Page 18 of Out of Reach
Every part of Hawk wanted to be at the restaurant with Jude while he had dinner with that snake, but that was impossible. Prescott knew who he was, and he couldn’t sit undetected like Andi and Sean could. So he did the next best thing and listened in, hating the fake lines Prescott was feeding Jude. Hawk bet the man fucked every one of his exes on the regular, and while he could understand Prescott wanting Jude back, he damned well didn’t think that asshole would do a thing to change their relationship, which, by the sound of it, was purely physical.
Thinking of Jude sleeping with Prescott had Hawk pacing a hole in the floor of the apartment. As soon as the dinner was over and he had word from Sean that Jude was safely on his way back, Hawk went downstairs to the gym to work off his ire and restless energy. After a brief warm-up, he set the treadmill on an incline and started running. Fifteen minutes later, sweat trickling down his back underneath his cotton T-shirt, he hit the place where his movements became automatic and he no longer felt the burn in his thighs and calves. Mind untethered, his thoughts wandered back to the night his world came crashing down on him.
“I’m leaving.”
Glancing over his shoulder to where Jude stood in the kitchen doorway of their apartment, Hawk said, “Okay. When will you be back?” A trickle of mayo ran down the side of his chin as he bit into the submarine sandwich he’d just made, and he wiped it with a napkin. “Want me to make you one?” he asked, gesturing to the sub.
“I’m not coming back,” Jude said.
Hawk wondered what he’d done to tick off Jude this time.
Cramming the food into one side of his mouth, he reached for his water bottle, draining it in a few gulps.
Pushing away from the counter, he reached for Jude, but Jude stepped away. That’s when Hawk spotted the suitcases sitting by the apartment door. Confused, he asked, “You’re serious? Where are you going?”
Jude looked resolute. “I’ve told you, Hawk. Don’t act like you didn’t know it was coming.”
Hawk thought back to the past few arguments they’d had. Nothing unusual: Jude nagging him about leaving laundry on the floor or not being around enough. Saying he flirted too much and took Jude for granted.
Holding out his hand, Hawk said, “Come here.”
Jude moved toward the suitcases. “Fuck you. It’s too late for you to try to fuck me into complacency. I’m leaving this relationship that’s going nowhere, and there’s nothing you can do to stop me.”
The words pelted Hawk like sharp rocks, and anger rose as a defense mechanism. “Where is this coming from? We’ve been together almost three years, and suddenly you’re just…leaving? You’re going to toss us away like we’re nothing?”
Jude’s expression shuttered. “Wearenothing. Nothing that means anything, anyway. When you’re home, we fuck. That’s it.”
That wasn’tit.At least, well, they did fuck a lot. But that wasn’t all they had. It meant a lot to Hawk that while he was gone Jude wasthere in the apartment.He was Hawk’s constant and had been for a long time. When Hawk was hiding in some hole in the middle of a firefight, trying not to make a sound so he wouldn’t get his head blown off, the knowledge that Jude was at home waiting for him meant everything. And hell no, they didn’t just fuck. They connected. Or had Hawk been the only one who felt that way?
Jude’s lips that Hawk loved to suck and bite turned down sadly. “You act like I haven’t been saying this to you for months. You don’t listen to me. I’m tired of being second best to your job, your friends, your goddamn exercise routine. I’m tired of you acting like how we are in bed should be the entire dynamic to our relationship!”
Hawk struggled to keep up with the onslaught of words. He reacted on autopilot, doing what he later would realize was probably the worst thing he could have done. Stepping closer, he ran his hands up Jude’s bare arms. “Come on, you don’t want to leave.”
Shoving Hawk away, Jude pointed an accusing finger at him. “Don’t! I might be a few years younger than you, and I might like to be dominated in bed, but I’m anadult,Hawk. I have my own mind, and I’ve told you again and again how I feel, but every single time it’s like I never even opened my mouth! You don’tlistento me. You don’t take me seriously, and you never have. Do you even know what day it is?”
Hawk racked his mind, trying to remember why the day would have significance. He didn’t think it was Jude’s birthday—that was sometime in the summer.
Tears filled Jude’s eyes. “You don’t, do you? That’s because it means nothing to you. Three years ago, we met for the first time. Big fucking deal.”
And he’d left.
Hawk had waited for him to come back, but he never did. Even after moving to North Carolina a year later, Hawk kept that apartment in Detroit because Jude had a key to it and Hawk wanted him to always be able to find him.
Hawk thought about Jude’s words to him that day. For the past four years, lying in the dark at night, lonelier than Hawk had ever imagined he could be, he’d turned them over in his mind, until he thought he understood what Jude had been saying. Hawk had taken him for granted. He’d seen Jude as the kid he’d been that night at the club, flirting outrageously with a man ten years older than he was and trying to buy liquor when he was underage. Of course, by the time they started a physical relationship, Hawk had noticed Jude had physically grown, but he’d never acknowledged how much he’d grown as a person or how their relationship should have changed. Jude hadn’t just stayed in Hawk’s apartment while Hawk was deployed; he’d singlehandedly taken care of the place, and had been there when Hawk got back, giving him what he needed. He was way stronger than Hawk had ever given him credit for. And his leaving left a void inside of Hawk that might as well have been a bottomless pit.
But it was too late to do anything about it. Jude had left Detroit, left Michigan, to chase his dream of being a model. That much Hawk had learned by hiring a private detective. And once he was assured that Jude was okay, Hawk left him alone. Because that was what Jude wanted.
“Hawk?” Jude’s voice close to his ear caused Hawk to trip on the treadmill and slide to one knee before hitting his head at the bottom as he rolled gracelessly onto the floor.
The whirring of the machine stopped abruptly, and Jude’s face came into view. “Are you okay?”
Blearily, Hawk stared up at him.
“Hawk?”
“You startled me,” Hawk said, pulling himself to a seated position and resting his palm on his pounding head.
“I’m sorry. I kept calling to you, but you didn’t hear me.” Jude had taken off the fancy suit jacket he’d worn to meet Prescott and pushed up the sleeves of his pink button-down. A lock of blond hair had fallen into his eyes as he stared down at Hawk.