Page 6 of The Heiress

“I miss you, too. I’m sorry Jace.”

“Fuck, don’t say shit like that today.”

Didn’t he understand Iwantedthe distraction? “Are you happy, Jace? Was it the right decision?” If he was happy then it didn’t matter what I thought as an idealistic (and naïve) eighteen-year-old.

“It was theonlydecision, Sam. You know that,” he growled, and that low rumble told me more than words ever could.

Jace should have gone to college with me. He was so, so smart, and kind and curious. He was destined for a higher education with a thirst for knowledge. He should be a professor. The hot-but-dorky kind who sported tweed jackets and worn jeans, but was still unmistakably sexy. He should have coeds waiting after class just for a chance to talk to him with hopes he’d be theirdirtyprofessor.

Instead he wore leather and rode a Harley and carried a gun. He was trapped in a life he didn’t choose.

“I was never mad at you,” I whispered.

“It sure felt like you were,” he chuckled, rubbing his jaw. “I had a bruise for a week to prove it.”

“You shouldn’t have taught me how to throw a punch.”

“Uh, yeah. I had to. You were a tiny little bookworm with your head in the clouds. You needed to know how to protect yourself when I wasn’t there.”

I had used the skills he taught me more than once in college. But I wasn’t going to tell him that. Jace had always been overprotective of me and even years later he’d be mad about it. No sense in upsetting him now. Not when I was snuggled against his chest and didn’t want to move.

“I wasn’t mad. I was sad. Disappointed.Angryyou felt like you had no choice but to follow Todd.” His stepdad was a real winner. I wanted Jace to get away from Todd more than anything else. “I was mad atTodd.”

He shook his head and kissed my temple. “I don’t want to talk about this right now.” He set me back on the bed and stood up, stretching as he moved to my window. He stared out for a long time, looking almost exactly the way I remembered him. Today he wore a blue dress shirt and dark grey slacks, his hair was clean and styled back from his face, he leaned forward on the windowsill and the sunlight washed away the years.

After our fight I went off to college while Jace became a prospect in Todd’s club. I dove into my studies and went to frat parties and football games. What did Jace do? Work for Todd and the club?

Did I want to know?

Our lives had split onto very different paths and I never thought we’d find a way back. Maybe it was grief and the shock of the letter, but seeing Jace again made me wonder if there was a way for a nerd and a biker to make a new friendship out of the ashes of our childhood.

I wanted to think that was what Jace was wondering too as he stood at my window, his knuckles turning white as he gripped the edges. He was so lost in thought, a million miles away. Then he shook his head and sighed. “You should lay down. You look exhausted.”

“I won’t sleep,” I replied automatically. “I haven’t slept since…”the morning I got the phone call.All the tension came flooding back into my body just thinking about trying to sleep. Or going back out into that crush of people. I was exhausted and needed to rest but my mind wouldn’t let me. Every time I stopped long enough to let sleep overwhelm me the questions came instead.

Why did they do it?Will I ever know?

Jace turned back with a frown. His eyes roamed over me, narrowed. “Will you let me lay with you? Maybe I can help you fall asleep. I won’t stay. Promise.”

That promise felt both wrong and right. Wrong because I didn’t want this rift to remain between us any longer, but right because he was essentially a stranger and, while I’d take his comfort now, it was weird to have him in my bed.

“I’m willing to give it a shot.”

It took some wiggling and position switching, but once I rested my head against his chest and his arm came around me, it was like a key fitting into a lock. Just right. Every muscle in my body went limp, suddenly feeling like weights were tied all over me, holding me down. I melted against his familiar safety and let the exhaustion sweep over me.

“Thank you for coming, Jace.”

“Wild horses couldn’t have kept me away.” He stroked my hair. “I’ll always be here for you, Sam. No matter what. We can go twenty years without speaking and I’ll still be here for you.”

I didn’t doubt his sincerity because I knew I’d do the same in a heartbeat. “I shouldn’t have stayed away,” I whispered.

His fingers faltered in my hair. “We have different paths to walk.”

“Doesn’t mean we can’t be friends.”

The rhythmic movement of his fingers against my scalp started up again and lulled me right to the edge of sleep. “We’ve always been friends, Sam. That never changed.”

But we’d changed. He was now a man I didn’t know. And I was a woman whose whole life was a lie. My past was in shambles and the future…well it was even more of a mystery.

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