Page 80 of Miss Matched

“No.” I cross my arms over my chest in an effort to shield myself from this moment.

Zac steps back, pacing the room and avoiding my eyes.

“As if a sex club smear campaign wasn’t bad enough. Now I look like a cheating, scheming bastard,” he says, throwing his phone into a nearby chair, and it makes me jump. “The board is already making threats. Samson, the dick, is gloating, and I won’t be surprised if they’ve already scheduled a vote to force me to step down.”

Of course that’s what he’s worried about. His business, his reputation. As if my company is an insignificant sacrifice to him because I don’t have billions of dollars in my back pocket to salvage the fallout from this, or the penthouse in the sky to hide in until people stop talking about us.

It’s all about him. His liability.

His true colors strike the canvas of this moment in front of me.

“This”—he waves his arm between us—“was supposed to be damage control, not a bigger problem.”

“This wasn’t supposed to be anything,” I snap back at him. “You were the one who pushed for more, no matter how much I warned you. I was doing my job.”

“And now I’m doing mine. I can’t lose everything I’ve worked for over a woman,” Zac says.

My eyes widen, and for a second Zac’s expression softens, but it’s too late.

“If you think for a second that you can throw everything we’ve done back at me like it’s my fault, then fuck you.” My blood heats. “You’re not the only one who is going to have to clean up this mess. Do you have any idea how this makes my company look—how it makes me look—to my clients?”

Zac pinches the bridge of his nose. “I can’t do this right now.” He throws his arms out, grounding us both back in place.

We’re fighting in the waiting room of a hospital where his dad is fighting to pull through.

A sick part of me wants to stop this. To wrap my arms around him until he stops trying to pour his pain into my heart. To hold him through this hurricane and see if we can survive standing in the middle as it rages around us. But the piece of me that’s breaking in my chest is overwhelming.

If this is a glimpse of what love feels like, I don’t want it.

“I’ll go,” I say, knowing my presence is only making things worse and that I shouldn’t have come here in the first place.

I was wrong to think being here for him would help, even if wrong started long before I walked through these hospital doors. Wrong weaved back to when I first agreed to help him. Wrong was thinking for a split second I could give him my heart and he wouldn’t break it.

I spin before my expression gives me away.

“This is over,” he says under his breath. And even through my rage it feels like a knife to the gut.

Twisting.

“Obviously,” I say, hoping my voice is strong enough to get me out of this room with dignity. “I’ll have Racine send over the paperwork to terminate the contract.”

He doesn’t respond, or I don’t let him. I’m out the door so fast he doesn’t have a chance. I keep my head down as I push my way out of the hospital, trying to swallow what feels like glass shattering inside me.

I’ve always known Zac and I were playing a dangerous game of Jenga—one wrong move, and the whole tower would tumble. I just never anticipated the move to be his.

The second I’m outside, I’m thrust into a downpour of rain as if the earth senses my world fracturing.

The sky is split open, weeping. But I don’t run for cover. Instead, I stand and let the rainwater hide the one thing I swore I’d never do.

I cry for a man.

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