No Turning Back (Breaking the Rules #4) - A.M. Madden Page 0,11

Jersey to come with me. She’d already lost so much after her mother had died, and she’d finally found peace through her work. I couldn’t expect her to start over because I had to. But leaving her had broken my heart, and the piece that had remained whole I had left behind with her.

Clearly, she still owned it based on the ache that continued to thrum through me after a five-minute encounter.

The valet pulled my car up to where Maggie and I stood in silence, and the drive to her apartment building wasn’t any different. I felt bad that I had nothing to say. My head was too busy reeling with memories that had long been locked away in a past-life box. That was what Riana represented to me. The past. Leaving her had caused so much pain, I’d had to lock away those memories or they would’ve consumed me.

From the first moment I saw Riana, I had been inexplicably drawn to her. She had liked to tease that our fates had no choice but to collide the day we’d met.

While waiting for my dentist appointment, I had noticed the brunette beauty sitting across the room in one of the other stiffly upholstered chairs. Her big brown eyes bounced between the magazine she casually flipped through and the TV mounted on the wall. Sensing my gaze, our eyes connected, and I couldn’t seem to look away. Neither could she, even as her cheeks tinged a rosy hue most likely from the way I unapologetically continued to stare.

“R. Carter?” the nurse practitioner I never had seen before that day called into the waiting room.

We both stood, took a step toward the woman, and paused.

“I’m Ryder Carter,” I said just as she said, “I’m Riana Carter.”

The elderly woman’s hot-pink-tinted lips lifted into an amused smirk. “I’m calling Ryder Carter, but if you two don’t know each other, I think you need to after this. I’m a sucker for romance. I’ll even pay for your dinner.”

And that was how we came to be. Even though I didn’t see Riana again that day, I tracked her down and found a Riana Carter who worked at a nonprofit organization in Newark. Just as I’d shamelessly stared at her in that waiting room, I brazenly stalked into her place of work and asked her out.

I made her mine.

The few years we were together were easy ones. We just fit. There was never any drama between us. My demanding career as a sports agent had me traveling a lot, along with long office hours whenever I was home. So many times, I had to cancel on her, hating that I had to. She never once complained, always understanding the reasons why. Riana was the kindest person I had ever met. Compassion came as naturally as breathing. It was inevitable to fall hard and fast for her.

When my biggest client’s transfer to a California team coincided with an executive leaving the LA office, my boss promoted me. Part of me wanted so badly for her to volunteer to come with me. Again, I couldn’t ask her to do that… nor would I have put up a fight had she offered. But Riana’s clients at Angels on Earth were too important to her. I couldn’t take offense to her choosing them, not when I was leaving her for a similar reason.

So much had happened since we’d parted three years earlier. We’d kept in touch for a while, and then only on birthdays until communication ended. Mainly because I had met Diane and found happiness again… kind of. She helped me forget Riana and move on. I thought of proposing, because that was the natural next step… which was not the right reason.

But as it had before, life happened in the way of another transfer to Florida. Diane was California born and bred, pursuing a modeling career, and wanted no part of that move. That obviously killed any plans of a proposal. In fact, I often wondered: If I hadn’t been transferred, would we have made it? My gut said no.

There I was with another failed relationship because of my job. It was the nature of the business, and I couldn’t bring myself to regret my choices. But having said that, I couldn’t stop wondering what would’ve been if I had asked Riana to make that first move with me.

“Are you coming up?” The invite became an accusation through Maggie’s tone.

“Actually, I’m exhausted.” Leaning toward her, I pecked her cheek