Page 83 of Paging Dr. Summers

I tilted my head, trying to make sense of his words. How would the truth come between us?

“Brooke,” he whispered. “I love my wife; you know that. But what you don’t know is that I thought the best way to honor her was to perpetuate this perfect-couple persona we had created. A persona that got in the way sometimes.”

I placed my hand on top of his, letting him know I was there for him and that there was no judgment. Look at my crazy life—I was the last person who had any right to cast stones.

“How?” I asked.

“I was ready to start a family with Erica, and she promised me we would once we’d been married five years. You don’t know how much I looked forward to it. But as we approached that time, she admitted she wasn’t ready, and that she wasn’t sure she ever would be. She’d lied about wanting to have kids.”

I stilled for a moment, trying to process. That was a big lie.

“Of course, she didn’t use those words. She said something to the effect that she knew how important it was to me, and so she thought she could change for me, so she wasn’t really lying. But we both knew that she had. What hurt me most was that she didn’t feel like she could be honest with me. Like our relationship wasn’t strong enough to work through it.”

“I’m sure that hurt.” My heart ached for him.

“Like hell,” he admitted. “But when she died, I tried to brush it off, focus only on the good, because there was a lot of it. And I felt so damn guilty that our last words were angry, so to assuage that guilt, I did what I thought she would want me to do—keep up the persona. That workedfor a while and then ...” He paused and tugged on a strand of my hair. “You came crashing into my life.”

“You make that sound ominous,” I teased.

“At first it felt like that.”

I held up a finger. “Excuse me—should I be taking offense here?”

“Hold on. I promise I’m getting to the good part.” He grinned. “It’s the way you consumed me and how much I wanted you that felt so overwhelming.”

“Okay, I like that,” I said, reflecting his smile.

“Me too, except I wasn’t prepared for it. Especially because, in so many ways, you’re Erica’s opposite. That, combined with how Erica and I left things ... it caused a lot of guilt. I couldn’t have that coming between us. And believe me when I say I want nothing between us.” His voice dropped, and the way he said it—so dang sexily—sent a shiver down my spine.

“But you left,” I reminded him, trying to stay grounded before I got ahead of myself. It was easy to do with him. “And I saw you the night I slept in your bed. All you could do was stare at Erica’s photo.”

“First”—he smirked—“if you were sleeping, how would you know that? And you must have been sleeping, because if you were awake, you would know I spent most of the night looking at you.”

“Oh.” I nibbled on my lip. “You did?”

“Yes, but that doesn’t excuse me for leaving you. I apologize sincerely. If I thought for one second you’d believe I left because I didn’t want you, I wouldn’t have gone. I swear.” His hand tightened slightly on my knee, his gaze locking on to mine with an intensity that made it so I couldn’t breathe. “I left because something Maxwell said panicked me. It made me realize how much I wanted to have zero regrets with you.”

There was so much to unpack in his words, but I had to start with my least favorite. “What did Maxwell say to you? Did he try to warn you away from me? Tell you I’m not good enough for you? Just like my mom wasn’t good enough for him?” I spat.

“No.” Logan cupped my cheeks with his warm hands, calming me. “If anything, I honestly think he didn’t want me to hurt you the way he hurt your mom.”

“I can’t believe that.”

“That’s understandable. But either way, the last thing I want to do is hurt you. It’s why I went to go work things out with Erica. I knew I had to. Sooner rather than later.”

“A heads-up would have been nice.”

He pulled me closer to him, his forehead landing on mine, our breaths mingling together. “I should have told you exactly why I was leaving, but I wasn’t sure you wanted something past this summer, and I didn’t know if I would find the peace I was looking for, so I stayed quiet, thinking that my trip might all be for nothing.”

“I wish you would have told me the truth.”

“Believe me, I do too. I’m sorry, Brooke. Truly, I am.”

“Did you work out what you needed to?” I had to know.

“I did.” His lips brushed mine.

“And?” I asked, my heart pounding.

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