I nodded. “Yeah, of course.”
“I feel…overwhelmed. And, uh, I came here because you have always seemed to be the one person on this whole Goddamned planet who could see right through me.” Looking up, he nearly pierced me with the intensity of his sharp green eyes. “You know me better than anyone else, Dani…and so I knew you were the person I needed to talk to. You’re the only person I knew I could talk to without resorting to lying.”
Unable to stop it, my eyes filled with tears—but they didn’t spill. They simply made it hard to see Zack clearly. “I’m here.” I blinked, trying to get my own emotions under control, and gave a short nod.
Zack let out a long breath, looking at the table again. He searched its surface as if trying to interpret an ancient text. Finally, he looked at me again, licking his lower lip. But it was his eyes that killed me—in them I could see doubt, fear, and…something else.
“This is, like, the worst possible time. I know. I’m not here to fuck anything up—and if you want me to leave, just say the word.”
“Okay.”
“I’m not asking you for a thing. I just…couldn’t carry this load by myself right now. I don’t have anyone to talk to.”
Again, my heart wrenched.Oh, Zack.Why hadn’t he been able to be this open when I’d needed him to be?
“I swear I thought just walking away would be the end of it. That’s why I left the guys, because I knew staying there was trouble. I’ve been there a million times before, you know? But this time was different.” He didn’t say anything for a few seconds and, when he did, his voice was softer. “But the quiet? Jesus. The lake was beautiful, but there wasn’t a sound, not even a breeze or a car driving by on the highway. It was the silence that got me. It was…too much. Give me a loud stage any day of the week.”
Zack—scared? My voice was barely audible. “Why did it bother you so much?”
“‘Cause I feel like I haven’t learned a goddamned thing. One drink—that’d be all it would take for me to be off the wagon again. I’m one drink away from ruining everything…just like I always do.”
I couldn’t argue with him, because I knew his words were at least partly true. Except… “Youhavelearned, Zack. Youdidn’ttake a drink.”
“Yeah, but I wanted to.”
“But you didn’t. You shouldn’t be so hard on yourself.” He shrugged just as the tea kettle started to whistle. I got up and turned off the stove, setting out two teacups. “Are you okay with chamomile or—?”
“Sure. Whatever.”
It wouldn’t quench that hungry thirst he felt, but I hoped itwould distract him. There were also little sugar packets in a bowl, so I put them on the table along with a spoon and then put our cups of tea on the table.
But Zack didn’t touch his. Instead, he let out a long sigh as he stared at his hands folded in his lap. As I sat down, he lifted his eyes to mine and said, “I need to tell you something.”
Why did the tone of his voice cause the breath to catch in my throat? I didn’t say a word, putting my cup down with barely a sound, wondering for a second if he found eventhissilence to be frightening.
“I fucked us up.”
“What do you mean?”
“I…” He let out another breath, his eyes scanning the table as if in search for answers—but they weren’t there; instead, they were inside him. He just had to figure out how to let them out. “Every time we tried…no. Every timeyoutried. Every time we got together, I fucked it all up. I pushed you away or made it impossible to love me. I was afraid…of you loving me, of me loving you, of how intense it all felt. I didn’t know how to handle it.”
Now the tears did fall down my cheeks and onto my lap, and there was no stopping them. My poor sweet Zack—how many times had I tried to get him to open up, to let me in and instead he’d…yeah, he was right. He’d pushed me away. Or found a way to hit below the belt soIwould leave—even the comment about being atrained monkey. All of it.
Had that been a conscious act on his part?
I couldn’t fully process it all, and I certainly didn’t know what to say.
Touching the handle of the teacup, he kept his eyes there as I gently wiped away my tears, hoping it wasn’t obvious that I was crying. “I, um…ended a relationship yesterday, because it wasn’t real. I keep pretending and it wasn’t fair to Ellie. Out of everything I could give her, she deserved honesty, even if it came as late as it did.”
Finally, he looked up at me, and his eyes could have burned a hole through my soul. “Dani…I have loved you as long as I’ve known you. I just never knew how to handle the intensity of everything inside and I sure as hell didn’t know how to be truthful about it.”
Goddamn the tears. Why was I crying?
“I know that doesn’t mean things change now. I’m too late, and I know that. And…I’m not here to put a wedge between you and Braden. He makes you happy, and that’s what I want for you. I just wanted you to know, after all this time, that Idocare.”
It was like the floor had dropped away and I was freefalling. Zack…hadalwaysloved me?I took his hand that was still resting in his lap, looking at the tattoos on the knuckles, feeling the callouses on the pads of his fingers against the palm of my own hand, trying to form the words I needed to say. “Um…thank you. I think I needed to hear that…even though the timing couldn’t be worse.”
He let out another breath and looked down at our hands. “My therapist keeps pushing me to be honest—‘cause I even lie to myself all the goddamned time. I was never able to tell you the truth, Dani…because lies always felt safer, like I was protecting myself—and protecting you. And all those years I felt like the…enormity of what I felt for you would be my destruction and so I pretended I didn’t care at all. It’s like I grew up but inside I was still a teenage kid who didn’t believe in himself.” His eyes shifted back to mine and I blinked the tears away again. “I still don’t trust myself—but I know what I feel for you is real. And I can’t deny it anymore, and I will spend the rest of my life satisfied that you’ve found the right man to make you happy.”
