Alex continued like I hadn’t spoken. “Jules may have lied to you, but she also willingly told you the truth. If she kept her mouth shut, you probably would’ve never found out what she did. The only reason someone would make an unprompted confession like that is because they want a fresh start, and the only reason they’d want a fresh start when the relationship is already going well is because they realized something.”
Get. Out.
I lo—
Don’t you dare say it. I said, get out, Jules. Get the fuck out!
My heart slammed against my chest and bruised my ribcage with each painful thud.
“I don’t have to tell you what the realization is,” Alex said. “You’re smart enough to figure it out. But according to you, she didn’t tell you earlier because she was afraid of how you’d react. She didn’t think you’d take her side. Now, tell me. How did you react when she finally told you?”
The oxygen in the room thinned.
Forget painful. Every breath was downright excruciating.
“I’m not a big fan of Jules, but you are my best friend. I want you to be happy.” Alex’s face softened a smidge, but that didn’t blunt the harshness of his words. “You can’t be happy if you have your head buried so far in the sand you think you can just walk away and forget her. Take it from someone who tried to do the same once with someone I love. You’ll be miserable until you resolve the situation.”
I’d never heard Alex utter so many words in such a short time. I would’ve been more stunned had I not been busy replaying them in my mind.
She didn’t tell you earlier because she was afraid of how you’d react. Now, tell me. How did you react?
I tilted my head back and squeezed my eyes shut again. “Oh, fuck.”
What the hell have I done?
51
JULES
My hospital visit was a blur of tests and examinations. I had a cut on my head, several nasty bruises, a shoulder sprain, and a mild concussion, but otherwise, I was pretty lucky. It could’ve been so much worse.
Despite my concussion, I opted to finish the bar exam the next day. I just wanted to get it over with. Plus, it was multiple choice; if worse came to worse, I could bubble something in and pray for the best.
I handed in my test and returned the administrator’s smile with a tired one of my own.
It was done. The results were out of my hands now.
I wouldn’t know whether or not I’d passed until October, so I might as well celebrate by sleeping for the next, oh, seventy-two hours.
Exhaustion weighed down my limbs as I exited the exam room, but now that the test was over, I couldn’t stop replaying yesterday’s hospital visit in my head.
Obviously, I knew Josh worked in the ER, but I hadn’t expected him to see him for some reason.
My heart twisted at the memory of his cold, clinical examination. I didn’t think he would rush to my side and forgive me just because I was injured, but I’d expected a little more…warmth? Empathy? Instead, he’d treated me like I was just another patient he didn’t personally know.
Polite and competent, but emotionally detached.
Don’t think about it. Not now.
Getting too caught up in my head was what screwed me over yesterday; if I hadn’t been so distracted, Max wouldn’t have been able to surprise me like that.
Cold sweat broke out on my skin. I didn’t think he’d be stupid enough to come back a second day in a row, but desperate people did desperate things. I imagined his “friends” weren’t happy he’d lost the painting, and he wanted revenge for what happened in his hotel.
I’d underestimated his capability for physical violence.
Then again, if there was one recurring theme in my life, it was that people were never who I thought they were.
I quickened my steps so I could squeeze into the elevator before the doors closed. It was packed shoulder-to-shoulder and smelled faintly of tuna and body odor, but it was still better than the stairwell. You couldn’t pay me enough money to take the stairs again.
I hitched my bag higher on my shoulder, taking solace in the pepper spray and taser sitting inside it. I’d borrowed them from Stella, who’d kept them on hand since her short-lived but terrifying episode with a stalker last year.
As a well-known influencer, she dealt with her fair share of creeps, but that guy had crossed the line. He’d sent her disgusting letters detailing what he wanted to do to her and messaged her candid photos of herself around town, which freaked her out so much she’d gone to the police. They hadn’t been any help at all, but luckily, the stalker stopped contacting her after a few weeks and she hadn’t heard from him since.
I was the only person who knew about it since we lived together. If Stella hadn’t been concerned about the guy showing up at our house, she wouldn’t have even told me. She had a bad habit of keeping all her problems to herself.
The elevator doors slid open.
Thank God.
I liked tuna; I did not like the smell of it mixed with B.O. and half a dozen different perfumes.
I walked across the lobby, eager to return home and binge another pint of ice cream. I’d inhaled so much Ben & Jerry’s over the past week I was surprised I hadn’t ballooned out of my clothes.
I’d almost reached the exit when two words stopped me in my tracks.
“Hey, Red.”
My pulse spiked at the sound of that nickname, in that voice, here…
No. It can’t be.
My mind was playing tricks on me again. There was no way Josh was here after the way he’d treated me yesterday.
A messy knot of emotion tangled in my throat.
Several people brushed past me and shot me strange looks. I was rooted to my spot on the marble floor, and I wanted to move. I really did. But my body refused to comply, and all I could do was stare at the exit, both longing to reach it and happy to stay in my bubble of delusion forever.
What if it was him? What if he was here? What if…
A shadow sliced across the sun-drenched floor before a body moved in front of me and blocked the exit from view.
I slowly raised my eyes, skimming over the T-shirt-clad chest, broad shoulders, and tense jaw before I met Josh’s eyes.
My heart whimpered like a wounded animal eager for comfort from the only person capable of providing it.
“I wasn’t sure if you heard me.” He stuffed his hands in his pockets. His brows were drawn tight over worried eyes, but a tentative smile played on his mouth. “How did the test go?”
“I—fine.” I couldn’t wrap my head around what was happening. It was too surreal.
Josh might as well be a different person from yesterday, and I wasn’t just talking about the one-eighty in his attitude. Gone was the clean-cut doctor; in its place was someone gruffer, more world-weary. Stubble shadowed his cheeks and jaw, his skin had taken on a pallid case, and his hair looked like he’d raked his fingers through it a thousand times. Regret filled his eyes and sent my stomach tumbling off a cliff.
There was only one thing he could be regretting, and—
Don’t go there.
I bit the inside of my cheek until a coppery taste filled my mouth. I refused to get my hopes up only for him to crush them again.