And then suddenly the look was gone. The softness vanished from her face, the fire from her eyes.
“I understand,” she said. “I’m a lot. Waylay’s a lot. This whole thing is a lot. Even on my best day, I’m too much and yet not enough.” Her laugh was humorless.
“Don’t, Daisy,” I ordered before I could help myself.
She took a slow, deep breath then gave me a perfunctory smile that felt like a fucking cleaver to the heart. “I believe that’s the last time you get to tell me what to do and call me Daisy.”
I felt something rising inside me that had nothing to do with the relief I’d expected. No. This thing growing inside me felt like the white-hot edges of panic. “Don’t be like that.”
She slid out of the booth and stood up. “You didn’t have to do it this way. Out in public so I wouldn’t make some kind of scene. I’m a big girl, Knox. And someday, I’m going to find the kind of man who wants an uppity, needy pain in the ass. One who wants to wade into my mess and stay for the duration. Obviously, you’re not him. At least you told me that from the start.”
I stood too, feeling like I’d somehow lost control of the situation. “I didn’t say that.”
“Those are your words, and you’re right. I should have listened the first time you said them.”
She grabbed her purse and snatched the paper off the table in front of me.
“Thank you for your offer of pretending to be interested in me, but I think I’ll pass.” She wouldn’t look me in the eye.
“Nothing needs to change, Naomi. You can still work at the bar. You and Liza still have an arrangement. Everything else can stay the same.”
“I have to go,” she said, starting for the door.
I grabbed her arm and pulled her into me. It had felt so natural, and it had the other benefit of forcing her to look at me. The knot in my gut loosened temporarily when her gaze met mine.
“Here,” I said, yanking the envelope out of my back pocket and handing it over.
“What’s this? A list of reasons I wasn’t good enough?”
“It’s cash,” I said.
She recoiled like I’d told her it was an envelope of spiders.
“Take it. It’ll help you and Way out.”
She slapped the envelope against my chest. “I don’t want your money. I don’t want anything from you now. But especially not your money.”
With that, she tried to yank free. It was a reflex that had me tightening my grip.
“Take. Your. Hands. Off. Me, Knox,” Naomi said softly.
It wasn’t fire in her eyes now. It was ice.
“Naomi, it doesn’t have to be this way.”
“Good-bye, Knox.”
She slipped out of my grip, leaving me staring after her like an idiot.
THIRTY-NINE
BREAKING UP, DOWN, AND THROUGH
Naomi
Too complicated. Too much. Too needy. Not worth it.
The thoughts swirled in my head on a vicious merry-go-round as I marched down the sidewalk, Knockemout blurring around me through unshed tears.