Page 42 of Don't Regret Me
“Where are you going?” Jasmine tried to pull her back.
She yanked her arm away. “Just be ready to leave Friday.” She’d already planned on taking the kids to the lake house, but now there was a greater purpose.
Grabbing her purse, she walked out into the rain to get to her car. If Nick thought their conversation was over, he was sorely mistaken.
She’d tried part of the truth, but there was no more room for half-truths and lies, no more room for secrets. They were a love story that deserved an ending. Any kind of ending. Tragic, happy. He couldn’t walk away until he gave her that.
19
NICK
“What are you doing here?” The moment Nick opened the door to his hotel room at the Beach Club, he wanted to turn right around. Because he wasn’t alone.
Sherrie sat on the corner of the king-sized bed. He wasn’t sure how she got in, but his mind went blank as all he could do was stare at the sleeping bundle in her arms. Stephanie.
Smiling down at the baby, Sherrie’s voice sounded almost sweet. “We wanted to see you. Is that so wrong?”
He tore his eyes away from the kid, kicked his shoes off, and walked toward the bathroom.
“Yes, it is.” He wasn’t in the mood for dealing with her manipulations, the way she’d twist this entire situation to prove he was exactly the person she’d been telling him he was for the last year.
Shutting the bathroom door, he drew in a breath and pulled out his phone, pausing when he realized he’d been about to text Liz. The moment he needed to talk to someone, she came to mind, almost like he needed her to rescue him.
Maybe that was what she’d been doing for weeks now.
But that life raft was gone. He’d punctured the rubber himself. Deliberately and cruelly. It was the only way he knew how to make sure he sank while she stayed on the door. She’d forget her Jack one day. Enough with theTitanicreferences.
“What am I doing?” he groaned, leaning against the wall next to the shower. His gaze lifted to the mirror, taking in his tired eyes, the weary droop of his shoulders.
It wasn’t a new feeling for him. In fact, it had been pretty common since Stephen’s death. Except recently. Except with her. Liz breathed a life into him he hadn’t realized he was missing. They’d hardly spent time together, and still, just the thought of her made him think he could handle anything in his life. An addiction he didn’t remember. A soon-to-be ex-wife waiting for him to come crawling back to her. A baby he’d loved for so long before she was born, one he still loved, who wasn’t his.
Not to mention a career in shambles.
Yet, the only thing he cared about was that he’d lost her. No, lost was the wrong word. It implied an unpredictable nature, and he’d always predicted he would mess up. It also conjured up this idea of a lack of will. He hadn’t misplaced Liz, hadn’t been driven apart from her by a circumstance out of his control. It was a choice. Probably one that would always haunt him, but a choice all the same.
Someone knocked lightly on the door.
“You okay in there, babe?” Sherrie asked. The sounds of a waking baby drowned out her next words. Crying surrounded him, and he couldn’t take it. Was she okay? Was Sherrie doing something to comfort her?
He shoved open the bathroom door and found Sherrie examining her nails as she leaned against the wall next to the TV cabinet. Stephanie lay in the center of the bed, her body struggling and squirming as she tried to free herself of the blanket she was wrapped in.
“It’s like a thousand degrees in here.” He scowled as he passed Sherrie. “She shouldn’t be so bundled up.” Without thinking, he unwound the blanket and lifted the sweaty girl into his arms, cradling her against his chest as he’d imagined himself doing so many times before. He stared down into her wide eyes, and she stopped crying, peering up at him like she somehow knew who he was.
Her mouth opened and closed, but no sounds escaped. He couldn’t speak, could hardly breathe. He’d wanted to feel nothing, for there not to be a single drop of yearning left for everything he’d lost. Not Sherrie. He didn’t regret leaving her. But he couldn’t hold Stephanie and not want to know her, the kid who carried his brother’s name.
“Why did you do it?” he asked, needing to know. “Why give her that name?”
Sherrie’s confidence dropped for only a second before she straightened. “Because he meant a lot to you.”
That was a lie. He knew it the moment the words left her lips. He didn’t speak of Stephen to anyone, let alone this woman. Even right after they were married, he’d never trusted her enough to share that pain.
“For once in your life, Sher, can you tell me the honest truth?” He was tired of anger, tired of defeat. All he wanted was to go back to the life of solitude he’d enjoyed at the rehab center. One where he didn’t have to face his own feelings. His thoughts could quiet; he could be calm.
Stephanie made a sound that was a cross between a hiccup and a cough. Nick’s grip on her tightened, his heart seizing inside his chest.
Sherrie walked forward and dropped onto the edge of the bed. “You want the truth? Do you really? Because for years, you’ve wanted to lie to the entire world, to pretend you loved me. I don’t regret our decisions, Nick. They helped my career. But being left by Nick Jacobs doesn’t exactly do wonders for my reputation.” She pushed a hand through her hair. “There were rumors of the divorce before you asked me for one.”
Rumors? Nick tried to imagine what she was talking about, but that entire time was gone from his memory.
