"You're in deeper than I thought," Nicholas says quietly, studying my face with an intensity that makes me want to look away. "This isn't like you, Phoenix. You don't fall apart over women. You use them and discard them when they've served their purpose."
"Maybe I don’t want to do that anymore.”
"Or maybe you're letting your emotions cloud your judgment." He leans forward, his elbows on his knees. "This girl has you twisted up in knots. I can see it written all over your face. You're not sleeping, you're not eating, you're drinking yourself stupid in the middle of the day. And for what? A woman who walked out on you?"
"She didn't walk out. She needed space. There's a difference."
"Is there?" Nicholas shakes his head slowly. "You're defending her even now. Even when she's not here, even when she's abandoned you, you're still making excuses for her behavior. That's not love, son. That's weakness."
The word hits me like a slap. Weakness. The worst thing a Crawford can be. The thing my father has spent his entire life teaching me to avoid, to despise, to crush in myself and others.
"I love her, Dad." The words come out rough, scraped raw by whiskey and sleeplessness. "I know you don't understand that. I know it doesn't fit into your neat little worldview of power and control and using people for your own ends. But I love her. And that's not going to change just because you disapprove."
Nicholas is quiet for a long moment. The silence stretches between us, heavy with everything we're not saying, everything we've never said. My father has never been good at emotions. He sees them as tools to be wielded.
"I can see that you love her," he says finally, his voice softer than I expected. "That's precisely what concerns me."
"Why?"
"Because love makes you vulnerable. It gives people power over you that they can use to destroy you." He stands, smoothing the front of his jacket, every inch the composed businessman I've been trained to become. "I've watched you these past few weeks. The way you look at her, the way you touch her, the way you lose yourself when she's in the room. It's dangerous, Phoenix."
"Love doesn't make you weak."
"It does if you let it control you." He moves toward the door, then pauses, turning back to face me one last time. "Get yourself together. Shower. Eat something. Stop drinking all day. Crawfords don't fall apart.”
”And if I can't?" The question slips out before I can stop it, raw and honest in a way I rarely allow myself to be with him. "What if I can't just pull myself together and move on like nothing happened?"
Dad studies me for a long moment, something unreadable flickering in his eyes. For a second, I almost think I see understanding there. Maybe even compassion. But then his expression hardens, and he's my father again, cold and distant and utterly in control.
"Then you're not the man I raised you to be."
He leaves without another word, the door clicking shut behind him with a finality that echoes through the empty house.
I stand there for a long time, staring at the closed door, his words rattling around in my head like stones in an empty jar.
My father is wrong. I know he's wrong. Love isn't weakness. Love is the only thing that's ever made me feel truly alive, truly human, truly connected to something bigger than myself.
But standing here in the wreckage of my life, surrounded by empty bottles and unanswered texts and the lingering ghost of Jade's absence, I can't help but wonder if maybe he has a point.
I pick up my phone and stare at the screen. No new messages. No missed calls. Just the same silence that's been haunting me since she walked out the door.
I'll wait. However long you need. I love you.
That's what I told her. And I meant it. I would wait forever if that's what it took. I would remake myself into whoever she needed me to be, shed every controlling instinct, learn to let her breathe without suffocating her.
But what if forever isn't enough?
What if she's already decided that the cost of loving me is too high?
I sink back onto the couch and close my eyes, too exhausted to drink, too wired to sleep. The house settles around me, creaking and sighing like a living thing, and I let myself imagine what it would be like if she came back. If she walked through that door right now, suitcase in hand, ready to try again.
I would beg her forgiveness and I would promise to change, to be better.
But promises are easy. Actions are harder.
And I'm not sure I know how to be anyone other than who I am.
CHAPTER 13- JADE
