“She lied to me about who I am, and if she were here now, she’d be embarrassed about you. How do you like that? Huh?”
“Drew.” Caesar strokes my face. “I’m sorry.”
“You don’t know,” I say, then step away, breaking his gaze. “You don’t know.”
Caesar doesn’t accept that, though. He grabs my shoulder and pulls me back, and when I don’t resist, he takes me in a full, tight hug. “Drew,” he repeats.
I cry, hugging him. He just keeps saying my name and insisting that my anger is right. It’s easy for him to say that, but the fact that I’m a blabbering mess only proves that I’m not ready for this. I can’t even handle a two-minute conversation with Becca without falling apart.
I need Caesar, but I hate him seeing this version of me. I hate him seeing that I’m not this competent, smart man with a bright future, but an emotional mess, hung up on the past.
“I spent years of my life taking care of her,” I say, my voice muffled by his chest, the truth spilling out despite every effort to keep it buried. “Now that she’s gone, what if I don’t know how to just be myself? What if I get stuck here and spend the rest of my life sad and alone?”
Caesar strokes the back of my head, running his fingers through my hair. “You won’t be alone. You’re a good man who cares about his family,” he tells me, and his voice is so rough, I think he might be on the edge of tears. “You’ll always be a good man.”
I laugh pathetically. “I don’t feel that way. I feel like I’m screwing everything up.” I wipe my eyes and step back. Caesar is still looking at me with deep concern etched on his expression. It feels weird, comforting and disorienting at the same time.
“You’re not fucking anything up,” he insists. “You’re doing great, kid.”
Hearing his nickname hits me somewhere tender. “Thanks, softie.”
Caesar gives me a sad smile. “You still need to eat.”
“And you probably need to drive back today.”
He straightens his back. I can feel my heart beating in the silence. I want him to go so that he doesn’t see how pathetic I am, but just as badly, I’m desperate for him to refuse and to insist on staying.
Finally, Caesar lets out a quiet grunt. “If you’re done with me.”
It’s so complicated having him here, but feeling the empty house again will be even worse. I’m right on the edge of saying just that, though, when my fears rise up, too.
My life is a mess. I’m not ready for a man like Caesar, no matter how sweet he is to me. And I know he has his own life waiting back in Chicago. I’ve already asked for too much, and I can’t bear to need him like this.
Fuck. Am I broken?
I wipe my eyes one last time. “You’ve already done so much for me,” I say, avoiding his gaze. “You should get back today. You have a long drive. I insist.”
Caesar doesn’t say anything. He just reaches out, takes my face one last time, and swipes at the corners of my eyes with his thumb. His steady gaze is set like stone, unflinching as he holds me, but I turn my eyes to the ground.
“Sure,” Caesar finally answers. “Whatever you say.”
CHAPTERTWENTY-THREE
CAESAR
I spentyears taking care of her. Now that she’s gone, what if I don’t know how to just be myself? What if I get stuck here and spend the rest of my life sad and alone?
Drew’s words echo in my head on the long drive back to Chicago, breaking my heart over and over again. I already knew what his life was like. I already knew the years he’d spent caring for his ma and her business, doing what’s right because he’s a good man and he wants to.
But seeing the reality and seeing how much he’d hidden himself away, that tore me up.
Fuck. It was easier when I just kept to myself. It was easier before Drew marched into my life, refusing to go away. But now I care about him, and I care about seeing him smile again, and there’s not a damn thing I can do to stop caring.
I accelerate, speeding faster than I should just to get my heart pounding and feel something different. It was cowardly of me to stand there and let him push me away. He’d just opened up to me, pouring his emotions out. I tried to stay strong and remind him of the truth, that he has good reason to be mad at his mother and it doesn’t mean he loved her any less.
I wanted him to know how good he is, but instead, I just failed. I stood there like a rock, and when he told me to leave, I obeyed him.
When the kid asks me to do something, I have to do it. Doesn’t matter if he’s asking me to come or go, and it doesn’t matter how much it might hurt to leave him. Drew has shaped his whole life around other people’s needs, but I want something different for him, the independence to live the life he chooses for himself.
