Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 121764 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 609(@200wpm)___ 487(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121764 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 609(@200wpm)___ 487(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
“Yeah,” I answered, but the word was like a croak from my dry throat.
“And you have your passport?”
My nose stung, and I shoved my shoes forcefully into my bag. “Got it.”
“We’ll need to leave pretty early in the morning,” he said from where he was zipping up his own bag. “Calgary Airport is about an hour and a half from here, and I have no idea what security will look like. It’s peak season here.”
I sniffed, cursing myself as tears flooded my eyes.
Stop it, Grace. Pull it together.
I felt the moment Jaxson saw me, felt how the energy in the room shifted when he froze. Then, slowly, he moved across the room, wrapping his arms around me from behind and pulling my back to his chest.
He kissed my hair before resting his chin on my head. “Not all fitting, huh?”
I slumped against him. “No.”
The word garbled out of me, and Jaxson held me tighter with a little chuckle.
“Hey, it’s alright. We’ll stop and grab another suitcase in the morning. My treat.”
I wiped my nose with the back of my hand, shrugging out of his grasp. Then, in a final attempt to shove all my emotions down, I started ripping things out of my suitcase.
“I don’t even know why I need all this… all this stuff,” I said, tossing one item after the next over my shoulder. “It’s stupid. It’s wasteful. Why did I buy all this? Why did I—”
Before I could launch the neon cowboy hat from the festival, Jaxson grabbed my wrist. He took the hat from my grip, dropped it back into my bag, and turned me until I was facing him. Then, he wrapped me up in a bear hug, his arms enveloping me, one hand at the small of my back, and the other holding my head to his chest.
“Shhh,” he said, running his fingers through the strands. “It’s okay.”
My face crumpled, and I squeezed him as tight as I could.
“I’m going to miss you.”
The second I whispered the words, tears pooled in my eyes too fast for me to stop them.
We both stiffened.
I was the first to acknowledge it, the first to call what we both were feeling to the surface.
And with that realization, I broke — shoulders shaking, tears rushing, all that pain that had been suffocating me breaking free at once. I couldn’t hold it down any longer, couldn’t fight it, and it took me under like a tidal wave.
I felt the way Jaxson’s next breath hitched, heard how hard he had to swallow before he responded. When he did, his voice was gruff and tight with emotion.
“I’m going to miss you, too, little Nova.” He let out a ragged breath. “So fucking much it kills me to even think about it.”
I squeezed my eyes tight, burying my face in his chest, and he wrapped me up even more. It was like we were trying to meld ourselves together, like maybe if we could become one person, we could have everything we wanted.
Take me with you.
The words were on the tip of my tongue, but I swallowed them down, fighting back another sob. I hated this pain more than anything in the world. I was so terrified of never being rid of it, of committing myself to a life of unhappiness.
But this was what we’d known all along.
I had to believe there were better days ahead. I had to believe that one day, I’d look back on this time in my life, on this summer with Jaxson, and I’d feel nothing but joy. One day, when my heart was healed — and it would heal — I would tell our story to another lover, or maybe to my kids or grandkids, or maybe just to a fellow stranger roaming the Earth.
I’d tell them and I’d smile, thankful for what we had, grateful for the time in my life where I belonged to Jaxson Brittain and he belonged to me.
But right now, in this moment, I was sad.
I was ripping at the seams.
It was foolish to think he would ever want to be tied down. As much fun as we’d had, that was just what we were — fun. We were a summer of being reckless, an unplanned road trip with no destination, and yet a most definite dead end.
He was my brother’s teammate.
He was thirty years old.
He was a professional hockey player with women quite literally throwing themselves at him and begging for his attention.
It made me sick to think of any of them getting it, of anyone else getting to touch him the way I had, to feel him inside them. Did he want to settle down? Did he want a family? Why would he, when he could live a life of taking any woman he wanted to bed?
Regardless — I wasn’t the girl for him in either option.