“Jack!” the redhead said cheerfully upon seeing him make his way over to her. “How are you enjoying–”
“What did you just say to her?” Jack asked, his eyes like glaciers, cutting into Vanessa’s very soul. He could be quite intimidating when he wanted to be.
“I’m not sure I know what you mean,” Vanessa said, shifting her eyes so she wasn’t looking at him.
“Vanessa,” he said through gritted teeth. “I’ve had a very shitty week so do not test me. What did you say to my girlfriend?”
Vanessa shrugged her shoulder as nonchalantly as possible. “The truth,” she said, although her voice wasn’t as firm as it had been with Andie. “I mean, come on. Were you really intending to be with her now that I’m back in Onyx?”
“Oh my God,” Jack said, placing both hands on top of his head. For a moment, he just stood there, looking up at the sky in hopes that he could fix everything with Andie before he narrowed his eyes at the woman in front of him. “Actually, Vanessa, I do intend to be with Andie. I don’t love you, and truth be told, I never really did. I only went out with you for a year because I didn’t want to date and it was easier to say I had a girlfriend rather than say no altogether.” He paused as a smile touched his features; an epiphany had struck him and it felt right. “You’ve caused more trouble than your worth. You know what? I don’t need this party, I don’t need you, and we sure as hell don’t need your investment.”
With that, Jack spun around on his heel and exited the party, hoping to catch Andie and make everything right between them once again.
The hotel Vanessa had picked to throw the pool party was adjacent to a beach, and from what Jack could see, Andie had decided to walk along the shore instead of head back home. He was inwardly glad for this, only because if she had gone back to the guesthouse, she might not have let him in. At least she couldn’t exactly run away from him on the beach, and even if she tried, he was definitely faster. But instead of immediately approaching her, he decided to lag a few feet behind and simply watch her frame. Andie’s body language was so revealing, and he always gauged her emotions from how she stood, what her hands were doing, what her eyes said. Since Andie’s back was toward him, however, he had to decipher everything from behind, which might have been difficult for him in the beginning of the relationship, but over the months together, he knew her and her body quite well.
From the slump of her shoulders to the downward tilt of her head, Jack could immediately tell that she was defeated. Her feet dragged in the sand, and not just because she was wearing a pair of flip flops. Hadn’t Beverly warned him he would be the cause of her pain if he didn’t just watch it? Even Andie mentioned that Vanessa had wanted to break them up, but he didn’t even believe her. He couldn’t allow himself to think that way because the investment was the only thing on his mind. He was in, for lack of a better term, denial. And now it wasn’t he who ended up hurt, but the one person he loved the most in the world.
To put it bluntly, he fucked up. He strayed off onto the wrong path, and just hoped Andie would somehow let him redeem himself.
And he realized he really didn’t need Vanessa or her investment. Andie’s Pet Day at the shelter already had more money than his pool party; maybe if he talked to Andie about helping plan a party, then they could raise the money themselves – without any unnecessary outside help.
And everything could go back to the way it was.
It could happen, couldn’t it?
“I know your following me,” a voice called from in front of him.
Jack blinked once and looked back up at Andie, who had stopped walking in order to turn her face and look out at the sea. Ever since Jack had known her, Andie had loved the sea. She was mesmerized by the waves rolling in and then crashing on the shore. It was no wonder that whenever the two had a fight, she came here. The sea always managed to calm her down. It should be noted, however, that the woman had yet to actually turn around and face him. But… at least she was all right with talking to him.
At this point, he would take what he could get.
“What do you want?” she asked him, her eyes firmly focused on the water before her as her hair was gently lifted into the soft breeze the sea provided for its visitors.
“I wanted to say I’m sorry,” Jack said, taking a step towards her. He was close enough where he could reach out and touch her if he wanted, but he refrained. Andie didn’t like being touched when she was mad at him; Jack had found out the hard way. “For everything,” he added. Andie cocked her head in his direction, her eyes heavily guarded as she tried to read sincerity in Jack’s. “You were absolutely right, about everything. The whole Vanessa thing – I didn’t see it. To be honest, I didn’t want to see it. I didn’t want to acknowledge the fact that her investment would come with strings attached. I didn’t want to even think about the concept that she might have been trying to hurt you – to hurt us. You have to know that I don’t see her that way, right? Everything she told you was a lie. You know that, right?”
Finally, Andie turned to face him, crossing her arms over her chest. The sun was slowly setting, causing the sky behind the horizon to explode with color, but Jack couldn’t take his eyes off of the woman in front of him. “Why did you break up with her?” she asked him, tilting her head slightly to the side. “And why didn’t you tell me about her before?”
Jack sighed through his nose, running his fingers over his cropped locks. He really should have explained his previous relationship with Vanessa, if only to help put Andie at ease when he and his ex had to interact because of business. “Vanessa and I started going out my junior year in college,” Jack explained. “She came from a wealthy family, and I didn’t want to date anybody that was after me for my money. Even in college, people knew of my parents’ death and how much I inherited. Vanessa was pretty and she was a sophomore. She was smart, too, though she could be mean when she really wanted to. The thing was, I just didn’t want to date, period, and so I thought it was easier keeping a girlfriend then rejecting girls who asked me out. But Vanessa and I didn’t click on a deeper level of intimacy. The reason I broke up with her was because just before summer break, she came to me saying she was pregnant. Truth be told, I was freaked out. I was already stressed about graduating, about returning to Onyx to head my father’s company – I couldn’t deal with a baby. But she said she wanted to keep it, and that we had to get married because her parents would disown her and she’d be dirt poor. I didn’t even love the girl, and here she was, demanding we get married. I told her I needed to think about it, and she said okay. So I was at this bar adjacent to the campus, nursing my third beer, when I overheard one of her friends talking about how Vanessa faked the pregnancy in order to get me to marry her. She was going to say she had a miscarriage when she didn’t start to show. So I broke up with her the very next day, and refused to have anything to do with her after that… until now, of course.
“And the reason I didn’t tell you? It’s stupid, I know, but I don’t really talk about things that aren’t important to me. And Vanessa has never been important to me. At all.”
Jack stopped, catching his breath, his usually guarded jade green eyes now seeping into Andie’s in hopes that she believed him.
“Jack,” she said after a long while, looking at him. “I’m not upset about the whole Vanessa thing. Trust me; I have to deal with women wanting you on an everyday basis. I think I can deal with another one. One of the reasons I’m upset is that you just couldn’t believe me when I told you she was trying to break us apart. A lot of the women who do want you don’t even care about me; they just want your attention. But Vanessa went out of her way to make sure that not only were you distracted with the investment, but that she had you all to herself, especially knowing you had plans with me.” She paused here, before cocking her head to the side and looking up at him with enigmatic expression on her face. “I need to know I have your support with things, Jack, and it can’t just be with words. I’ve realized that wh
en I went to dinner with Burr, I didn’t need you there; I handled it on my own. But I needed your support. And you not showing up showed me that you didn’t support me with this. The fact that you were with Vanessa was like rubbing salt in my wounds.”
Jack hated hearing these things about himself, but he knew they were true. He knew he had made mistakes, and in order to overcome them, he needed to hear them.
“You’re right,” he said. “And I’m sorry.” He reached out and placed his hands on Andie’s hips, pulling her closer to him. He needed to feel her, to touch her, afraid she might disappear. “For everything.”
Andie bit her lip but nodded, holding his shoulders tightly, and before she could breathe properly, Jack crushed his lips against hers. Neither of them noticed or cared that their picture was being taken by numerous paparazzi. All that mattered was the two of them, together again.
The next day was Melinda’s bachelorette party, and Andie was in the guestroom, packing up what little belongings she had taken over with her. It was good to finally be going home.
A noise caught her off-guard, then someone ripped her door open. Before she could even turn around to see who it was, a hand with a damp handkerchief clamped around her mouth, and before she knew it, she began to pass out.
32
Reese didn’t know how she knew it, but something was going to happen tonight. Something big. Her heart was pumping blood through every crevice of her body, and she could feel it. As she changed into her body suit, she tried to keep her thoughts quiet. She didn’t want to overanalyze her feelings, didn’t want to rationalize away her intuition. But as she zipped her suit up, her hand shook.
Wasn’t she supposed to be a Seer? Shouldn’t she know what was going to happen tonight? Maybe she did, and didn’t want to think about it. Maybe she didn’t and worried that she did. Maybe she was confusing herself and if she didn’t get a handle on herself, she would get herself into trouble.
“Get a grip on yourself, Reese,” she murmured to herself, shaking her head.
She still needed to do her makeup.
It had been a few days since her tea and pastries with Henry, and his words still hung in the air. “You can’t save everyone.” “People as a whole, not individuals.” “Just like something started this war, something will end it.” It was hard to focus on anything else when her mind kept going over and over her vision. Clearly her vision was going to come true. There was no stopping it. If such a thing were possible, her family would still be alive. At some point, Reese was going to sacrifice everything for Ollo. She didn’t know the consequences of her actions. Didn’t know how it would affect the war or Ollo or even herself. She didn’t know if she would even survive the attack.
It didn’t matter.
Ollo was in danger and she needed to save him. That was that. She didn’t even have to think about it. Probably didn’t in her vision.
When she was all ready to go, Ollo–as usual–walked her to the door. She knew he had been working on making his opinionated comments about her going out every night to a minimum. He attempted to be strong and supportive for her, and she appreciated that more than a lot of what he did. There was a soft smile on his face as his murky brown-blue eyes regarded her that night. His dimples popped. His hair actually looked combed. He pulled it back in a bun but long strands of hair still fell in his face. He wore a light blue v-neck t-shirt and dark jeans. He’d probably change into pajamas once she was out the door. He didn’t particularly like clothes if he could help it.
“Do me a favor,” she said before she could stop herself, before she could think things through. “Don’t leave tonight.”
Ollo furrowed his brow, causing an indent to appear between them. He bent his knees and tucked his chin in so he could look at her more on her level. “What’s going on, darl?” he asked in his gravelly tone. His accent caused the hairs on her arms to stand erect, and she closed her eyes in order to fight off a shudder. “You think it’s going to happen tonight? Your vision?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I just feel like something is going to happen, if that makes sense. And I just want you to be safe. I don’t want anything to happen to you, Ollo. I don’t know what I would do if–” she cut herself off lest her voice start to crack, and she wanted–needed–to be strong for him.
“Hey, hey, hey.” Ollo took his hand–God, it was so big, it could cover her face–and placed it on the back of her head, bringing her to his chest. Immediately she curled it under his arm–their height discrepancy was noticeable at the very least–and let him hold her, wrapped her own arms around his torso and clutched him tightly, as though she were desperate.
And she was. In all honesty, she was. She might have been a Seer, but she had no idea what the future held for her, for Ollo, for them. All she knew was this moment, and how she felt in this moment. Before she realized what she was doing, she took a breath, tilted her chin up, looked into Ollo’s eyes, and said, “I love you.”
It wasn’t the first time she had told him that, but for some reason, the words held more weight this time around. There was a significance to it that wasn’t there before. And when she said them, she wasn’t nervous or hesitant, she wasn’t scared or worried. She stated it for what it was: a simple fact that was important for Ollo to hear, regardless of his own feelings and his own opinion on the matter.
Ollo continued to caress Reese’s hair, wrapping the locks around his fingers before letting them go once again, and repeating the motion over and over. There was something there, something in his eyes, and Reese knew, she knew he felt the same way. He even opened his mouth in order to respond – maybe to tell her the same thing, which she had yet to hear from him. And God, she wanted that. She didn’t need it, didn’t say she loved him in order to hear it back, but she wanted it more than she realized.
“Darl, relax.”
Well.
That response was unexpected.
She felt tears accumulate in her eyes but she quickly blinked them away, hoping he wouldn’t see. He didn’t have to tell her he loved her, but did he really need to tell her to relax? That was the worst thing anyone could say to a girl, especially one that had just confessed her feelings for him. Again.
“Sometimes, I think you think too much.” He took his hand and pushed the hair from her face, even though it had already been pulled up into a high ponytail. “You’re telling me this because–”
“Because it’s the truth,” she felt herself respond. “Because I do love you. And I wanted to say it.”
“But why now? You think something is going to happen to you tonight? That maybe something might happen to me tonight? You can’t think about things like this or you’ll lose your focus, and if you lose your focus, something will happen to you. We can discuss this when you get back tonight, but for now, I…” He stopped playing with her hair in order to run his hand through his as far as he could go before the bun prevented him from pushing further. “I can’t respond. Not in the way you want me to, at least.”
“Can’t, or won’t?” Reese hated the fact that her voice came out shaky. She didn’t want Ollo to see her this way; disappointed, rejected, and heartbroken. He was the last person she thought could ever make her feel this way, but now look at her.
And he didn’t want her to lose focus tonight? Couldn’t he have phrased everything a little less harsh, then?
“Reese, I don’t think now is the most appropriate time to discuss something as weighty as your feelings for me,” he told her.
He said her name. Which only meant that he was being honest. He didn’t want to talk about this. Not now. Maybe not ever. Maybe she had completely read the signs all wrong and he didn’t feel much of anything for her. Yes, he liked to connect to her in a physical way, and he made her feel special, a way no one had ever made her feel before. Was it all a lie? Maybe he just needed to lose himself in her to forget about his own problems the same way she had needed him. Except, she loved him. There was more to it than just that physica
l connection, at least for her.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she decided, flashing her grey eyes up at him. “Not anymore.”
“Darl.”
She had stepped out of his embrace, and he went to reach for her, to touch her in some way, but she took a step back, avoiding him.
“You made your decision.” She was serious. Hurt, calm, and serious. “It’s fine.” At that moment, her phone rang. She never appreciated an interruption the way she did in that moment. “I have to go.”
She headed out the door as she answered her phone, and though it took everything in her, she did not look back.
“Reese, it’s Beverly,” the voice on the other end greeted. “I hope I didn’t catch you at a bad time.”
“Oh no, not at all,” Reese replied as she slid into her Benz. “I’m just leaving. Is everything all right?”
“That’s why I’m calling, dear. Jack wanted me to tell you to meet him at his place. Something’s come up. Something important, and it’s caused a change in plans.”
Reese started the car and nodded her head. “I’ll be there soon.”
When she hung up the phone, she immediately threw her thoughts into what happened to cause Jack to completely change his plans for the evening. It wasn’t like him to sacrifice a night of guarding Onyx, unless it was important. She hoped everything was okay, and pressed the gas pedal a little harder.
As selfish as it sounded, she was just grateful it offered her a welcome distraction from thinking about what had happened with Ollo and how everything between them had come undone.
Jack answered the door himself, which surprised Reese, but even more than that, he was not dressed as Black Wing. He was Jack Phillip, and he looked like shit. His brown hair was messy, he still wore a suit–she assumed it was the same one he wore to work that day–and his eyes were tired and dark. His face was pale, not sickly, but not vibrant the way it normally was.
The Dark Paradise Trilogy Box Set Page 84
