He looked at me with reluctance. “Not by choice.”
“Then just stay with me.”
“I need to get some things sorted first.”
Did that mean he was coming back for me? “How long will that take?”
“Mila.” He said my name with so much gravity that I wanted to cry. “I don’t have any choice. I have to leave, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to come back.”
“Then why are you going back there?”
“I have to face the consequences of my actions.”
I still couldn’t comprehend the sacrifice he was suggesting. My voice was so small. “Are you even going to try to come back to Canada?”
He took his time answering. “I don’t think they’ll let me, but I’ll try.”
I didn’t know whotheywere. “Can I come with you instead? I’d rather be with you.”
He gave me a smile that was filled with regret. “That’s not possible.”
I felt a lone tear streak down my cheek. I didn’t want to be asking these questions, but I couldn’t seem to stop. “Did it mean something?”
Emotions I’d never seen flitted across his expression. “It meant more than it should have. It was more than I deserved.” He reached out and wiped the tear from my cheek with his thumb. “The important thing is that you’re free now.”
“I don’t want to be free. Not from you.”
“I need you to go live your life, Mila. Do you understand that? I need you to do that for me.”
I shook my head, crying for real now. “I don’t want to. Why do we have to be apart?”
“Promise me.”
“I don’t like this,” I told him through my tears. “This feels like goodbye.”
“I need you to treat this like it’s goodbye.”
I was sobbing at this point, but between feeling rejected and pushed away, I didn’t know what else to do other than get out of the vehicle.
I stood by the open passenger door and looked at his bruised face. “Was any of it real?”
“Yes.”
“How? What was real to you?”
He was about to speak, but then a taxi pulled up behind us and blasted his horn.
He went into Axel mode and completely shut down. And I knew this was the end.
“You have to go,” he said gently.
“I’m going to miss you,” I blurted, but my words were drowned out by another blast from the taxi.
I started to cry harder before shutting the door. I stood and watched as he slowly pulled out into the lane, and then there was nothing but the red of his taillights driving away from me.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
AXEL
