Unwrapping the Best Man

I stare at the floor, my hand pressed against the closed door to my apartment, unable to go in. Unable to face what awaits me on the other side.

Caitlin. The woman I love and...and abused. My lungs contract, air rushing out of me as the pain winds me so completely.

Eliza is in my head—her words, her brutal truth—and I can’t shake her out of it. She only confirmed everything I already knew. Everything that tells me I have to end this now. Before I go further. Before I break her, like Eliza broke me.

And so I’ve stalled.

It’s late—one a.m. late. I’ve been gone hours. I’ve been setting things in motion for the business, finding out through my own channels what Eliza hinted at with regards to Berlin and Madrid. It seems her marriage problems extend to their business and their investors are getting nervous. It’s an opportunity. A chance to swoop in and take over, really make Blacks global, and the ultimate revenge for what she—what they—did.

The calls could have waited though. Eliza and Damien, the club expansion, it all could have waited. I just didn’t want to face Cait. The end that has to happen.

I straighten up, square my shoulders and harden my heart.

You’re doing it for her...

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

THE CLICK OF the door closing rouses me and I push up to sitting on the sofa, my eyes bleary in the low light of the room. ‘Jackson?’

‘Yeah...it’s me.’

His voice is rough, raw, and I brush the hair away from my eyes to make out his presence in the darkened hallway. I hear his keys hit the dish beside the door. My head’s all foggy with sleep and I rub my eyes. I must have been asleep a while.

Was he really with her all this time?

My stomach writhes and I pull the sleeves of my jumper into my palms and bring my knees up to my chest, clutching them to me. I’ve long since changed out of my costume and into the comfies I packed for tomorrow. I’m so glad of it now.

‘What time is it?’

‘Late.’

No shit. I know that much.

He’s slow to approach and the closer he gets the more I can see. His eyes are bloodshot, his hair is crazed—I swallow, please let it be by his own hand.

The thought zips through me, waking up my brain, clearing the fuzz.

‘Has she only just gone?’ I feel sick even as the words leave my lips.

He tosses his jacket on the sofa and heads to his bar. He doesn’t even look at me. The move speaks volumes. The silence between us stretches, heavy and thick, broken only by the clink of crystal on glass, the release of the stopper in his whisky bottle and the slosh of liquid as he pours.

He knocks back a mouthful, his face, what I can see of it, is drawn tight, grim.

‘Jackson?’

He flicks me the briefest of looks, chucks back another swig and heads to the wall of glass, as far away from me as he can. I shiver, the chilling dread building out of my control, and I press my chin into my knees until it hurts.

‘She left just after you.’

Hope flickers and my head snaps up. ‘Then...where have you been?’

He angles his head to the side so I can make out his profile, but his eyes don’t reach me. ‘Taking care of business.’

‘Business?’ I frown. ‘What kind of business?’

‘She brought something to my attention...something that could benefit Blacks.’ He looks back to the glass. ‘I’ve been making calls, putting wheels in motion, it’s going to take me abroad for a while.’

He sounds...clinical. I’ve never heard his voice so soulless; it takes me another second for his words to actually register and then: abroad? Eliza? Business?