“Don’t answer it,” Eliza said urgently. “If he’s the one doing this to you—”
Caroline shot to her feet, ignoring her friend’s curse. Nothing short of an apocalypse could have prevented her from answering. Maybe if she just talked to him one more time, it would provide the closure she needed. So she could sleep and move on with the almost guaranteed success heading her way. Yes, that was all she needed. “Hello?”
“Sweetheart.”
Tears blurred her vision. Caroline knew at that moment she’d made a colossal mistake in answering. With one husky endearment, he’d set her right back to where she’d started. The dark place she’d been in since driving away from him Saturday night.
With determination, she rung out the greedy sponge inside of her that had soaked up his voice. “Jonah.”
A long pause. “I know I shouldn’t be calling you like this.”
She waited. “But?”
“Caroline, I—” In the background, she could hear him pacing. Slowly, she sank back down onto the bench. “Gabby’s mother agreed to the meeting.”
“That’s great,” she breathed, genuinely meaning it.
“Yeah,” Jonah agreed, obviously trying to temper his excitement. She felt it anyway. It reached out and touched her through the phone. “The timing, however, is less than ideal. She drove here spur of the moment and is waiting for me at my lawyer’s office as we speak.”
Caroline absorbed that calmly. “Okay. Do you…need something?”
“Come with me.” When she didn’t, couldn’t respond, Jonah continued in a slightly more subdued tone. “Every aspect of my life needs to appear stable. I have the income, the brand-new apartment…but it will help my cause if someone speaks on my behalf. Someone to help prove I’m capable of a healthy relationship. One that doesn’t exist inside the four walls of my club.”
She commanded her lips to move. “I don’t understand. You want me to pretend we’re together?”
“No. I need someone on my side,” he clarified. “I need someone intelligent and professional to align herself with me. There’s no one better than you.” There was a long pause. “You said you thought I would be a good father.” He cleared his throat uncomfortably. “Did you mean it?”
Caroline wanted to answer him, but the rare vulnerability in his voice momentarily choked her. She ignored Eliza’s rapt concern beside her. Could she actually do this? In her present state, seeing Jonah again seemed like a horrible idea. She knew it with dead certainty. Yet the thought of being with him, just for the afternoon, made her feel alive for the first time in days. One thing she knew for certain, if she could help Jonah gain visitation rights with his daughter, she needed to do it. How could she live with herself otherwise?
“Is it— Will it be confidential?”
“Of course. No one will ever know you spoke on my behalf.”
She heard the edge in his voice and understood it. Her cheeks suffused with heat, guilt. Again, her unfair treatment of him made it so she couldn’t speak.
Jonah sighed. “Listen, I wouldn’t ask unless I had no other choice.”
Caroline bobbed her head in acknowledgment, then remembered he couldn’t see her. She started to speak, to tell him of course she would do it, but he cut her off.
“If you do this for me, I’ll…” Silence echoed so long, Caroline had to check the phone to make sure the call hadn’t been dropped. Finally, he spoke again. “If you do this for me, Caroline, I’ll…let you go.”
Her heart dropped, then shot back up into her throat to beat furiously. “Let me go? W-what does that mean?”
This time, he spoke with crushing resolve. “It means next time I see you out on a date, I’ll look the other way. It’ll be none of my damn business. It means I don’t ever show up at your office again. I won’t call you or send you gifts.”
Yes. This was it. It had to be. He was setting her free of this prison she’d been locked in for weeks. If she helped him, he would release his hold on her. This was the solution. Finally. Right?
“Yes or no, Caroline. I’m out of time.”
“Yes.”
“I’ll text you the address.”
He hung up.
…
Jonah stared down at the cell phone in his hand. What the hell had he just done? Already he felt an emptiness in his chest, a vicious cavity that had once been occupied by the chance that Caroline would give him more of her time. He’d just been given what he wanted, but in the form of an end point. One he’d freely given.