Careless(17)

I lean into her and press my mouth to her ear. “What about the fluttering in your stomach?”

She quickly places a hand over her middle as if she can hide it from me that way.

“What about that flicker of hope you feel when you look at me? Are you really going to sit here and pretend you don’t feel anything for me?”

“All I feel is fear,” she spits out. I pull back as the shock from what she just said, ripples over me.

“Why? I know I shouldn’t have walked away, but at that moment I thought I was doing the right thing. I’d never hurt you intentionally, Doc.”

She stares at the glass of wine and says, “When I lost my mom, it hurt. I’ve never felt pain like that before. I couldn’t rationalize it. When I was with you, you made the pain go away.”

She brings her eyes to mine, and the pleading look in them makes me want to wrap her in my arms and never let go.

“For the first time in my life, you made me feel what it felt like to be loved by a man. Then you walked away. It felt like I lost you and my mother that night. It hurt…” she takes a trembling breath. “The pain was unbearable.”

“Doc, I only walked away because it’s what you wanted. The hardest thing I’ve ever done was walk away from you. You needed to hate someone, and I took the fall. But it’s been six years. It happened in another life.”

She looks anguished as her breathing speeds up.

“Another life,” she whispers, and I can see it written all over her face. She knows I’m referring to what she said.

“I know a lot has happened between us, and I understand that we’ll need to take it slow. I won’t rush you. I just need to know whether there is any possibility at all, that I can love you without you hating me.”

I hold my breath as her eyes begin to shine with unshed tears.

Fuck, this is where she breaks my heart.

“I don’t hate you, Jaxson. There was a time I didn’t like you at all, but I never hated you.”

“You used past tense. Does that mean you like me now?” I can’t help but tease.

“I like you, Jaxson, but that doesn’t mean we can be together. We hardly know each other. We’re practically strangers, and I don’t have time for a relationship.”

“You don’t have time, or you won’t make time? There’s a difference, Doc.”

“I’m not relationship material, Jaxson. You need to find someone who will fit in your world.”

“You are the only woman who fits in my world.”

She lets out a frustrated breath and glares at me.

I’m not giving up. She can glare at me all she wants, but there’s no way I’m letting her go, especially now that I know she likes me.

∞∞∞



LEIGH





It’s getting harder and harder to keep him at a distance. The same intimacy we shared the night we made love is enveloping us now.

Even the way he looks at me is the same as that night.

“Tell me what you’re really afraid of, Doc?”

His voice is low and filled with so much emotion it makes me want to cry. I can’t lie to him, even if I wanted to. It feels like I’ve been hurled back to that night.

“I can’t lose anyone else,” I whisper. “If I let you in, I’ll love you and when I lose you… I can’t, Jaxson.”

He frames my face with his hands and presses his forehead to mine. My heart clenches so painfully, I almost grab at my chest so I can try to ease it. He makes me feel so much that it suffocates me.

“When you lose me? You’ve already decided that I’ll leave you. That’s not like you, Doc. You’re not the kind of person to assume things.”

I stare at him with wide eyes. Everything he’s saying right now is a reminder of why I fell in love with him.

He sees me. He understands me.

But he also has the power to hurt me in such a way that I’ll never recover from it.

I turn my face away from him because if I look at him any longer, I’ll give in to this pull between us.

“You saw me when I found out that I lost my mother. You’re the one person who saw what it did to me. It will be so much worse when I lose you. If I allow myself to love you, I’ll love you with everything I am.”

Please understand! It already hurts too much.

“Jaxson, the pain will destroy me.”

“Give me a chance to show you that I won’t leave you,” he pleads. “I will never walk away from you willingly.”

I smile sadly because that’s just it. “You might not have a choice one day. We all die. If you were to die because I couldn’t save you… I don’t even know how to process that thought.”

I can see he finally understands because he looks away from me, his face torn with emotion.

We sit in silence for a few minutes, each busy with our own thoughts.

When he looks at me again, he places his right arm behind me, resting it on the chair. Being caged in by him doesn’t help at all. It makes me want to lean into him because I’ll know I’ll be able to lose myself in him. I won’t have to think about any of this then.

“Doc, when you lost your mom, did you regret knowing her? If you could go back in time, would you want to know her for those nineteen years and lose her, or not know her at all, and save yourself the pain?”

I gasp at his question, at once angry that he could even ask me something like that.

When I start to turn my face away from him, he places his left hand on my cheek to keep me in place.

“Just answer it. I’ll let you get off this plane, and I won’t bother you again if you answer it,” he says urgently.

“Of course I don’t regret my mother. She was an amazing woman. I couldn’t have asked for a better mother. I was lucky to have had her for nineteen years. And yes, if I could go back I wouldn’t change anything.”

“Why?” he asks.

I shake my head and glare at him. “You said if I answer it, you’ll stop.”

“Why wouldn’t you change it, Doc? You could save yourself the pain.”

“Because I love her!”

We’re both breathing hard when the sharpness of my voice dies away.

I yank my face free from his hand and get out of the seat. I start to pace the aisle, needing to find some kind of release for this tension coiling inside of me.

Jaxson gets up and steps in front of me, stopping me from pacing.

“I’m scared out of my mind, Leigh.”

That’s the second time he’s said my name. I’ll never admit that I love it when he calls me Doc, but hearing him call me Leigh, makes my heart expand until it might burst.

“I’m scared of losing you. None of us have a fucking clue about what the future might hold. I could die first, or you could die first. We’d both be taking the same chance.”

He closes his eyes, and he’s so heartbreakingly beautiful, it feels like a physical blow.

“Mr. Hayes was the only father I had ever known. My dad bailed on me and Logan when we were too young to understand what was happening. My mom… she’s out there somewhere because it was too much of a hassle to raise us. Mr. Hayes passed away soon after you left. I’ve lost every parental figure I’ve ever had in my life. I know what loss feels like and as much as it hurts, I’d rather have a day with you, than a lifetime without you.”

I blink the tears away.

He steps into my personal space and brings his hands to either side of my neck. Tilting my face up, our eyes meet, and there is so much emotion loaded into this moment that I’m struggling to breathe.

“You would do it all again because you love your mom. Give me a chance to love you in such a way that you would love me, in this life and in another lifetime. If our love is worth the pain of death shouldn’t we at least fight for it?”

My shoulders slump and I press my face into his chest. I can’t bring myself to say no again. I can’t push him away again.

“I don’t know how to date. I’ve never even been on one. I wouldn’t know what to say or how to act. We live in different states. We can’t fly up and down to see each other. We –”

He pulls me away from his chest and presses a finger to my lips.

“I will fly up and down. I will move heaven and earth to date you, Doc. Just say yes. Say you’ll date me and leave the rest to me.”

I swallow hard as my heart starts to thump in my chest as if I’m about to perform an aortic dissection.

“Yes,” I whisper, already fearing that I made the wrong choice.

Shock flashes over Jaxson’s face and then he leans down so that we’re almost eye to eye.

“Really? Yes? You said yes?”

I let out a burst of laughter. and he scoops me up into a hug so tight, it lifts my feet from the floor. I wrap my arms around his neck, hugging him back. It feels amazing to hold him again.

“Fuck, Doc,” he says with excitement. “Thank you.”

Finally, he lowers me down his body until my feet touch the floor. It looks like he’s going to kiss me and it instantly makes me blush. I take a step back and straighten my shirt.

I might have kissed him already, but so much time has passed. I feel too nervous right now. I’ll mess it up. I just need a little time to get used to the idea of dating.

I glance shyly at him, hating the question as it leaves my mouth. “So we’re dating now? It’s done?”