“What I’m saying is that I want a second chance,” I said, reaching for her hand. “I don’t want to argue with you, and I don’t want to run. I was an idiot. A complete idiot.”
“I don’t know,” she whispered, turning her face away from mine. “How do I know that this won’t happen again?”
“You don’t. But I don’t know how else to make this right. We both have pasts. We both have issues. Trust is mine. After what happened in my past, I have a hard time taking anyone at face value. But I’d really like to try to handle everything together. To start over.”
She sighed. “Jensen…”
“Give me a chance, Emery. Please.”
Snow slowly started to fall around us. She looked up at me through snowy lashes with fluffy flakes tumbling into her dark hair and blanketing her jacket. I knew she was hurting, and I had done almost irreparable damage. But I wanted to make this right…if she would just let me.
“Okay,” she said finally. “One chance, Jensen. That’s it.”
Then, I tilted my face down toward hers, and our lips met, gently and nurturing. It was a kiss I’d missed all week. A kiss I’d remember forever.
“You won’t regret it,” I whispered against her lips.
She sighed into me and wrapped her arms around my waist. “I hated the last week.”
“Me, too. I hated being away from you.”
“Why are you such an ass?”
I laughed. “Can’t seem to help it.”
“God, we’re so fucked up.”
“Emery?”
“Hmm?”
“What really happened with your breakup with Landon?”
She sighed again, heavier, and took a step back from me. “You really want to know?”
I nodded. “Yes. I would like to be on equal footing. Figure things out together. That way, maybe neither of us will be blindsided again.”
“All right.” She dropped her head forward, swallowed, and then nodded. “Landon and I had dated nearly two years when he got into Stanford on a golf scholarship, and I got into Oklahoma as a National Merit Scholar, but both of us wanted to stay home and go to Texas Tech, so we could be together. We had this whole plan. Then…as far as I know, your father told him to go to Stanford.”
“No way,” I argued. “My father wanted nothing more than for all of us to go to Texas Tech, just like him and all our relatives.”
She shrugged. “I was there. This is what happened. He thought Landon should be more serious about school and about sports. He wanted Landon to go to Stanford and try to walk onto the football team, which Landon didn’t want to do.”
“That at least sounds like my father.”
“Yeah. Landon was a good football player, but he always preferred golf. He got into a huge argument with your dad one night right before the deadline where we both had to decide where we were going to school. His dad said that he needed to break up with me or something like, if I was so important, then we could make it work long distance. As you know, your dad died shortly after that.”
I nodded. That part, I was well aware of.
“Landon felt…responsible for what happened. As if that argument had pushed him over the edge.”
“He wasn’t and it didn’t.”
“I knew that; I still know that. But the last thing that he ever said to your dad was something mean, and he couldn’t cope. He accepted the full ride to Stanford because that’s what your dad had wanted, and I took the Oklahoma spot. Then, Landon was just…gone.”
“Gone?”
“Adrift. I tried to bring him back and to help, but he disappeared those next couple of weeks before graduation. We were still together. I knew he still loved me, but he was broken. So, he broke up with me the day of graduation. He told me that he’d talked it over with his family—with you—and you’d all agreed it was best.”
“We never talked about this. He told me that you were going to different colleges, and you’d grown apart.”
“Well, I see now that you didn’t know.” She swallowed hard. “But, as you can imagine, as an eighteen-year-old, I was heartbroken. He still loved me. I still loved him. I knew he was only doing this because of what happened to your father. I tried calling him and messaging him and emailing him. No answer. He just disappeared off the face of the planet. I know he got my messages. He never blocked me. He knew how much I was hurting and ignored it. Sound familiar?”
I winced. It did. I’d seen her messages and how desperate she was. I’d put her in the same spot Landon had ten years ago, and I hadn’t even known it. And I’d done it for no good reason.