“I don’t know how to get past this,” I tell her, my eyes welling up.

“You just do.” Her voice is soft, soothing. “Time goes on, and things get easier.”

“I tried to go out, but people looked at me…” My stomach clenches, remembering the way the delivery guy seemed to leer at my chest when I’d gone to pay for the carryout Ethan had ordered.

Ethan had stepped in a second later, gently putting me behind him and paying the guy. He didn’t say a word. Didn’t have to. It was obvious to the terrified delivery guy that he was a few seconds away from breathing out of a tube. He took his money and practically sprinted away.

It might feel good to have Ethan to stand over me like a protective bear, but he can’t be there all the time. And he can’t keep people from thinking what they want.

Some jackhole reporter pulled up pictures of me kissing Jaden—that silly stunt that feels like an eternity ago—and now they’re calling me a money chaser, the same type as the woman who made my mom cry and my dad stray. I shouldn’t care what strangers think. It’s a horrifying realization to know that I do.

Mom is talking again, drawing my attention back to the present. “Why don’t you come to London instead?”

“I don’t know…”

“No one here gives a fig about American football. You can relax. We can go Christmas shopping, have hot toddies, perhaps attend a musical.”

It sounds so perfectly lovely that I tear up again and sniffle. I miss my mom. I miss being a kid under her care, when the biggest worry I had was doing my homework on time and whether she’d let me have cookies after school.

Mom’s voice is coaxing, working over me like spun sugar. “Think about it, darling girl.”

I close my eyes and take a breath. “Okay.”

Chapter Forty-One

Dex

I find Fi in the kitchen. She isn’t drinking or eating or preparing anything. Which worries me. It isn’t like her to stand around, staring off at nothing.

Fi is light and love. Happiness and laughter. Even when she’s peaceful she has a radiance. But it’s gone now. She’s pale and quiet. Her hair has lost its shine, hanging limp around her pretty face.

I want to go to her, hold her close. But lately she flinches when I touch her. And it hurts too much for me to risk it right now. “Hey, Cherry.”

Fi blinks as if pulling out of a fog. “Hey. Were you working out?”

“No. Just sitting outside for a while.”

My naturally curious girl doesn’t ask why. Drew is right; I need to snap her out of this. Even if I have to haul her out over my shoulder.

“I was talking to Drew.”

She winces, her shoulders hunching in. “Let me guess, about me.”

“He wanted to see how you were doing. He cares about you, Fi.”

She shakes her head. “You know you’re fucked up when you’d rather no one cared.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“But I do,” she snaps, her eyes hard and cold. “I’d be perfectly happy if I never got asked how I’m doing again.”

It’s my turn to wince. Because I ask her every day. I’m hovering, annoying her with my concern. Her expression tells me that’s exactly what she’s thinking.

My head begins to pound along with my heart. I run a tired hand over my brow, not knowing what the fuck to say anymore.

Fi runs a finger along the grain in the marble countertop. “I was on the phone too. Talking to my mom.”

I’ve met Fi’s mom twice. Fi has her coloring, but Ivy has her features. I’m looking forward to meeting her as Fiona’s man, but I don’t think that’s what this conversation is about. Instinct has me bracing for impact.

Fi’s gaze flicks to mine. “She asked me to come to London.”

“London. Now?” The pounding in my heart gets harder, faster.

Fi shrugs, studies the marble. “I could go out there. Do things. Not be trapped.”

Trapped like she is here with me.

I run a hand through my beard and discover my fingers are trembling. “I can’t go with you right now, Fi.”

She doesn’t look up. “I know.”

I’ve been hit by three-hundred-pound men intent on mowing me down—that hurts less than those two flat words. She doesn’t want me to come.

Her voice is soft when she speaks, as if she’s trying to spare my feelings. “You once said we should take a step back until things blow over.”

“And you told me I was wrong.” Tell me I’m wrong again. Fight for us.

“Maybe you were right.”

My throat clogs, and I have to clear it. “You said you didn’t want to be apart.”

“I didn’t—don’t. But this…” She gestures to the windows and the world outside of it. “Is no way to live.”

“So stop hiding. Let’s go out there, and fuck what anyone thinks.”

Her eyes flash, deep green and angry. “Easy for you to say.”

“It isn’t easy at all, Fi. This whole thing fucking kills me.”

“Then help me,” she says, leaning toward me, her slim body tight and tense. “I can’t stand this, Ethan.”

I can’t look at her. Not without losing it.

“It’s not forever,” she says.

She’s right. It’s just a trip, not the end. But it feels like it. I have a sickening fear that the second she walks out my door, she’ll be lost to me.

I want to fight for her. Insist that she be with me. But I can’t be selfish. If I force her to stay, I’ll lose her anyway. Fi isn’t an object. She’s the woman I love. And if she needs her mother right now, that’s what she’ll get.