Total pages in book: 62
Estimated words: 60852 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 304(@200wpm)___ 243(@250wpm)___ 203(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 60852 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 304(@200wpm)___ 243(@250wpm)___ 203(@300wpm)
“She was my wife,” I grind out.
“And I’m your wife now.”
Fuck.
Fuck.
“I know that. Fuck, you think I don’t know that. I love you, Janine. But right now, my head is a mess and it’s swimmin’ with feelings I can’t make sense of. Can you just give me some fuckin’ time?”
Shaking her head, she looks sadly at me. “I’m not waiting. Go, take your time, but know that if I’m what you choose, I won’t be here.”
“So that’s it then? You’re willin’ to throw everything away?”
“I didn’t throw anything away,” she says, walking to the door and pushing it open. “You did. Your ten minutes is up.”
“Fuck me, Jaybird, I’m not leavin’. Don’t fuckin’ do this.”
“Okay, Muff,” she whispers, her eyes pained, “how about this? I won’t do it, if you can stand here and tell me that it is me you choose, and that you will deal with her and we can go back to life without her in it, then I’ll give you a chance.”
Her words are like a sledgehammer to the heart because she knows I can’t follow through with it. She knows it, and she’s asking it of me anyway.
“That’s unfair.”
Shaking her head, she pushes the door wider. “What’s unfair is one minute I had a husband and a family, and the next, I didn’t. Leave.”
“I’m not leavin’ you like this.”
“If you don’t, I’ll call the police.”
I jerk, her words hitting me like a punch to the fucking face.
The emptiness in her eyes scares me, it fuckin’ scares me because I’m afraid she means it.
Would she really throw it all away?
Have I really lost her?
How did my life go from amazing in one second, to completely fucking broken in the next?
And how the hell am I meant to fix it?
“WHEN THE FUCK WERE you goin’ to tell us?” Jackson growls, bringing a cigarette to his lips and inhaling, his eyes traveling over me.
“Not your business, Jacks. It’s mine.”
“It is our business when those women are runnin’ off to different cities to follow you.”
I glance at Cade, who is studying me, his eyes narrowed. “Janine matters to us, brother.”
“You think she doesn’t fuckin’ matter to me?”
“Know she matters to you, that’s not what he’s sayin’,” Spike cuts in. “What he’s sayin’ is that you should have told us so we could have advised you on how to handle this shit without blowin’ your entire life up.”
“I had a wife, I thought she was dead, now she’s back. Tell me, how the fuck I was going to deal with that without blowing my life up?”
“You be honest with your wife.” Jackson shrugs. “You should have told her, a long fuckin’ time ago, that you were married and she died. Wouldn’t have been so bad then.”
Glaring at Jackson, I pull out a cigarette of my own. “Thanks for your fuckin’ fantastic advice, Jackson, but I didn’t ask for it. What’s done is done, now I’ve got to figure out how the fuck to fix all of this.”
“You love that woman?” Spike questions, crossing his arms, his eyes narrowing.
“She was my wife. When she died, yeah, I fuckin’ loved her. Loved her with everything I had. I grieved, I moved on, but I never forgot about her. You of all people should understand. If Cheyenne came back, are you tellin’ me you’d just shrug it off?”
Spike flinches, and I know it’s a low blow, but if anyone should understand how I feel, it’s him. He was married and he lost his wife. It nearly fucking killed him. Now, he’s in love again, and I want to know how much that would change if she suddenly reappeared. It’s not an unfair question, even if it does piss him off.
“Watch it,” Spike growls.
“Answer the question,” I throw at him. “Tell me how you’d handle your life, as it is, right now, if Cheyenne suddenly showed up alive.”
“I can’t fuckin’ answer that because I know for fuckin’ certain she’s dead,” Spike snaps.
“Enough.” Jackson puts a hand up, moving his gaze to me. “What Spike would do doesn’t matter, what matters now is how you’re goin’ to handle this.”
“If I knew that, I wouldn’t be here,” I grunt, inhaling deep, letting the smoke fill my lungs in a pitiful attempt to take the pain away.
My heart is fucking breaking.
My mind is utter chaos.
“You can’t make her disappear,” Cade adds, leaning a hip against the counter. “So, you gotta deal with her. Decide how you want to proceed. Then, you need to fix shit with Janine.”
Sounds simple.
It really isn’t.
“Janine is fuckin’ broken,” I mutter. “I fuckin’ broke her.”
“You love her,” Jackson says, his voice careful. “Wouldn’t matter if you didn’t. But you can’t give her your everything until you’ve dealt with the other woman and your feelings toward her. Only way to figure that out, is to go and spend time with her, talk to her, figure your shit out.”