Page 93 of Hard to Handle

“I did. I raged and screamed but I had to do it in a pillow so you guys wouldn’t hear me.” The wave of memories hits me. The loneliness. The fury. The unknown. The sadness.

“Okay, then why don’t you let yourself love?”

I laugh despite the tears welling in my eyes. “Grieving for Mom and falling in love with someone are not mutually exclusive.”

Her arm goes around my shoulder. “It never went away, did it?” she asks again.

I blink away the tears, but one escapes down my cheek as I think of how heartbroken I was three years ago when I walked away from Hunter, and how similarly I felt this time with his nonchalance and nod. “The first time, he didn’t ask why the abruptness of it all. Why we went from seeing each other as much as we could to nothing.”

“Maybe because he had feelings for you and felt scared about them too. If you bailed that easily, why is it hard for you to believe that he could do the same? If you’re afraid of love, why is it unfathomable that maybe he’s afraid of it for other reasons?”

I lean my head on her shoulder and breathe deeply, hearing her words but not wanting to believe them.

“What happened this time, Dekk?”

I let the silence settle as I struggle with telling her the truth. Their problems are my problems but my problems are no one’s problems. So, I usually keep everything close to the vest.

“What happened this time?” I repeat. “He’s like kryptonite to me.” I give a self-deprecating laugh. “There’s something going on with him he won’t talk about, and of course, I want to try and fix it.”

“No surprise there.”

“No, I mean . . . I went there to do my job as an agent—what Dad asked—but when I saw him, I knew he was wrestling with something.” I continue to explain his acting out, his hot and cold, his being completely burned out and finally admitting it.

“So you slept with him.”

“Mm-hmm.”

“And then what?”

“And then I bailed to my room. It was much easier doing that than trying to sort through my feelings with him sleeping right beside me.”

“But you felt something, right?”

“I felt fucking everything,” I admit without hesitation and know how stupid it sounds. To run away from those kinds of feelings, but the fact that she doesn’t point it out makes me feel a little better.

“And when you confronted him?”

“He acted like I was asking him about the weather.”

Brexton turns to face me and puts her hands on my shoulders so I’m forced to look at her. “The question is, what are you going to do about it, Dekker? Are you going to let him walk away a second time when you know damn well he’s the only one who’s lit your fire emotionally and sexually?”

“Christ.” My cheeks flush.

“No. I’m being serious. What are you going to do? Rob yourself of the chance of seeing what happens because you’re too chickenshit to try?”

“That’s not fair.”

“Why isn’t it? Maybe what’s not fair is how we’ve let you sneak by doing this and not really living for anything other than work and a false sense of security with people who put water on your fire like Chad.” She gives a little shake to my shoulders. “So the question is . . . what are you going to do about it?”

“There’s nothing I can do about it. I can’t ask him to be a client and want to have a relationship at the same time. I can’t—”

“Fuck that.” She waves a hand at me. “We’ll figure it out. Dad will have to deal. There are always solutions to every problem. We can handle him.”

“But that doesn’t fix the other problem.”

“Other problem?”

“Like how other clients would perceive me sleeping with a client I’m going after.”