Page 124 of Hold Me Tight

Not here in front of him.

“You know what? I actually feel sorry for you.” My tone gentles. Not with sympathy, but with pity. “You’re missing out on your daughter’s life. The real moments. All the ones that matter. Someday you’ll realize that. I just hope it won’t be too late to undo the damage you’ve inflicted.”

Instead of giving him a chance to respond, I turn on my heel and head for the elevator. Even when he calls out my name, I don’t look back.

Because the man who actually loves me already gave me the truth without ever having to say a word.

45

River

It feels like I’ve been pacing the penthouse for hours. Back and forth. Again and again. Like a man on the edge of splintering apart, because that’s exactly where I am.

Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, the city blazes in sharp daylight. Sunlight bounces off glass towers, but I barely register the scenery. The brilliance blurs together, smearing across the glass like a watercolor left out in the rain. I’ve stopped seeing the view. Stopped feeling anything but the restless churn inside me.

My phone is clenched in one hand, screen still lit with the glow of the location-sharing app. I hate that I’ve been staring at it all day like some obsessed asshole. I hate how badly I’ve needed the reassurance that she’s safe. More than that, I hate that I’ve reduced myself to watching a blinking dot to know if she’s coming back to me.

This morning, she was at the bakery.

For a few hours, my heartrate slowed and my brain quieted. I told myself she was where she needed to be. Back in the rhythm of her own life. Surrounded by the women who always have her back.

But then the dot moved.

To Zane’s address.

And just like that, my world tilted on its axis. My hand was already on my keys, my body halfway to the door before my brain caught up. The urge to storm over there and rip her away from him nearly swallowed me whole.

Zane fucking Holloway doesn’t deserve her.

Or Nora.

He never did and he never will.

As much as every instinct in me screams to fight for her, this isn’t a battle I can win with brute force.

Not with Callie.

She’s not some problem I can fix or a prize to be claimed. She’s a woman who’s had to be strong for too damn long. Who’s been let down, disappointed, and dismissed more times than I probably even know.

And if there’s one thing I’ve learned since she and Nora came into my life, it’s that the only way this works is if she chooses me on her own.

Not because I begged or showed up with a list of reasons why she should.

But because she feels it and she wants this as much as I do.

So I wait.

Even if it kills me.

Which it just might.

I’ve replayed last night over again on an endless, painful loop. The way she climbed on top of me like she needed me just as badly as I’ve always needed her. The way her eyes stayed locked on mine, filled with everything we haven’t said out loud.

And then she was gone.

No note or explanation.

Just a hollow space where her warmth had been.