Always Will: A Bad Boy Romance Read online

  I take a breath. I suppose I might as well be honest. “He ended it with me last week.”

  Sarah lets out a heavy sigh and pinches the bridge of her nose. “That asshole.”

  I raise my eyebrows. “That’s not the reaction I would expect from you.”

  “You think I’d take his side?” she asks. “I’ve been his friend for a long time, so he does deserve some loyalty. But this is just him being stupid.”

  “I don’t think it’s stupidity.”

  “Call it what you want, he’s being an idiot,” she says. “Do you mind if I ask what happened?”

  I lean back in my chair. “He told me he crossed a line with me and he shouldn’t have. That he can’t be the man I need.”

  “He said that out of nowhere?” she asks.

  “Well, not exactly.” I tell her about the skydiving trip.

  She nods her head slowly for a moment. “Things are starting to make sense.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Did he ever tell you about his accident?” she asks. “The one that happened when he was in college?”

  “Not really,” I say.

  “He’s probably going to fire me for telling you this, but you deserve to know,” she says. “In college, Ronan dated my roommate, Chelsea. I was dating this guy named Mike, and the four of us became good friends. Mike and Ronan were both kind of crazy and loved outdoor sports, so we did a lot of stuff on the weekends—hiking, rock climbing, that sort of thing. Nothing like what Ronan does now, of course. Anyway, we had a climbing trip planned. Ronan and Mike scoped out a location out in the middle of nowhere. We were excited, because our usual climbing spots were getting really busy. At the last minute, I had to cancel because my mom had to go to the hospital, but I insisted the rest of them go. I told them they could find out if the location was any good, and we’d all go the following weekend.”

  Sarah takes a deep breath and re-crosses her legs. “They left early in the morning, and the route was up this mountainside on a road that was barely a road. I don’t know why they swerved. Ronan wasn’t driving, and he always said he didn’t see. But they ran off the road, and there wasn’t anything on the side. It was literally a cliff. The car rolled all the way to the bottom.”

  “Oh my god.”

  “Yeah, it was bad,” she says. “Mike never regained consciousness. Ronan tried to revive him and when he couldn’t, he did his best to keep him hydrated while he waited for help. Chelsea was awake for a while, but they determined later she was bleeding internally. There was nothing Ronan could have done. He had a broken arm, and cuts and bruises all over. Even with climbing gear, he couldn’t get back up to the road. Not that it would have mattered. There wasn’t any other traffic. They were too far out.”

  “Chelsea didn’t make it?” I ask quietly.

  “No,” she says. “I don’t know how long she lasted, but I’m pretty sure he stayed with her for a long time after she was gone. Eventually, he figured he had to move or he was going to die, too. I was at my folks’ until well into the following week, and it wasn’t until Tuesday that anyone even knew they were missing. We got a search party going, but I only had a vague idea of where they went. There was so much ground to cover.”

  “How did they find him?” I ask.

  “A trucker picked him up on the side of the road, and called 911,” she says. “He walked thirty miles in two days to find a highway with traffic. He was dehydrated, sleep deprived, and injured, but he was alive.”

  Sarah pauses and takes a deep breath. “He was never the same. He was always pretty adventurous, but after that, he started taking bigger and bigger risks. Rock climbing turned into cliff diving, which turned into skydiving, and BASE jumping, and who knows what else. His family was afraid he was trying to kill himself, but he always insisted he wasn’t. He pushes himself in every aspect of his life. He takes risks no one else will take, and he does it without flinching. When he took over Edge, everyone thought he was nuts. Same with buying VI. But he does that. He doesn’t see the world the way most people do anymore. If he’s not tackling some new challenge, he isn’t really living.”

  Ronan makes a lot more sense now that I know what he’s been through—but Sarah’s story also confirms everything I thought about why he left me. “And I was a challenge. I was hard to get, and he couldn’t resist trying.”

  Sarah’s eyebrows draw together. She looks uncomfortable. “I know that’s how it seems.”

  “Are you really going to tell me that isn’t what happened?” I ask. “Did Ronan tell you everything about me? How we spent a night together before he moved to San Francisco? How as soon as he saw I worked for him here, he started pursuing me? How he pushed against all my boundaries, found loopholes in the rules I set for working together? He wanted me because I told him no.”

  “If you were any other woman, I’d have to grudgingly agree with you,” she says.

  “What does that mean?”

  “I’ve known Ronan for a long time,” she says. “I’m well aware of how he is with women. And it’s nothing like how he was with you.”

  I shake my head. “That’s what we always want to believe, isn’t it? That we’re the special one? With everyone else, he’s a player who gets what he wants and moves on. But with me? Oh, I’ll be different. Do you know how many times I’ve told myself that? How many men have screwed me over because I bought their bullshit? Ronan is not the first. But he’s certainly going to be the last.”

  Sarah takes another deep breath. “I’m sorry, Selene. I really didn’t mean to stick my nose in your business. He’s just … he’s not okay. But now at least I know why.”

  My heart aches at the thought of him hurting, and I’m angry at myself for caring. He should be hurt. He crushed me. It would be worse to hear he was happy, wouldn’t it? At least maybe I can believe he misses me.

  No, I don’t want to believe that. I’ve been naive for too long.

  “He’s probably just stressed about landing this contract,” I say. “We’re all working too much lately.”

  “I suppose,” Sarah says. “Can I ask you one more question? You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to, and regardless of what you say, this is confidential. I won’t tell him.”

  “Sure.”

  “Are you going to quit?”

  I look away. “Honestly, I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

  “Well, for what it’s worth, I hope you don’t,” she says. “But I’ll understand if you do.”

  “Thanks, Sarah.”

  She smiles and leaves.

  I wonder what she meant when she said Ronan isn’t okay. Does he regret what he said to me? Or is he just working too hard?

  I’m tempted to go talk to him. I’m hurt and angry, but I can’t help that I still care about him. I glance at the clock. It’s after five, but I’m sure he’s still here.

  I grab my things, but I head for the elevator. He made himself clear. I can’t indulge in any stupid fantasies about him changing his mind at the sight of me in his office. It’s been a week. If he had any doubts about what he said to me, I’m sure he would have told me by now.

  28: Ronan

  There’s a knock at my door and I look up from the paperwork I’ve been perusing. Damon sticks his head through the crack. Fuck, I forgot he was coming.

  “Hey, brother,” he says.

  I lean back in my seat and rub my temples. This fucking headache will not go away. “Damon.”

  He raises an eyebrow at me and comes in, shutting the door behind him. He’s dressed in a faded green t-shirt and jeans. “Sarah said I could just come in. Am I interrupting?”

  “I’m just working.”

  “Right,” Damon says. He takes a seat across the desk. “You forgot I was coming, didn’t you?”

  The bullshit line I’m about to give him fades before I say it, and I decide to be honest. “Yeah, I forgot.”

  “I figured you would,” he says.

  I narrow my eyes at him. “
What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Nothing,” he says. “You’re busy and I know how you get caught up with work.”

  I take a deep breath. I don’t need to be an asshole to my brother. He’s a decent guy, and he’s always had my back when it counted. “Sorry, Damon. Things have just been kind of fucked for me lately. I have you on my calendar, but I wasn’t expecting to see you until tonight.”

  “Yeah, I took an earlier flight,” he says. “I’m the dick for showing up early.”

  “No, it’s fine,” I say.

  Damon rubs his smooth jaw. “So, there’s something I need to talk to you about, and I sort of want to get it over with.”

  “What?”

  “Something happened, and I think you’re going to be pissed,” he says.

  The tension in his voice makes my back clench. “What happened?”

  “Mom has breast cancer.”

  The words drop onto me like a boulder. “Cancer? What the fuck? When?”

  “She found out a little over a month ago,” he says.

  I almost fly out of my chair. “A month? Are you fucking kidding me? Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

  “Slow down,” he says. His tone is infuriating. “They didn’t want to tell you until they knew for sure what was going on. They … well, they know how you handle this kind of thing.”

  “What the fuck does that mean?”

  Damon sighs. “They were worried you’d flip out and go dive off the Golden Gate bridge or something.”

  “You can’t jump off the Golden Gate,” I say.

  “See, the fact that you know that is part of the problem,” he says. “They didn’t want you to go do something stupid.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Come on, Ronan,” he says. “Remember when Dad had that scare a couple years ago? When we thought it might be his heart? What did you do?”

  I pause, thinking back. “I went BASE jumping in Nevada.”

  “Exactly,” he says. “And you almost fucking died that trip. Mom has enough to deal with right now without worrying that you’ll try to kill yourself.”

  “I’m not trying to kill myself,” I say.

  “Could have fooled the rest of us.”

  I get a grip on my anger with a deep breath. “How is she? What’s the prognosis?”

  “She’s fine,” he says. “They caught it very early, and it’s not aggressive. She had a lumpectomy two weeks ago, and the surgeon was really happy. She starts radiation in a few weeks, but really, that’s more of a precaution than anything. She’s going to recover.”

  “I can’t believe they didn’t tell me.”

  “Well, I’m telling you now,” he says. “Call her. Talk to her. She misses you.”

  I’m overdue for a visit to my folks. “I’ll go. I don’t know when I can get away, but I’ll get down there as soon as I can.”

  “Good,” Damon says. “Honestly, you don’t need to worry about her. She feels great, and there’s every indication she’ll make a complete recovery.”

  I nod. “Good.”

  “So what’s the plan for tonight? Do I get to meet this mysterious girlfriend of yours?”

  That word is a stab to my gut, and my voice goes icy cold. “She’s not my girlfriend.”

  “Sorry, last time we talked, you said—”

  “She’s not.”

  Damon takes a deep breath. “I know it’s usually a bad idea to poke a wounded animal, but what happened?”

  There was a time when I might have talked to Damon about this. He knew all about Chelsea. I even talked to him about how I felt afterward. He helped get me through one of the worst experiences of my life. “Things just got really intense.”

  “How so?”

  “You know what? It’s nothing. I made a mistake with her. And I’ve been so fucking buried with this meeting we have coming up. When it’s over, I need to get out of town for a while. Blow off some steam.”

  “Right, blow off steam.”

  “Do you actually wonder why I don’t come around?” I ask, unable to mask the irritation in my voice. “I get the same thing from you every time. From Mom and Dad, too. Stop with the passive-aggressive bullshit. I know none of you approve of me—but none of you understand me, either.”

  “I understand you a lot better than you realize,” Damon says.

  I shake my head. “I don’t need you to come here and psychoanalyze me.”

  “Actually, I think you do,” he says. “I didn’t come up here intending to bust your balls, but I think I’m overdue. I haven’t been much of a brother to you all these years, and I’m sorry for that. But every time life gets hard, you can’t go dive out of a goddamn airplane or whatever it is you do.”

  “It’s not about life getting hard,” I say.

  “Then what is it about?” he asks. “What is it that makes you do all that stupid shit? Mom thinks you have a death wish. She’s convinced it’s survivor’s guilt and you’re trying to tempt fate or something.”

  “I’m not trying to die,” I say. “This is what I mean. You look at me and you think you understand what I went through, or what it did to me. No one does.”

  “Then enlighten me,” he says. “What’s it like to be you? Why do you take such stupid fucking risks with your life?”

  “Because that’s the only time I feel alive,” I say. “Right now, sitting here? I’m half dead. I don’t feel much of anything. I don’t jump off cliffs or out of airplanes, or climb rock faces, because I want to kill myself. I do it so I can stay alive.”

  Damon gapes at me for a long moment. “You’re a fucking mess. You know that, right? The only way you’re ever going to get better is if you find something to make you feel alive that isn’t going to kill you.”

  “What did you say?” I ask.

  “Which part?”

  I put a hand to my chin and look away.

  Something that makes me feel alive, and won’t kill me.

  I had it. That’s exactly what she was.

  “What?” Damon asks.

  “No, it’s nothing,” I say.

  “Fuck that,” Damon says, his voice sharp. “I’m sick of sitting on the sidelines watching you self-destruct.”

  “Self-destruct?” I ask. “Look around you. This company is mine. I bought it because I had a vision that no one else had the guts to pull off. And I’m right on the brink, Damon. I’m one presentation away from making this happen.”

  “I know you’re successful,” Damon says. “I’m sure you have more money than you know what to do with, although you probably risked it all to buy this company.”

  I tip my head. He’s right about that. I did risk it all.

  “But here’s the thing, Ronan,” he says. “No risk is ever going to be enough for you. You can keep betting it all and hoping you come out on top, but one of these days, you’re going to be fucked.”

  “Is that your professional opinion?”

  “Don’t be an ass,” he says. “It’s the truth. I know you hate it when I do this, and I’ve always backed off. Just … tell me one more thing.”

  “What?”

  “What was that a second ago?” he asks. “I said something about feeling alive, and your face changed. What went through your mind?”

  I’m not one of his goddamn patients. But he struck a nerve, and I’m compelled to tell him. “Her name is Selene.”

  “Tell me about her.” He settles back in his chair and I can imagine him sitting in his office, talking to his patients in the same, soothing voice.

  “She works for me,” I say. “She’s amazing at her job—smart, passionate, driven. She’s one of those women that makes every man stare.”

  “And you were in a relationship with Selene?” he asks.

  I pinch the bridge of my nose. Fuck this headache. “Yes.”

  “That’s past tense,” he says. “You’re not with her now.”

  “No.”

  “Can you tell me what happened?”
r />   For reasons I can’t fathom, I tell him everything. How I pursued Selene relentlessly. How she made me feel. I tell him about taking her skydiving, and her chute failing. About how it made me realize I had to end it with her, even though now I feel so dead inside I’m not sure why I’m even here.

  Damon doesn’t say anything for a long moment, and I start to regret telling him. He’s probably diagnosing me right now.

  “Chelsea wasn’t your fault,” he says finally. His voice is quiet.

  “Excuse me?”

  “What happened to Chelsea wasn’t your fault,” he says. “I don’t think you realize that. I think you’re carrying the responsibility for her death on your shoulders. You need to let it go.”

  “I wasn’t talking about her,” I say.

  “No, but that’s where this comes from,” he says. “You just admitted to me that you fell in love for the first time since Chelsea, but you broke up with her. Why do you think you did that?”

  “Because she deserves better. If I stay with her, everything in her life would be wrapped up in me. Her career. Her happiness. Her fucking life. I’m never scared for myself when something goes wrong out there. But I was scared shitless for her.”

  “But that’s a completely normal reaction to a person you love being in danger,” he says.

  “It isn’t about the jump,” I say.

  “No, I know it isn’t. It’s about realizing that someone trusted you deeply, and being afraid that you aren’t worthy of that trust.”

  I want to argue with Damon, but he’s making a little too much sense.

  “She’s going to quit,” I say.

  “That bothers you as much as anything, doesn’t it?”

  “Yes,” I say. “This is where she belongs. The company won’t be the same without her.”

  “Neither will you.”

  I look away. He’s right. I’m not the same. Selene cut through me, to my core. She found a part of me I thought was dead. I thought it died the day Chelsea did, at the bottom of that cliff. But whether or not Selene is good for me isn’t the point. I can take risks with my own life, but how can I take them with hers?