I could still see her in the rearview mirror, holding the box in her hand, and the pain was so big, so great, that it felt like I’d left my heart behind.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Remi
We didn’t stay long at the shelter. It was never meant to be a full shift anyway—only facilitating the puppies’ arrival and coordinating the fosters since Ness was working by herself. Bringing Gavin hadn’t seemed like such a big deal because it would only be a couple hours, and I didn’t want Pops to cancel lunch with his friends.
Mistakes.
Mistakes had been made, and there was nothing I could do about it now.
There was enough left in my haywire brain to put the box from Archer in the passenger seat of my car before I went in search of my son.
I found him in the kennel room, helping Ness feed the puppies.
His eyes were clear, so there’d been no more crying, but his face was drawn, his skin pale.
“Ready to go?” I asked.
Gavin nodded.
“Or do you want to talk first? We can go in my office.”
“Mom,” he sighed. “You know how you said it’s okay to take a little space from something that you don’t understand?”
Screw my past self and her therapy-driven advice. Apparently, I’d taken that advice to heart, and it had landed me right in the middle ofdrama city. I didn’t understand what I was feeling for Archer, and space felt like the only real option. Genius, Remi. Fucking genius. I’d spaced myself right into a breakup from a non-relationship and eviscerated my heart into pulp.
I rolled my lips together and nodded. “Yeah, I remember that.”
“Is it okay if we talk about it later?”
Literally no greater weapon had been forged than a child giving their parent eyes like that. Big and pleading and sweet. I was helpless. Helpless to say no.
“Yeah, bud. It’s okay.”
Ness gave me a sad smile, and with her thumb and pointer finger extended out to mimic a phone, she held her hand up to her ear and mouthed,Call me?
I nodded, blowing her a kiss.
Gavin was quiet on the drive home, and even though I was too wrung out to attempt an emotionally appropriate conversation about what he’d just witnessed, I couldn’t let him stew in it for too long. After asking permission to play Nintendo, he disappeared into his room.
It was too quiet. There was nothing to distract me. And in that stillness, I heard Archer’s voice. Recalled the feel of his lips on my forehead. This was the messy side of love I’d avoided at all costs. Dangerous and tempestuous, a feeling that would never come close to average.
He’dnever come close to average, and the fact that he wished it—for me—made my head spin like a top. What had I done?
How had I ended up here? Heartbroken over someone who’d never given their heart away before, and even though he’d never said the words, I felt like he’d given his to me.
I sank into a chair and speared my hands into my hair, trying to figure out what would make me feel better.
Archer.
Archer would make me feel better.
There was no distraction in existence that would replace him, not right now, and that was terrifying. The wildly selfish thought sentme spiraling, because I couldn’t pinpoint when that had happened.Terrifyingdidn’t even really cover it. Like standing with my toes over the edge of a waterfall. There was no seeing the bottom through the billowing mist. No way of knowing what waited for me when I jumped.
I could break every bone in my body.
Or it could be paradise.