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“I know we’re not exactly friends. I still remember the day, all those years ago, when you made me promise to never be friends with you again. You said we could be civil for Marcus’ sake, but that we could be nothing more. You never even wanted to be alone in the same room as me, and I respected that. Until the day you agreed to be my sponsor.
“You helped me when I had nobody else I could ask or could trust. It broke all the rules you set, and all the promises you forced me to make, but once again, you put my needs before your own.
“You’ve been there for me through my toughest times. You’ve seen me at my worst, and you’ve helped me get through it, even though I’ve never deserved your support. So, after all that, why are you abandoning me now?”
The way his voice breaks at the end shatters me, and I can’t help lifting my gaze to meet his. His chocolate eyes are glistening as they bore into mine, almost like he’s trying to silently plead with me.
“I’m not abandoning you…” I tell him, my voice low and empty. “I’m just protecting myself.”
I feel like shit. I may be mad at him for dating Indie… Hell, I may even be jealous of them, but that isn’t a good enough reason for me to stop being the sponsor I promised him I’d be.
“I’m confused,” Jake admits. “What are you protecting yourself from?”
I shake my head at his naivety. Does he really have no fucking clue why I’m angry and wound up right now? Why I might be mad at him?
Just the thought of him not being aware enough to have even thought of the millions of questions that are running through my brain brings back the anger that never seems to go away. It’s always humming away just under the surface, waiting for something to trigger it—like now.
I fix my piercing gaze with his, and the intensity seems to startle him a little as his eyes widen. “I agreed to be your sponsor, and I don’t regret it. I knew I’d have to be there for hard conversations, listening while you hash out the past, and I was fine with that, as I’d do anything to help you get better. But there’s a point where I have to consider myself, my own feelings, my own sanity.”
“What? I…” Jake lets the words hang there as he struggles to finish his sentence, so I continue.
“Standing on the sidelines, watching someone else get to have everything you’ve ever wanted hurts more than anything. I’ve done it before and it almost killed me. I can’t do it again.”
Thoughts of Jacob and Indie together flash in my mind as I say the words, giving them more power than I intended. I’ve watched Jacob move from woman to woman, and each one that gets to kiss or touch him in the way I never can, is like a knife to my heart.
I thought I’d put it behind me and moved on with Dee. I fell for her hard and fast, and then she left me. I wondered constantly if she moved on to someone else. If another man was kissing her the way I wanted to, those thoughts drove me crazy.
Now, the only two people I’ve ever loved are with each other, and that jealousy, sadness, and longing that I’ve desperately been trying to ignore seems to be amplified. I should hate them both, as well as being angry at them for not considering myfeelings, but I feel so much, I can’t pinpoint just one emotion. I’m drowning in them.
Jake looks at me like I’ve punched him in the gut, bringing up a past I’ve never spoken about in front of him before. His mouth opens like he wants to say something, and his arm twitches upwards, as though he might try to reach for me, and panic sets in. If he speaks or touches me, I might break, and I can’t do that right now.
Without saying a word, I quickly climb out of the ring and walk towards the dressing room. I hear him mutter my name, almost like a plea for me to come back, but I don’t. I can’t even bring myself to look back, or I might lose the last of my strength.
Instead, I keep my head high and force one foot in front of the other, as my stomach rolls and nausea overtakes me. My heart breaks with each step I take.
- TEN YEARS EARLIER -
The end of my teenage school years is supposed to be a happy time, filled with excitement now that exams are over and the end-of-year prom is nearing. Soon, we’ll be graduating, moving on to university, getting the freedom all teenagers crave.
Yet, for me, the end of school just puts me one step closer to a future I’m not even sure I want. I’ve been raised to take over from my father as one of the rulers of Blackthorn, and no other future is available to me.
As part of an agreement made with the Morellis, we’re allowed to finish university, but after that, we have to take our place by our fathers’ side, learning the ropes on the job until they hand over to us permanently.
While I’m grateful that I get a few more years of freedom, there’s a constant, loud ticking clock hanging over my head, putting me one step closer to a destiny I never got a say in.
No matter how much I try to focus on prom, the fun summer we’ve organised, or our plans for when we move to university,there’s always a part of my mind that’s somewhere else…somewhere darker that’s filled with expectation and pressure.
“Are you listening, Jacob?” my father snaps, pulling me out of my thoughts.
I lift my gaze from where I’m absentmindedly staring at the meal I’m picking at with my fork to meet my father’s hard glare. “Sorry, I zoned out,” I mumble, not able to say anything else, as I have no fucking clue what he was talking about.
My mother tuts as Father rolls his eyes, and I’m sure Chloe starts to chuckle before turning into a cough. I glance over at her and she’s deliberately looking down at her meal, trying not to draw any more attention to herself.
Father huffs once more, clearly annoyed at having to repeat himself. “I asked you about prom. Who are you taking?”
I wince, but quickly straighten my face, so he doesn’t notice. This is a subject I was hoping to avoid, and given my parents are hardly the most involved when it comes to parenting, I was almost certain they wouldn’t ask. I should have fucking known better.
I pull back my shoulders and look Father in the eye, hoping my confidence will distract from what I’m sure will be an answer he doesn’t approve of. “I actually haven’t asked anyone.”