Chapter 12—Connor

I barged into Jessica’s office without knocking. “I need to talk to you.”

“Hi, Connor, come on in,” she said, without looking up from her desk.

“Jessica, I’m quitting.”

“What?” She jerked her head up to look at me. “Why? You can’t just walk in here and quit. We’re coming into the busiest time of the year. Plus, we’re in the middle of a major internal reconstruction. Travis and I are announcing it next week. You know that. I need you here.”

“I’m sorry, but there’s something I have to do.” I paced, my insides jittery.

“Is it your tooth again? I can have Travis call his dentist and get you in today.”

“It’s not my tooth.”

“Then what is so damn important that you’re willing to quit your job?” Her patience was gone, which wasn’t like her. She was normally very calm and collected, even when she was putting up with me.

I ran a hand through my hair. My nerves were shot. “I have to go to Indiana.”

Jessica stood, her palms pressing flat against her desk, a look of utter exasperation on her face. “I don’t know what’s going on with you, but you can’t quit on me, Connor. Why don’t you take a week off? Clear your head and then come back. I’ll have Madison and Craig take some more hours and I can—”

I sighed. “I’m not coming back, Jess. I’m sorry, but I have to do this.”

“Do what?” she shouted, scrutinizing me to the point it made me uncomfortable. “Oh. Okay, now I get it. This is about Vanessa, isn’t it?” A devious smile spread across her mouth.

My palms became sweaty, and I felt like vomiting. “What makes you think this is about Vanessa?” I asked, clearing my throat. It had everything to do with Vanessa. I missed her. I longed for her, and I was fed up with lying awake at night thinking about her.

“Cut the crap, little brother. I know all about you two.”

“You do?”

Jessica came around to the front of her desk, leaned her butt on it, and crossed her arms over her chest. “She told me about it the day she left.”

“She did?” I came in here with my mind made up. I was going to quit, fly to Indiana, and beg Vanessa to give me another chance. But now, listening to my sister, I was starting to second guess my master plan. “What did she say?”

“You should be ashamed of yourself, Connor.”

“What?” Why in the hell was she scolding me?

“Mom and I raised you better than that. What makes you think you can treat a woman like you’ve treated Vanessa?”

“Whoa,” I said, putting my hands up to stop her. “I don’t know what she told you, but—”

“She told me that you two spent a night together. That she told you she liked you, and you took off out of her house like it was on fire.”

“I made a mistake,” I muttered, desperate to make my sister understand what had happened that night. “I have to go to Indiana. I have to find her.”

“Don’t bother. She’s not there.”

My heart dropped to the floor. I slumped in the chair in front of Jessica’s desk and rubbed my hands over my face. I’d really blown it this time.

“I love you, baby brother, but you need to give Vanessa some space. She’s lost everything, Connor. Her company, her house, all of it.”

And the hits just kept on coming. “Why? What happened?”

“Her company lost several large clients, and she couldn’t recover. She was forced to file for bankruptcy.”

I buried my face in my hands and groaned. Why hadn’t she told me any of that? Maybe I could’ve helped her. Or at the very least let her know I was here for her. Shit. I should’ve told her that regardless.

“When I saw the way you hugged her, I was so sure you were going to say something to her, ask her to stay, anything. I can’t believe you just let her leave like that.”

“Damn it, Jess,” I shouted, standing. “I know I fucked up. It seems like no matter what I do, I fuck up where Vanessa’s concerned. I have to make things right. Do you know where she is?”

Jessica shrugged. “Why should I tell you?”

“You should tell me so I can tell her how sorry I am and beg her to forgive me.”

“Do you love her?”

I stood, anger pulsing through my veins. “It’s not fair for you to ask me that. Please, Jess, if you know where she is you have to tell me.” I did love Vanessa, but I wanted to tell her that, not my sister.

“Answer one question for me, and then I’ll tell you where she is.”

“Anything.”

“Why’d you run that night?”

Of course that would be the question she had to ask. “I panicked. I’ve…” I rubbed the back of my neck. “Look, Jess, you know I love you, but this is something I need to talk to Vanessa about, not you.”

“So talk to me then.”

I whipped around at the sound of her voice. There she was, standing behind me in Jessica’s doorway, arms loosely crossed over her chest, hair pulled back into a ponytail, and a look of ice in her blue eyes. “Vanessa? What’re you doing here?”

“Vanessa is the resort’s new accountant,” Jessica said, standing beside me. “I’ll give you two a few minutes. Don’t fuck up again, Connor,” she said as she left the room and closed the door. Something about the way she said that, and the look in her eyes had tension swirling in my gut.

I closed the gap between me and Vanessa, and I pulled her into my arms, slanted my mouth over hers, and kissed her. Vanessa was pliant in my arms as her tongue twisted and turned with mine. I tugged the hair tie and freed her hair, threading my fingers into the silky strands, holding her head still as the flames of desire ignited, burning us alive. It was like we hadn’t lost a single moment the past six weeks.

“Connor,” she said, pulling her lips from me and wiggling out of my arms. “Stop. I can’t think when you do that.”

I smiled. I knew the feeling.

“And we have to talk,” she said, putting some distance between us. “Three years ago, why did you run?”

I took a calming breath. It was the moment of truth. “I panicked, Vanessa. When you told me you’d had a crush on me, at first I thought I was dreaming, because believe me when I say I’d dreamt of you saying something like that to me.”

“If it was something you wanted to hear then it seems to me that your reaction wouldn’t have been so extreme.” I took a few steps toward her, and she backed away. “No,” she said. “I can’t be that close to you and have this conversation. You’re too damn distracting.”

I chuckled. Fair enough. Okay, Connor, time to stop being a pussy and tell her the truth. “I’ve loved you from the moment I met you, Vanessa, and I was terrified that I was going to say that exact thing to you that night.”

She cupped her hand over her mouth and gasped, tears pooling in her eyes. I forced myself to continue when all I really wanted to do was hold her.

“I had nothing to offer you back then. I was unemployed, living out of a suitcase, and sleeping on Jessica’s couch. Hell, I still don’t have anything to offer you. I’m a bartender living on the beach for Christ’s sake.” We stood silently for a few moments. “Please say something.” Her silence was killing me.

She sniffled and wiped at her tears with her knuckles. “That’s why you didn’t ask me to stay? Because you have nothing to offer me?”

“Yes.”

“What makes you think I wanted anything from you, Connor?”

“Huh?” Her entire demeanor had changed just like that. The tears stopped, and the tone of her voice had shifted from sad to angry. Say something quick. “I’m not the kind of man who goes into a relationship with nothing to offer, especially with a woman like you, Vanessa. You deserve better than that.”

“What I deserve is honesty. I deserve a man who is going to fight for me—a man who won’t take off running every time I say something he doesn’t want to hear.”

“You’re absolutely right, Vanessa. I’ve been a total dipshit, and I’m sorry. I have nothing to offer you but this,” I said, opening my arms, offering my body. “I know I can be the man you deserve if you’ll just give me a chance.”

“And what happens when I say something you don’t want to hear? Are you going to take off running again?”

“No.” I shook my head. “I love you, Vanessa, and I swear to you I’ll never be so stupid again.”

“Prove it,” she said, walking up to me and standing chest to chest with me.

“I will spend every day for the rest of my life proving it to you.” I flexed my fingers, trying really hard not to touch her.

“That’s not good enough. I need you to prove it to me right here, right now.”

Fear rushed through my body like an unforeseen attacker. “What…? I mean, how am I supposed to do that?”

She caressed my cheeks with her hands, running them down my neck, and placing them on my chest. I looked into her eyes trying to get a glimpse of something, anything, that would give a clue as to what she was thinking.

I took her hands and brought them to my lips. “Vanessa, I don’t know what I can do to right here and now to prove to you that—”

“I’m pregnant, Connor.”

My ears rang, and I choked on my tongue when I tried to swallow. Three conflicting thoughts simultaneously raced through my mind in an attempt to reach my mouth. My first thought was, how the hell did this happen? She told me she was on the pill. My second thought, Run! You have no business being a father. And my third thought brought a smile to my face; Vanessa is going to have my baby. “Pregnant?” I muttered.

“Yes.”

“I’m going to be a dad?”

“Well it sure as hell isn’t anyone else’s baby,” she snapped, stepping away from me.

My eyes widened. “Oh God, Vanessa, no.” I reached for her and was grateful when she didn’t pull away. I framed her face with my hands. “That’s not what I meant. I didn’t mean to imply…” Tread carefully or you’ll fuck up again. “Marry me.”

Vanessa jerked away from me as if I’d slapped her or something. “Don’t do me any favors, Connor. I came back here because I needed a job, not to trap you into marrying me because I’m pregnant.”

I took a few clumsy steps back. “You think that’s why I want to marry you? Because you’re pregnant?”

“What else am I supposed to think?”

I felt my face go from comfortably warm to burning hot. “I know that all I do is fuck things up when it comes to you, but for you to think I’d ask you to marry me just because you’re having my baby is low, Vanessa.”

She remained silent, and my anger reached its boiling point. “Tell me this, Vanessa. If the only reason I wanted to marry you is because you’re pregnant, then why have I been walking around with this in my pocket for the past two weeks?” I reached into my back pocket, pulled out a small, black, velvet box, opened it, and slammed it down on Jessica’s desk.

Vanessa looked at me, then down at the ring, then back up at me. Tears fell faster than she could wipe them away. Her lips trembled, but she still didn’t say anything. Anger erupted inside of me, and I couldn’t stop it. I reached into my other back pocket, took out my plane ticket, and tossed it on the desk next to the ring.

“I planned to fly to Indiana later today. I was going to apologize and ask you to marry me. I was going to do whatever was necessary to get you back. God, I’m an idiot.” I dragged my shaking hand through my hair. “At least I know where I stand with you before I go making a bigger jackass of myself.”

“Connor.”

The sound of her broken sobs clenched at my heart, but I refused to be swayed. I could understand why she thought I’d proposed. It was bad timing on my part. That I could forgive. But knowing she automatically assumed the worst about me—that was a hard pill to swallow. “You have nothing to say?” I said as she stood silently crying.

“I don’t know what to say,” she said. “This is all too much. I wasn’t expecting—”

“Allow me to make it easier on you.” I walked out of the office and slammed the door. Jessica was sitting behind her former secretary’s desk. She gave me a questioning look. I pointed my finger in her face. “Before you go giving me an ass chewing, you should know that I wasn’t the one to fuck things up this time.” I pointed to Jessica’s closed office door. “She did.”

I stalked back to my bungalow, slamming my hand against the door to open it, kicking furniture and walls and whatever else I could on my way to the bedroom. What the hell had happened back there? I’d told her I loved her. Nothing. I asked her to marry me. I get accused of doing it because she’s pregnant. I couldn’t win.

Vanessa’s pregnant with my baby.

That realization pushed me to the breaking point. I flopped down on the edge of the bed. Vanessa may not love me or want to marry me, but she couldn’t keep me from my child. I was going to be a father. A single father. That realization broke me. I dropped my head into my hands and cried.