We talked for an hour about safe topics - my work campaigns, how his brothers were doing, what I did in my spare time now. But underneath the surface conversation was something else. A recognition that we still knew each other in fundamental ways, even after months apart and all the changes we’d both undergone.
“I should let you go,” I said finally, though I didn’t want to.
“Thank you,” he said. “For the call.”
“Thank you for becoming someone I wanted to talk to.”
After I hung up, I sat there in the darkness, trying to process what had just happened.
The man on the phone wasn’t the Dutch I’d left behind in Millfield. That Dutch would have spent the call trying to convince me to come back, would have made promises about changing, would have pushed against every boundary I’d set.
This Jacob had asked about my happiness and seemed genuinely glad when I said I’d found it. Had taken responsibility for his mistakes without trying to minimize them. Had given me complete control over the pace and terms of our reconnection.
My phone buzzed with a text from Vaughn:Still on for dinner tomorrow? Found a new documentary about sustainable farming that looks interesting.
I stared at the message, thinking about the difference between the two men. Vaughn, who was safe and predictable and would never break my heart. And Jacob, who had already broken it once but seemed determined to become worthy of holding it again.
The thing was, Vaughn and I had been clear about our intentions from day one. I’d told him I was getting over a relationship, that I wasn’t ready for anything serious. He’d said he didn’t want to be anyone’s rebound, and he’d been honest that if his big break came—a record deal, a tour, whatever—he was going to take it. No ifs, no buts, no worrying about people he’d leave behind. We were each other’s now, and that was what we both wanted. We’d never made any commitments to each other beyond total honesty.
Vaughn represented everything logical, everything smart, everything I’d thought I wanted after Jacob’s betrayal. Security. Stability. A man who would never cheat because he’d never inspire the kind of passion that led to chaos.
But talking to Jacob tonight had reminded me of what I’d been missing. The electric connection, the feeling that someone saw all of me and wanted all of me. The difference between companionship and true partnership.
I texted Vaughn back:Raincheck?
His response was immediate:Of course. Everything okay?
All good, I wrote back.
It wasn’t about Vaughn deserving better. I wasn’t going to be the woman who kept two men in the dark about where they stood while she figured out her feelings. That was Dutch’s playbook—keeping me around while secretly entertaining other options.
I wouldn’t become that person. The one who played games, who hedged her bets, who treated people like they were interchangeable. Vaughn and I might not be serious, but he still deserved honesty. And more than that, I deserved to respect myself enough not to split my attention between two men while pretending I wasn’t.
Because that was what tonight had taught me. I was still in love with Jacob—or at least, with the man he seemed to be becoming. The one in the emails who’d spent months learning how to be better, who’d written me messages that took responsibility instead of making excuses.
But I wasn’t naive enough to think that man was the whole picture. Jacob on paper, Jacob on the phone—that wasn’t the same as Jacob in real life. He was still Dutch, still president of the Venom Riders, still surrounded by a culture that had shaped him into someone who thought cheating was acceptable. One conversation didn’t erase years of conditioning. One letter didn’t prove he’d actually changed when it mattered—when club girls threw themselves at him, when his brothers expected him to act like Dutch, when the pressures of his world pushed him back toward old habits.
I might still be chasing closure, not reconciliation. Might need to hear his voice and see his words to finally let go, not to hold on tighter.
Love wasn’t enough. I’d loved the man who hurt me too, and look where that had gotten me—packing my things in the middle of the night, running to Nashville with a shattered heart.
This time, if there was going to be a this time, it would be different.
I didn’t know what that would look like. But tonight’s phone call had given me something I hadn’t expected to feel again when it came to Jacob.
Hope.
I pulled my knees to my chest, the hardwood cool against my bare feet, and watched the Nashville lights blur through tears I hadn’t realized were falling.
Chapter 16
?
— Dutch —
“Vaughn took me to see a documentary about sustainable farming,” Indira said, her voice warm through the phone. “It was really interesting.”
I gripped my whiskey glass and said nothing.
