Page 49 of The Toy Maker (The Pink Cherrie #1)

FORTY-ONE

My march to see Jason was set to the sound of cursing on a loop inside my head, each profanity punctuated by the dull throb of my bruised throat.

Pink Cherrie pulsed around me, neon lights flickering against brick walls, the hum of music mixing with the murmur of pleasure and business as usual.

Because the show must go on. A few chatty Cherries stopped me along the way, their voices light and their smiles genuine as they told me how glad they were that I was alive.

I nodded, forcing a hollow smile in return, but my mind was already elsewhere.

They left to join what I could only assume was a threesome in the forest while I continued my mission.

I was sick of contemplating my life choices in front of doors that I knew I was going to walk through anyway. So I didn’t stop. I didn’t hesitate. I pushed through like I owned the place.

But the man who actually did own the place just stared at me from his bed.

Jason looked exhausted. Shadows darkened the sharp angles of his face, his green eyes duller than I’d ever seen them.

He didn’t move toward me, but I could see it—the restraint in how his fingers curled into the sheets, the way his jaw tensed like he was holding himself back from doing exactly that.

“Are you okay?” His voice was tired, strained.

“I’ve had better days.” My lips twisted into something resembling a smirk, but it fell away just as quickly. Any day where I wasn’t strangled and betrayed was automatically better than this one.

Jason looked down at his lap. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled. His words, spoken so quietly and sincerely, doused some of the fire burning in my veins.

“For what?”

I needed to hear it. I needed to know exactly what he regretted. The fuck-and-flight? The public humiliation? The secrets he’d kept?

But he didn’t answer. His hands were still smeared with Sam’s dried blood, and his knuckles were raw. I could see where he’d tried to scrape it off, but the stains remained.

“Jason?” I pressed.

And then, before I could react, he was on me.

He crushed me into his embrace, so sudden, so firm, that it knocked the breath from my lungs. His scent—cologne, sweat, everything distinctly him—wrapped around me like a drug, and I fought the urge to melt into him, to stay there forever.

His hands were shaking. One cradled the back of my head, the other pressed flat against my spine like he was trying to make sure I was real.

Like he was trying to keep himself from falling apart.

But it wasn’t enough. None of it erased what had happened.

I pulled away.

Jason’s face fell, just for a second, before he slammed the walls back up. He turned and moved to his desk, flipping through a stack of papers as if nothing had happened.

“Where’d you go?” he asked, clearing his throat.

“To see Kitty.” My voice was soft.

He kept his back to me. “And how’d that go?”

I shifted where I stood. “Could’ve gone better.” That’s the understatement of the year .

Jason nodded absently, still pretending to focus on the paperwork in front of him.

I watched him, the words climbing up my throat before I could stop them. “I think she’s in love with you.”

The statement landed between us like a bomb.

“She’s not,” Jason sighed, still refusing to look at me.

“How do you know?” I asked.

“I just do.”

“And if you’re wrong?” I challenged. “It makes sense, doesn’t it? Why she was so upset when she saw us together? Why she wanted me gone?”

“Tara.” His voice was edged with warning, but I didn’t care.

“She’s been here longer than anyone,” I pushed, stepping forward. “You’re telling me there’s no chance she has feelings for you?”

Jason exhaled harshly, rubbing a hand over his face. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

I wanted to scream. My body ached all over—from the bruises, from the exhaustion, from the emotional whiplash of never knowing where I stood with him.

“I almost died today,” I seethed, my voice raw and furious. “And you can’t even give me a real answer?”

He kept flipping through his goddamn papers, pretending like he didn’t care about me at all.

“Say something!” I begged.

And then, finally, he looked at me.

The same green eyes I had stared into the day I was initiated into his world met mine, but the man behind them wasn’t the same.

The cold certainty was gone. Fear had crept into the cracks and tangled itself around him like chains. His eyes weren’t just haunted. They were full of something far worse.

Self-hatred.

Jason reached into the pile of papers and pulled something free.

“What’s this?” My voice was wary as he handed it to me.

“Your contract,” he said quietly.

Confusion knotted my brows. “I never signed a cont?—”

“To Pink Cherrie.”

The breath left my lungs. My mind scrambled, grasping for an explanation. “Why are you showing this to me?”

His face was unreadable. “That contract was only valid for six months.”

I shook my head. “Right, but that’s not until?—”

“Yesterday.”

The realization slammed into me.

I glanced down at the crisp paper in my hands, my grip tightening as if holding onto it could change what was already set in motion. The inked words blurred in my vision.

He wasn’t planning on drawing up new paperwork.

This wasn’t a conversation. This was a goodbye.

“Jason…” I hesitated, my heart slamming against my ribs. “You don’t have to do this.”

His jaw clenched, but he forced a small, almost regretful smile. “You can go.”

The words were sharp. Too sharp. Too practiced, too effortless, like he had prepared himself for this moment.

Jason didn’t look at me when he said it. He stared past me, toward the window, the rain outside casting muted shadows across his face. His fingers twitched at his sides, betraying him. He thought this was right. He thought this was what was best for me.

I numbly shook my head. “I don’t want to.”

“I don’t care what you want,” he snapped suddenly, his voice cutting through the air. “Isn’t that obvious to you by now?” The words stung more than they should have, but deep down, I knew it wasn’t the truth—at least, not the whole truth.

Jason was trying to push me away, trying to make it easier.

“Stop that,” I whispered.

“What? Being honest?” he scoffed. “I thought that’s what you wanted.”

“Not like this.”

Jason laughed bitterly. “Honestly, I don’t give a damn what you think.” If this was an act, it was pretty damn convincing.

I twisted the contract in my hands, my knuckles turning white from my grip.

“I saw you, I used you, and now I’m telling you to get out,” he said, voice cold and emotionless. “But somehow, you’ve managed to turn fucking into feelings.”

I had spent my whole life trying to convince people to love me.

Trying to prove I was worth staying for.

I had done it with my mother, begging for scraps of affection that never came.

I had done it with my father, hoping that if I was good enough, smart enough, quiet enough, he would look at me like I mattered.

And now, here I was again. Standing in front of someone who meant everything to me, someone who was pushing me away with every ounce of strength he had left.

Maybe Jason thought he was protecting me. Maybe he believed that if he made himself into a villain, it would be easier to let go. But all I could hear were echoes of the past, of slammed doors and silent car rides, of all the ways I had failed to fix what was already broken.

“This isn’t about feelings,” I said, my voice barely holding steady.

“Okay,” he scoffed. “Then say it. Say you don’t love me, and I’ll give you a new contract.”

I opened my mouth.

Nothing came out.

Jason’s expression didn’t change, but I saw it—how his throat bobbed, and his fingers twitched. He was hoping I’d say it.

I took the contract and ripped it in half. “Say you don’t love me,” I fired back. “And I’ll go.”

For a fraction of a second, I saw hesitation. His breath caught and I thought, just for a moment, that he might drop the facade.

But then his face hardened.

“Don’t you get it, Tara?” His voice was barely above a whisper. “You’re imagining that I feel something for you.”

Tears burned behind my eyes. “I’m not.” My voice wavered, suddenly uncertain. Was I? Had I misjudged everything? Had I built an illusion of love out of longing?

It wouldn’t have been the first time.

Jason stared at me for a long time, his expression unreadable. And then, with the finality of a death sentence, he said, “You can’t work here anymore.”

The breath left my lungs. My heart twisted in on itself, curling inward like something abandoned in the cold.

He had done it. He had made his decision.

And now, I had to make mine.

I straightened my shoulders, forcing numbness to take over. My voice came out steadier than I felt, even as my hands trembled at my sides.

“I want my last paycheck.” It wasn’t worth fighting anymore.

Jason’s jaw twitched, but he didn’t argue. He turned back to his desk, grabbed his checkbook, and scrawled his signature across the slip like it meant nothing.

Like I meant nothing.

The silence between us was suffocating. The scratch of his pen against paper was the only sound in the room, but to me, it was deafening.

When he finished, he tore the check free with an agonizing slowness and held it out.

I reached for it, but before I could take it, he pulled back—just enough to make me look up at him.

For a moment, neither of us spoke.

Jason’s expression was blank, but I saw the tension in his grip, the way his fingers curled slightly around the check, as if he wasn’t ready to let go.

This was hurting him, too.

But he wasn’t going to stop it.

My breath was shaky when I finally forced words out. “That’s it, then?”

His lips pressed into a thin line. He exhaled sharply through his nose like he hated that I was making him say it. “That’s it.”

I nodded slowly, my fingers closing around the check. His grip loosened, hesitant, reluctant, but in the end, he let it go.

And that was all it took for my chest to cave in.

I clenched my jaw, turned on my heel, and walked out without another word. My heartbeat pounded in my ears as I walked toward the door, each step pulling me farther away from him, from the ache, from the unraveling piece of myself that still wanted to stay.

I didn’t give him the satisfaction of looking back.