with Rielle, grabbing her, pulling her into his arms, smashing his lips down on hers. It was an attack, retribution, an act of war against a heartless warrior who’d left him living dead instead of killing him off properly when she’d had the chance.
“Hey!” shouted the barman.
Jake pulled back breathing heavily. Rielle was wide-eyed with shock, and her body was trembling under his grip.
“It’s okay,” Jake growled, but Dave had already come out from behind the bar with a cricket bat in his hand. Jake let go of Rielle and stepped back, holding his hands out and up to show he wasn’t making any trouble.
“It’s all right, Dave, I know this guy. He won’t hurt me,” Rielle said, but her eyes showed shock and her voice shook like she wasn’t sure.
Dave retreated with a wary look on his face, laying the bat on top of the bar for easy access.
Jake turned away. He was done. “I have nothing for you.”
She called after him. “You have everything I need.”
He stopped, his back to her. “You took what I had to give and you trashed it.” His voice felt serrated, like it belonged to someone who ate swords for a living. He turned back, he needed to see her face the moment she truly understood the damage she’d wrought him was permanent. “I’m done. Go home.”
Tears streamed down Rielle’s cheeks. “I am home.” Despite a rage that made every colour in his eye’s palette appear a shade of red, Jake knew if he stayed, if he looked at her too long, he might have to forgive her and he couldn’t live with that. He turned and walked out.
Outside on the footpath, Bodge and Glen waited, but their expressions changed when they saw him.
“You bastards! What the fuck made you think that was a good idea?” He registered the rapid ripple of surprise in the look Glen and Bodge exchanged, but he didn’t wait for a response. “How long has she been here?”
“Three days,” said Bodge, shifting his weight forward. His eyes were on the doorway. He’d made this happen. He’d set it all up. They were supposed to be mates.
“Ten months, one week, three days,” Jake said bitterly. Ten months, one week, three days and every minute was the twist of a knife in his ribs.
“Sorry mate,” said Glen, “we thought—you’re both so stubborn—we thought if we gave it a nudge—”
“What? That I could forget what she did to me?” Jake exhaled hard, shook his head. He put a hand up to forestall either of them responding and left them standing there.
He rode home via a bottle shop. He didn’t think he could carry enough alcohol to dry out the flood of feeling in his body, to create enough forgetfulness, but fuck it, he’d try. Back home, he drank steadily, until he made himself sick, until he could no longer see her face, feel the ghost of her in his arms or imagine how it all might’ve been different.
Rielle was at the bar tearing up drink coasters into pieces, when Bodge found her. That poisoned riff was in her head, like a dirge, like a lament. If only. If only. If only.
“Rie, shit, I’m sorry.” Bodge hung his head, avoided looking directly at her and took the beer Dave pulled gratefully.
Rielle gave him a watery smile. “It’s okay. You didn’t know it would go like that.” She put her hand on Bodge’s arm and gripped, trying to find an anchor in the swell of emotions that swamped her.
The depth and heat of Jake’s anger had left her wrung out. She knew she’d hurt him, but he was meant to forget her and move on, not marinate in the bitterness she’d caused. He was too smart for that, too rational and stable. He was meant to look back and see her for the disaster she was and be relieved it was over. He was meant to live without regret and compromise. He wasn’t meant to love her so much. The change in him shocked her. He’d looked lost, without his compass, without the steady centre that defined him. Somehow she hadn’t forced him to let go, she’d taught him to hold on and to hate because of it.
She couldn’t process that. Couldn’t take it in.
“It was wrong, we screwed up.” Bodge’s big hand came down over hers, calloused and warm. “Should’ve let you make your own decision. Shit, we’re both divorced, Glen and me. Neither of us know how to keep a woman.