it just sex?”
Her jaw fell.
“Life is not linear.” It was wrecked with ups and down, spins and crashes, but as long as they moved forward, life was as it had to be. Chelsea finding Julia’s engagement ring had forced him to think about the future with her, and the irony was not lost. “And I want you to come back inside.”