Nate shakes his head, frowning.
“I don’t know. I don’t think we’re giving him enough credit. I think it’s a risk we just have to take. That’s if…that’s if you think this is a risk worth taking.”
I swallow. In any other circumstance, I’d say yes. I’d tell him that I’ll go anywhere with him. I’d tell him that I want to spend the rest of my life with him because as crazy as that sounds I do want to spend my life with him.
But we both know that I can’t.
He can see the pain in my eyes. He already knows that I’m going to walk away from him. Not because I want to, but because I feel backed into a corner.
It feels like no matter what I do, people are going to get hurt. It may as well be me who takes the brunt of the pain.
“I want this more than anything in the world,” I whisper. I almost reach out to touch his face, but I stop myself just in time. “In another life…we’d be together. But I have to protect my dad. He’s been through too much already.”
“And what about what you’ve been through? He’s been holding you back all this time. Stopping you from being truly happy. Do you think he’d want that for you? Because I don’t,” Nate growls. And he’s right. My dad wouldn’t want me to be unhappy. But he also wouldn’t be happy that I’ve found happiness with his best friend.
I sigh, shaking my head slowly.
“He wants me to be happy…but I guess it’s just going to have to be on his terms. I’m sorry, Nate. I never should have started something I can’t finish.”
“Don’t do this,” he pleads, but I have to turn my back on him now or I never will. I turn away from him, swallowing down the lump in my throat.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry…I’ll stay out of your way until we make it home. Then you’ll never have to see me again, I promise.” I pause, taking a deep breath. “I’m…I’m sorry.”
He doesn’t say anything as I begin to walk away. Away from the only man I'll ever love. Away from my one chance at happiness.
I guess some paths are just meant to be taken alone.
I don’t look back. I know if I do, I’ll be too weak to resist running back into his arms. But this is for the best.
He deserves better than me.
Someone who is less of a coward. Someone who can give him all of the love he deserves. And the thing is, he can have any woman he wants. He doesn’t need to settle for me. Not when there are so many better women out there for him.
That’s what I tell myself as I walk away. I’m doing him a favor. This is the only option for all of us. This is for the best.
It has to be.
CHAPTER TEN
Nate
I can barely believe I’m watching Tara walk away from me. It feels like someone has hollowed out my chest and taken everything important from me. I thought we were on the same page, that we wanted the same things…
I guess I was wrong.
No, no I wasn’t. She still wants me, she just feels like she can’t have me.
I feel anger boil up inside me. All because she thinks her dad will refuse to understand the chemistry between us. If he knew what we share, then he would never try to stand in our way. But I think she’s right, there’s no way he’ll ever allow us to be happy. He would take one look at us as a pair and write us off as a fling, and try to tear us apart, but I know that if she stood by my side, he’d never manage it.
But she had to make a choice. I understand why she’s walking away. Blood is thicker than water. She has to choose her family, the only family that she has. I can’t imagine what it must be like to be in her shoes…to grow up without a mother, to have a father who coddled her all the time, never letting her leave his side…it sounds like an unsustainable way to live, and I can’t blame her for wanting to escape.
And yet now that she has the chance, she’s choosing to go back to that way of life. Doesn’t she realize that her father will always find some way to cage her if she doesn’t go out on her own? I guess she must know…but there’s still nothing she can do about it.
My heart aches for her. Because I know that as she walks away, her heart is aching just as much as mine. There’s no chance that I imagined the lust, the connection, the emotion between us last night.
There’s no way it meant nothing to her. And if it meant as much to her as it did to me, then she must be feeling broken right now.