Chapter Twenty-One

Jesse

I turned to see Charlotte running toward me, her phone in her hand. It looked like it was off, but did it really matter? Not after what I just heard. It was clear I wasn’t really in the running here. Not by any real stretch of the imagination.

“Jesse, wait, don’t go,” she said.

“Why?” I asked. “Why would I stay? How in the world could I compete with that?”

“What are you talking about?”

I groaned, looking to the sky for some form of strength and finding none.

“Look, just go to Paris with your boyfriend. Forget I exist.”

Charlotte’s eyes widened, and she took a step closer to me, one hand rising to land on my chest. Her touch was like a sledgehammer to my will, but I had to stay upright. I had to keep strong.

“I don’t want him. I want you,” she said.

I searched her eyes and found nothing there but honesty. At least she thought she was being honest. But how could she be? I was just some moron cowboy singer, who often ended up in jail and had crazy ex-girlfriends who were trying to ruin me. This Graham guy wanted to fly her to Paris. Tonight. For some event. It was like comparing a prince in a Disney movie to some schmuck who bagged groceries. It wasn’t even comparable.

“This Graham guy,” I said, “he’s your boss?”

“Sort of, yes,” she said.

“And his last name is the same as the hotel chain?”

“Yes,” she said. “Where are you going with this?”

“So he’s probably, like, what? A billionaire?”

“I… I don’t know. I’ve never talked to him about money.”

“Because you never had to,” I said. “Because there will never be a moment that he can’t afford something. He can afford to jet off to Paris and send you a plane later just to accompany him at some event. Don’t you see how ridiculously different that is from the life you’d have with me? Just look at where my life is right now, Charlotte. Being beat up by cops, thrown in jail, have a woman chasing me swearing I owe her child support, and trying to become a rock star in my thirties. I’m pathetic. Go be with your boyfriend and stop letting me ruin your life.”

“Jesse, please.”

“I am a fuck-up, Charlotte. I always have been. If it weren’t for my brothers, I’d be in prison or dead. This guy… he’s older than you. He’s in the same business as you. You have things in common, and he could give you a stable life. A life with me is not stable. It’s chaos. Always chaos. I know what my life is like because I live it, and no one should have to be part of it that doesn’t have to.

“Just go to Paris with him. Live your life. Be happy. Don’t complicate everything by being with me.”

“I want to complicate my life with you,” she said through gritted teeth and tears that welled up in her gorgeous almond eyes. “I have wanted you since the first time we talked. I have wanted you even when I thought I was the other woman. Even when I thought you ditched me in Oklahoma. I have always wanted you, Jesse James Galloway, and no one else. Why won’t you let me love you?”

For a moment, I didn’t know what to say. Neither of us had said that word yet, and while it wasn’t direct, it was there. We both seemed to recognize the significance of it, and it broke down a wall between us. At the same time, it raised the stakes, and the only way to get her to go and do what she knew she should would be to say something that I couldn’t take back.

“Just forget me,” I said.

“I could never forget you,” she said.

“Sure you could,” I said. “You did for eight years. Why not now?”

She gasped and stepped back, her face a mask of anger and pain. I felt awful saying it, and immediately regretted it. Why was I doing this? Why was I pushing her away so hard?

Because I loved her. That’s why. And I didn’t want her to have to deal with loving me back.

“Charlotte, I …” I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Now was the time for honesty. “I love you. I have always loved you. But because I love you, you need to go. Because I will hurt you. Just like I hurt everyone else in my life. I don’t make smart decisions. I don’t do the right thing. I act impulsively, and it comes around to bite my ass all the time. You don’t deserve that. You deserve the best the world could possibly give you.

“Graham can give you that. He can give you the world. All I can give you is struggle. Go be with him and leave me here. You have a plane to catch. You’ll miss it if you don’t get going.”

I took a step back, then another, then turned my back to her and walked away, gritting my teeth and trying to will the emotions away. If I focused on the anger in my chest, I couldn’t feel the sadness at the same time. At least that’s what I told myself.

But I couldn’t look back. This was the last time I was going to see her, and at least I was able to tell her how I felt. But she deserved so much better than me. She deserved to be happy. And with me, she never truly would be. I knew that about myself. I wasn’t worth that kind of love. I wasn’t worth the effort.

What I could do to make things better was to take the bullet for my family and get even with the Andersons. And if someone went down for it, it would be me. That was my role. The sacrificial one. I didn’t have anything else to give.