Jessie grinned at him. “I work this bar in the evenings, but I’m halfway to getting my masters in psychology. I’m going to be a therapist.”
What in the actual hell was this? He was finally going to give in, throw everything he believed out the window—and along comes Jessiethe therapistto save him from himself.
“And why not? Doesn’t it fix people’s problems temporarily?”
“Nope. You take one drink, and you’ll keep going. When it wears off, you’ll have to get another, and another, until you can’t stop because the pain won’t stop. It’ll come back over and over again until you heal the wound, instead of throwing a bandaid over it and pretending it doesn’t exist.”
Goddamnit. Why couldn’t he have gotten someone who didn’t give a shit and would’ve just let him jump off his metaphorical cliff. Justin sat the glass down and pushed it away.
“How much do I owe you? For whatever you poured me and the therapy session?”
Jessie smiled and laughed. “This one’s on me. Go home, take a Tylenol, and get some sleep. The sun always rises in the morning. You’ll figure this out. But if you don’t, I’ll have a practice in a few years, and you can come see me again.” She winked and took the glass off the bar, walking away and dumping it down a small sink at the back end of the wall.
Justin stood and exited the bar, still never touching the thing that made his dad a monster—and that scarred him physically and emotionally as collateral damage. He didn’t plan to go after Blythe. His gut told him that waiting her out would be better than forcing her to do anything before she was good and ready.
She was safe at Silo Springs. That’s all that mattered.
He was beat up, but everything he’d been through made him resilient. Of course, he wanted her back, but he knew trying to control someone who didn’t want to be controlled always ended in disaster.
He would continue to suffer in order to save her any more pain. If she never came back, so be it. He meant it when he’d said he wanted her to be happy, whether that happiness involved him or not.
THE MORNING AFTER
What the hell was she doing? She was going to hyperventilate. Running away was starting to become her mode of operation, and she didn’t necessarily like that. Her flight response was greater than her fight response at this point. It was easier to run, that was for sure. She didn’t have to deal with things when she ran. If she could just get away, maybe she could forget, or make the problems disappear altogether by ignoring them.
Fat chance.
She was great at avoidance. Out of sight out of mind. It worked when she dipped out of Chicago. It worked when she ignored Max’s roses. It worked when she ignored his stupid texts, too. But not this time.
Not with Justin.
Now, she was shoved between a rock and a hard place because there wasn’t a world in which Justin Forge couldeverbe shoved out of her mind. He was the light in her darkness. Evenwhen she’d just met him and he was infuriating as hell—she still had to admit, he’d always been sunshine.
Her original plan was to let the dust settle, give it time, and then move into the apartment above Justin’s shop. That was, if he even finished it.
Damnit.
It would be okay. They could go back to being just friends, couldn’t they?
The pit in her stomach dropped lower. No, they couldn’t. They’d crossed a line, and she loved him… Well, as much as she possibly could. Knowing that she actually, probably, didn’t know what love was. She was being honest when she told him that she didn’t believe she deserved the kind of love he harbored for her. Justin deserved someone so much better than she was. Someone who didn’t run, someone who could be steady—and someone who could fucking own their shit like he’d said.
She was very aware of her issues. But getting rid of them? How the hell was she supposed to do that? She didn’t go to school for this shit. Add on top of it all an entirely new problem—one that she created. This time, she was the villain who stomped on someone else’s heart and treated it like garbage when she walked out on him.
Not once, but twice…in the same day, no less. What a bitch move.
She needed a distraction. One that wouldn’t put her in tears or fuel the hate fire within herself.
She hadn’t seen Addie and Evie when she got back the night before because it’d been so late. Maybe they wanted to go grab some ice cream or bake cookies with her after they all got dressed for the day.
She pulled her socks on and finished making her bed in the best room, with the best view in Montana.
Wrong again.
Justin Forge was the best view in Montana—and his bed, in his room, was where she desperately wanted to be. She’d moved forward when she moved in with him. Now, it felt like she’d moved ten steps back.
TWO DAYS LATER
“Dinner was great, girls. You always make just the right thing to hit the spot.” Chris rubbed his belly and grinned, conveying he was full and satisfied.
