Every now and then, she reminds me a little of Mom.
All I can do is nod.
She’s right. I knew what the rules were. It’s my fault I broke them by starting to fall for Val.
I couldn’t help it.
Chapter 30
Val
I don’t have timeto dwell on how I feel about Sawyer leaving, it gets too damn busy in the bar to even think about it.
Except after I click the lock on the door and go through the motions of cleaning up, then trudge the quiet stairs to my apartment, does the full weight of it sink in.
There’s no doubt that he heard me accept Eli’s invitation.
After weeks of holding Sawyer at arm’s length, it bit me in the ass.
“I really fucked this up,” I grumble, pouring myself a stiff Screwdriver before curling up on my couch.
Everything in my tiny space reminds me of Sawyer.
I don’t want to go to bed.
The real question is, do I reach out to him? Or let him go?
I need to stop deluding myself that he could turn into Chris.
He’snothinglike the man I married.
Sawyer puts me on a pedestal. I can see it in his soft gaze every time he looks at me.
“Why in the hell did I say yes to Eli?” Standing, I make myself another drink to think this through.
I’ve known Eli longer than Sawyer.
Shit. Almost the same.
Sawyer’s been on the edge of my life for almost as long as I can remember.
Didn’t Eli get in trouble a few times when he was younger?
I can’t recall the details. It was that group he was running with. Quincy, the Simmons brothers…Chris.
It had to be that hint of “bad boy” that caught me off guard. Eli would be like falling for my ex all over.
A shiver runs through me at the thought.
Sawyer would never do something so heinous.
I tended his wounds that he gotprotectinga woman that he’d be the first to say he didn’t even like.
My own damn fears pushed him away.
I’ve been so worried about how we’d fail, I never gave us a chance to succeed.
Fuck it.
