Page 88 of See It Through
One look at Remi’s shimmering intensity, and I knew running wasn’t an option.
He’d never let me get away.
Chapter Thirty-four
Hannah
Remi rounded the couch,putting us face to face. He was flushed, his scruff thicker than normal, the smudges beneath his eyes deeper. I wondered if he’d been having more nightmares. My stomach churned at the thought of him having them alone.
“First things first, we’re not over. Not by a long shot.” My heart stopped at his adamant declaration, and he didn’t give me an opportunity to acclimate before going on. “You’re unhappy, and I hear you. We’ll work that out together. Get to the bottom of how I can make you happy.”
I sucked in a sharp breath. “Remington…I know we need to talk. I’m sorry I blindsided you. That wasn’t fair. But we can’t continue. It’s not good for me—not with you planning on leaving. I know you have your career, and that means you’ll be traveling. I get how important it is to you. But I don’t have it in me to wait at home for you to return. I don’t even know if you’d want that, but I—”
“Hannah.” He picked up my braid and wound it around his fist, drawing me into him. My hands flew up to his chest to brace myself. “I have no plans to leave.”
“Maybe not right this second, but you will. I wish I was the type of woman to give you a kiss and send you on your way, but I’m not. I know myself. I need my man to be near. And that makes us incurably incompatible.”
He shook his head. “You’re saying a lot. Making a lot of assumptions. What you’re not doing is listening to me.”
“I’ve heard you, though.” I shoved my shaking hands into my pockets. “You terrify me.”
He froze, his eyes wide. “I terrify you?” He asked this so carefully, as if his words were footsteps over the thinnest of eggshells.
“I’ve watched you detach yourself. You shut off feelings you don’t want. For god’s sake, Rem, your father died after an incredibly long and painful illness, and you’ve barely said a word about him.” He flinched like he’d been assaulted. I ached for causing him pain, but I couldn’t see a way around it. “I’m terrified you’ll detach from me just as easily. I think about it all the time.”
“That’s—” he cut himself off, shaking his head hard, like he was trying to knock the very thought out of his brain. “That’s not going to happen. My feelings for my dad have no bearing on what I feel for you. If that’s what this is about…”
“It’s not. I mean, that’s part of it, but not all. I don’t see a way forward here, Rem, and I can’t possibly invest more into us when I already know how this will end.”
“How?” he exhaled on a harsh breath.
“You walking off and leaving me in the dust. I’ve picked myself up before, and I don’t want to do it again.”
His fingers went to the side of his head, carving furrows in his hair. It had gotten long since he’d come to town, overgrown. He needed a haircut, but it wasn’t my place to tell him that.
Finally, he dropped his hand and pinned me with a liquid stare. “You’re not asking me questions, seeing where I’m at. You made a unilateral decision, and you want the truth? I’m pissed at you, Hannah Kelly. You got your mind set a certain way and didn’t give us a chance to work together to find a way for us to be possible.”
He may have been mad, but he didn’t sound it. All he was giving me was soft tenderness. It was almost enough to convince me he was right. That there was a way around these obstacles. Then I remembered how I’d come to the decision I made.
“I saw the paperwork for the house, Rem. You’re accusing me of making decisions without you, but what about you giving me that house?” My chin quivered, the well of my sadness overflowing, but I choked back the threatening tears. “You’re going to leave. Maybe you’ll say you’ll come back, but if you have nothing tying you here, why would you?”
“Fuck,” he muttered, the tension in his jaw bleeding out to the rest of him. “That was supposed to be a surprise. A good one.”
I sniffled. “How would you cutting all ties with this town be a good surprise?”
“No, Hannah. My ties to this town have nothing to do with a house or property. If that was the case, I wouldn’t have been able to leave all those years ago.”
“You had people who loved you then too.”
He closed his eyes and lowered his forehead to mine. “I was really young, and so miserable, I couldn’t see straight. I made a mistake, thinking I had to let go of everyone when I left. Lucky for all of us, I tend to learn from my mistakes. That’s not one I’ll make again.”
“I can’t be your Seattle,” I whispered. “It would kill me.”
“My Seattle?”
“I won’t sit around and be your crash pad between assignments, Rem. I want a husband and babies. So, you see, we’re at a crossroads and need to go our separate ways.”
He jerked back, my braid unraveling from his hand. His eyes flashed with confusion then shimmered with anger.