Sinner (Shelter Harbor #1)(168)

I knew she needed it.

Hell, I can’t even imagine something like that being dropped on me. I try and picture someone telling me that Emily isn’t mine, and the idea of your reality and everything you know being shattered like that?

Shit, I can’t even begin to comprehend what that does to you.

So I gave her space.

She didn’t pick up the next day. Didn’t show at the office - not that I blamed her.

But now I know it was more than “needing space” or not wanting to answer her phone. I know that now - now that it’s too late.

It’s been a week since Serena left Denver. Five days since I finally went to her condo to check on her and discovered the truth.

“Oh, yeah, she left.”

“Left? What the hell do you mean left?”

“She left, bud. Suitcase and everything. I got her a cab to the airport.”

There’s a song I used to know that says, “You don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone,” but that’s crap. If it’s that good, you know damn well what you’ve got when you’ve got it. It’s just our own vanities, and baggage, and hang-ups, and bullshit that gets in the way of seeing it when it’s right in front of us.

Yeah, you know what you’ve got, it just that sometimes, that thing leaving clears the room.

And suddenly you realize how empty it all is without her here.

I knew when I was crossing every line with her. I knew with every lingered look, every touch that lasted too long. I knew with every kiss, and every feel of her skin under my hands.

I knew in words we never spoke, and in the words hidden between the ones we did.

What’s my point here?

Easy.

I’ve been in love with Serena Roth for longer than I care to admit I have been, and it’s taken her leaving my life for me to see it.

Put that in a song.



I re-read the email on my laptop screen a fourth time, blowing air over my lips as I rake my fingers through my hair.

It’s been like this all week - the daze, the slow realization that she really isn’t going to respond to my calls. The dawning understanding that this really is over.

And fuck does that suck.

I scowl back at the screen, skimming over the words again. Don and the rest of the board met with a potential buyer today - some Russian media mogul who wants to add “American football team” to his portfolio of a Venezuelan baseball team, a Spanish soccer team, Fijian rugby, and three of the top five Russian swimmers.

Sam’s legacy and the organization I’ve basically spent my entire adult life working for reduced to a footnote in a multinational conglomerate quarterly report.

Wonderful.

The upside - if you can even call it that - is that I’ll be keeping my job. I’ll even retain the chairman position. And Don’s not wrong - we’re all going to get rich on this. After everything shakes out, there’s going to be something to the tune of eight million for me in this.

Eight fucking million dollars. Hell, between that and my residual contract money from playing, I could retire right now and never work again. Hell, Emily wouldn’t have to work again.

And yet, it’s a sour victory. It feels like being paid to lose. It feels like taking a dive for cash.

It’s a shitty feeling, and there’s a hit to your pride and your soul that won’t go away when you take an offer like that, no matter how good the payout.

The doorbell chimes through the house, and I groan as I ease back from the laptop screen. The chime comes again as I stand.

“Relax,” I mutter, stalking through the house for the front door.

It goes off a third damn time just as I reach it.

“Cool off!” I growl, unlocking the door and yanking it open. “I’m right fucking here-”

I blink, staring at him before I remember to frown.

“Good evening, sir, I’m selling Girl Scout cookies, and I was wondering if you-”

“Shouldn’t you be in the fucking hospital?”

Sam grins at me. He’s still pale, and frail looking - still a shell version of the man I know. But he’s on his feet, albeit with a cane. He’s got his usual sharp clothes on, his prized ’67 Porsche Coupe sitting in my driveway.

“I told those assholes that if they stuck another needle in my arm or another catheter up my pecker, I’d sue ‘em for malpractice.”

He grins at me. Normally, this is the banter - Sam’s over-reaching, larger-than-life persona. The crude jokes, the winks, the jostling back-and-forth.

I’m not bantering with him. I’m not there yet.

He sighs, the smile dropping from his face. “You’re still mad at me.”

“I’m not mad at you, Sam, I just don’t feel much like having anything to do with you.”