The Wrong Kind of Love

I stand at the storm door, staring across the pines at the setting sun. She’ll hate me, and that’s just fine.

I push back from the door when I hear footsteps come down the hall. Tor moves around me without even looking at me. I have an innate urge to take hold of her, to kiss her, to tell her I fucking love her, but I swallow it back. I force it down into the depths of my blackened soul and hope, with time, the idea of love will suffocate.

When Caleb reaches for the door, I grab him. “You watch her go through security, do you hear me? You stand there until it fucking takes off.”

He nods, then slips through the door and wraps an arm around Tor as he leads her down the stairs. I wanted to be the one who took her, but me being a heartless bastard is one way to make it easier for her to let me go.

Caleb shakes his head as he opens the driver’s side door. The pressure in my chest builds. Just stop them. Go get her. My fingers pull into fists. It would be selfish to stop her. She doesn’t fucking belong with me.

The headlights come on and Caleb backs out of the drive. I slam my palm against the glass pane before heading to my office. I just let her leave, hurt and destroyed. I sit and replay the way she looked like I’d broken everything inside her when I told her to leave for the next hour, telling myself it is for the best when Caleb texts me to tell me she’s gone.

Gone. And my house has never felt so empty.

I lean back in my office chair, dragging a hand down my face and ignoring the phone when it rings. I’m can be fucked to take bets right now.

The machine picks up just as I reach for the whiskey to pour myself a drink. “You fucked up, Jude.” A thick yankee accent comes over the line. “And now I’m going to fuck her up, just like I fucked up your whore of a mother.”

Tor

The drive to the airport is silent. I feel broken, every fiber of my being begging me to go back to that house, but there’s no more awaiting me there than in New Zealand. Jude doesn’t want me. He never did. Only a fool falls in love with the devil.

Every once in a while, I catch Caleb wipe away a tear, and I ask myself why the hell I couldn’t have fallen for the good brother. But Caleb has become like the little brother I never had. I’ll miss him almost as much as that asshole.

I try to hate Jude, to shutter my heart against the thought of him, but heartbreak has no defense once the damage is done. It’s a wound that eventually heals but always leaves a scar, and I know Jude’s will be an ugly gash I will forever wear on my sleeve.

By the time Caleb parks in the deck, I’m numb. He takes my bag and shoulders it, placing an arm around me as he escorts me inside the airport.

“He loves you…”

Tears sting my eyes but I fight them back. Why couldn’t I have fallen for Caleb instead of Jude? “I don’t think Jude is capable of love anymore, Caleb.” Maybe he’s just lost too much. Maybe he’s always been this way to anyone other than his family. Maybe I’m just a fool.

“I love you.”

I choke on a small sob and Caleb swipes my tears away. “I love you too. This hurts so much.”

“You’ll be okay, Ria. You’re one of the strongest people I’ve ever met.”

He stays with me as I check in and walks me to the point at security where he can go no farther. “I’ll miss you,” he says, throwing his arms around me and pulling me into a hard hug. His lips press to my forehead, and holds me like he’d never let go if only the world wasn’t determined to separate us.

He lets me go, and I hand my boarding pass and fake passport to the TSA agent. When I step through the turnstile, I know I’ll never see Caleb again.

When I look back, he’s gone, I’m all alone in the world.

I fiddle with the strap of my bag—Jude's bag—trying not to cry. I should be rejoicing in my freedom, but I can’t because it feels as though there is no freedom in a world without Jude.

I maneuver through the boarding gate and almost run into the man in a dark blue uniform now blocking my path. "Ma’am, can you please come with me?"

My heart drops to my stomach. They know the passport is fake. I'm going to go to jail, or worse, they'll find out who I really am. They'll find out I'm supposed to be dead, which will lead them to wonder why, when a body has already been found, am I now here trying to leave the country under a different name? I swallow around the lump in my throat. “Of course.”