“So, I’ve got the patent shit and a visit from the fucking FBI, and I know that the funds I finally got the board to earmark for the women’s health division are going to be shifted away to handle the legal fallout of that shit, which means that we’re not going to have enough data to launch the endometrioses treatment this year.”
Brooks stills. “Fuck,” he says. “Really?”
“Yup.” I sigh, buzzed, but not buzzed enough to be optimistic. “And without the patent and the funds it will bring, we can’t afford the funding for smaller trials. Which we need in order to go for FDA approval in the fourth quarter.”
“Damn, that sucks.” He nudges my foot with his. “Really. I’m sorry.”
“I know you are.”
“Is there anything I can do?”
“Have any ins with the FDA or patent office?”
He screws up his face. “Unfortunately, not. Security systems and biomedical haven’t exactly formed the perfect crossover yet.”
“What? Retinal scans don’t require labs full of eyeballs?” I ask lightly, going for a lame joke.
Because lame is all I have right now—humor or otherwise.
Brooks throws me a pity chuckle, and then silence falls between us.
“I’ll ask around,” he says to break it. “Let you know if I hear anything helpful.”
“Appreciated,” I mutter.
The silence falls again.
And this time I’m the one to break it. “Do you…” My eyes cut to his and then away, focusing on the top of my bottle. “Do you think about her?”
I feel the tension in him like a punch to the gut, hard and intense and so strong it steals the breath from my lungs.
I expect him to tell me to fuck off, to shut up, to never talk about Briar, the woman he left at the altar, years ago now.
He grows quiet, stays that way for long enough that I think he’s not going to answer.
But then he surprises the shit out of me by saying, “Yeah.” A beat. “All the fucking time.”
“I—”
He bumps my foot again, this time harder, his voice taking on more urgency than I’ve ever heard from him before. “If she really means something to you, don’t be a fucking moron like I was?—”
“You said that you had to leave because?—”
“IthoughtI had to,” he says. “I even believed it at the time. But it was all bullshit, man.”
“The threats weren’t real?”
“No, the threats were there. Allowing them to drive us apart was the biggest mistake of my life. I could have done so many things differently, could have…” He closes his eyes, taps the top of the beer bottle against his forehead. “I could have made it work—kept her safe and not break her heart, kept her safe and loved her like she deserved.” A long blip of quiet before he sighs and sets the bottle on the counter, eyes opening, gaze connecting with mine. “I didn’t. And I lost her, which was fucking awful, but it’s worse knowing I broke her?—”
His voice cracks, eyes sliding from mine.
Fuck.
“Breakups are hard on both parties,” I say, trying to soften the regret in every single line of his body. “I’m sure she’s?—”
“I visited her.”
That has me sitting up straight in my stool, worry churning through my stomach. “You?—”
