I reached for a kitchen towel just to have something in my hands and looked away. While I was busy trying to find the right words to apologize for what I had said at his office, Jack spoke up.
“You can’t even look at me, can you?”
Startled by his words, I met his gaze. Was that what he thought?
“Jack, I—”
“It doesn’t matter now,” he continued. “I came to give you this in person.” He unrolled the file in his hands and put it on the island, right next to the triple chocolate brownies, then pushed it my way.
My eyes still on him, I reached for it.
“What is this?” My voice came out like a whisper.
When he didn’t answer, I looked down and turned the first page.
Shocked by what I was reading, my eyes flew up to his.
“Divorce papers,” he said calmly.
I was anything but calm. My mind in overdrive, my eyes tried to follow the words and sentences, but it was all a jumbled mess in front of me.
“You want a divorce?” I croaked out, the papers slightly trembling. I tightened my grip to hide it from his eyes.
“Yes. It’s the right thing…for you.”
My brows drew together and some heat started to come back to my limbs. I forced myself to drop the papers on the island and take a step back as if they would come alive and bite my fingers off.
This time I met his gaze straight on, the dread and excitement turning into anger. “For me. How about you? What do you get out of it?”
He tilted his head to the side, his eyes slightly narrowing in a calculating manner. “It’s the right thing for me too.”
A little dazed, I nodded. Barely able to speak through the tightness in my throat, I said, “I see.” Impressive word choices, I know.
I was so out of it that I didn’t even notice him taking out a pen from his suit jacket and offering it to me.
I stared at him as if he had sprouted another head.
“You want me to sign it…now.”
It wasn’t a question, but he treated it as such.
“Yes. I’d like to get it done right now.”
“You’d like to get it done right now,” I echoed.
“Preferably.”
That word—that one annoying word pushed me over the edge of worry and guilt into anger.
Preferably.
I decided right then and there that it was the most ridiculous and annoying word in the world. I didn’t touch the pen. I didn’t pick up the papers.
I crossed my arms against my chest. “The right thing to do would’ve been to be honest with me from the beginning.”
Cool as a cucumber, he pushed his hands into the pockets of his pants as red-hot fury licked over my skin.
“You’re right, which is why I’d like you to sign the papers.”
“No.”
His brows drew together as he looked at me from across the space. “No?”
“No.” I was very good at being stubborn. I was like a cow—if I didn’t want to be moved, you couldn’t move me, no matter who or what came.
“Rose—”
“No.”
He gritted his teeth. “Why?”
I shrugged, feigning nonchalance. “I don’t think I feel like signing anything today. Maybe some other time.”
“Rose, it needs to be today.”
“Really?” I asked, making a thinking face and then grimacing. “Ah, I’m so sorry. I’m busy today. Maybe some other time.”
He looked truly taken back. “Why are you doing this? I thought this was what you wanted.”
No wonder I had thought him to be a cement block in the beginning—not only did he not show his emotions, he didn’t understand them even when they slapped him in the face.
Something wet slid down my cheek and, appalled at myself for crying, I wiped at it angrily with the back of my hand. That’s when Jack’s face changed and his entire body tensed. He lost the frown, the anger, the disbelief and hid behind his mask again.
I wiped off another wayward tear and lifted my chin high.
He shook his head then rubbed the bridge of his nose. Next thing I knew, he was moving toward me. I did my best to breathe in and out normally and stayed put. Even when he was standing right next to me, his chest almost resting against my shoulder, I didn’t move. I stopped breathing too.
“Rose,” he started in a low voice, his head bent closer to mine.
I stopped trying to clear the tears away. They were only angry tears, and maybe stress, nothing more, and the same reasons applied for the trembling, too.
When I felt his lips against my temple, I closed my eyes. “You’re breaking my heart, baby, trying to hold on to something that should’ve never been. Sign the divorce papers, Rose. Please.”
“I won’t,” I whispered.
“Why?” he asked again.
“I won’t.”
I felt the gentle touch of his fingertips as he gripped my chin and turned my head. I opened my eyes and looked straight into the dark blue eyes of the man I had irrevocably fallen in love with.
I wanted to say so much to him.
“Do it. I’ll send someone to pick up the signed papers.”
He held on to my chin and seemed to map out my face in his mind as his eyes touched every inch. Then his hand slipped forward, cupping the side of my cheek.
My eyes closed on their own as he pressed a kiss to my forehead then the next second he was gone. I was too scared to open my eyes, to face the reality of the hell that had been my life for the last week.
He could send his entire firm to my door if he wanted to. I was not going to sign those damn papers.
“Rose? It didn’t go well, did it?”
I took a few deep breaths and opened my eyes, feeling more determined than ever.
Sally was standing right where Jack had stood just moments earlier. I picked up the papers, holding them out for her to take. “He wants a divorce.”
She seemed to choke up before she took the file from my hand. “But, he said…how would—did you sign them?”
I shook my head. “Nope.”
“Are you going to?”
“Nope.”
That evening when we closed the coffee shop, no matter how hard I looked, I couldn’t find Jack anywhere, and I took his absence as an invitation.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Jack
She hadn’t signed the papers.
I knew that because the guy I’d sent to pick them up had returned empty-handed. So, I headed out to face her myself—again—and when I found her, this time I wouldn’t walk away until I got a damn signature. The divorce had to happen, and it had to happen soon.
But before I could deal with Rose, I needed to make a quick stop.
I knocked on his door and hoped he’d be inside.
He opened after a few seconds and looked shocked to see me.
“How do you know where I live?” Joshua Landon asked with a furious expression on his face.
I smiled at him and blocked the door with my foot before he could shut it in my face and shouldered my way in.
“You couldn’t stay away from her, could you? Your greed will cost you, Joshua.”
“Listen to me you—”