I guess he really is what he told me he was in the beginning – unable to commit to a girl. And no matter how much wishing on my part for me to have been the one to change him – the signs are telling me otherwise.

Yes, he says he wants me. But each time he’s said that, he’s either been inside me, or well on his way to it. And I know better than anyone that a man will say things he doesn’t mean while he’s having sex with you.

Last night was no different. I’d woken up in the early hours of the morning to find Jordan gone from his bed, and in the space beside me, where he’d fallen asleep, was a sleeping Dozer, stretched out and snoring.

In the end, my curiosity and frustration won out. I’d searched the hotel to no success, then eventually found him sitting out on the boardwalk over the lake, drinking a beer…

I walked over and stood between his open legs, staring down at him. Jordan’s hands went around the back of my thighs, fingers gripping. His head rested against them, like it was hard for him to look at me.

I slid my fingers into his hair, silently begging him to talk to me … but wishing for only things I’d want to hear.

His hand slid up my leg and took hold of my hand. He tugged me down to sit between his legs. I rested my back against his chest, and he wrapped his arm around my middle while taking a drink of his beer.

“What you doing out here so late?” I asked, my words drifting out over the lake, disappearing into the night.

He nuzzled my neck, inhaling. “Couldn’t sleep.”

I took the beer from his hand, had a swig, then handed it back.

“What’s keeping you awake?”

He placed the bottle down beside him and let out a long breath. “Nothin’.”

Nothing!

Angry, tired, and completely pissed off with his lack of communication, I got to my feet.

“If you don’t want me anymore, Jordan – this whatever we have – then just say so! Just … please, stop … this!”

I swiveled on my heel and ran back to the hotel.

He caught up with me on the porch by the main door.

His hand closed the door I was opening. He came up behind me, pressing his chest to my back.

“I want you,” he said, rough, against my ear. “Don’t ever think for one fuckin’ second that I don’t. I want you more than I have ever wanted anyone.”

“So, why all this?” I was breathing heavy, feeling confused, my heart thundering in my chest.

“All of what?”

I turned, curling my hands around the door handle as I leaned back against it. “You, being different … distant with me … I know there’s something you’re keeping from me.”

His eyes closed as if he were in pain. “It’s nothing for you to worry about.”

I reached for his hand, curling my fingers around his. “I just want you to talk to me.” I tugged on his hand, trying to encourage speech.

His eyes opened, staring down at our entwined hands.

A long breath. “I will…” He shook his head. “But not right now … not now.” It felt like he wasn’t even talking to me by this point.

Then his hands went to the door, either side of my head, and his lips came down hard on mine, no hesitation.

I wanted to push him away, tell him to talk to me now, not later. That kissing me wouldn’t solve whatever was eating at him.

But I didn’t. Because I didn’t want him to stop kissing me – ever.

He broke the kiss to pull my pajama tank over my head. Bending his mouth down, he took my nipple into his mouth.

My head fell back against the door with a thud.

I reached for him, unbuttoning his jeans. I slid my hand inside his boxer shorts, grabbing his hot, hard cock.

“Fuck, Mia,” he groaned, pushing himself into my hand.

Then things got heated and urgent and fast.

My pajama bottoms and panties were off, and before I knew it, I stood naked on the hotel porch, and Jordan – still fully clothed, was lifting me off my feet and slamming his cock inside me.

I cried out from the quick invasion and the instant pleasure. Wrapping my legs around his waist, I dug my fingernails hard into his shoulders.

This only set him off further.

He was hitting me with sure, hard thrusts, his jeans chaffing painfully against me, but I didn’t care. All I cared about was having him inside me. Nothing else mattered at that point.

We were outside, having crazy, furious, make-up sex in the early hours of the morning … all those things fueling it a hundred times hotter … a thousand times more intense.

“You’re mine, Mia,” he ground out as his hips pinned mine to the door, making love to me with a fierce intensity. “I’m never losing you. Never.”

“You’re not going to lose me,” I panted out, confused and turned on like never before. “Not ever.”

That was a handful of hours ago. And now I’ve woken again to find myself alone in Jordan’s bed.

I let out a sigh, swing my legs over the edge of the bed, and pay a visit to the bathroom.

I put the clothes I was wearing last night back on as I hadn’t brought any clean ones from my room. Not even ready to talk to Jordan at the moment, I decide to go back to my room so I can shower, brush my teeth, and change into clean clothes. I grab my room key from his desk and head through the house of the hotel.

When my foot is on the first step to take me upstairs to the hotel, I hear two male voices. One is Jordan. The other I don’t recognize. They’re upstairs in the office.

I debate what to do.

I don’t want to go barging into the office if he’s talking with someone important. I’ll just go out through the back door, and walk around the hotel and come in through the lobby to get to my room.

I turn on the step, but stop when I hear my name spoken. It’s not Jordan who says my name. It’s the other man.

Curiosity getting the better of me, I walk up the stairs quietly, the voices becoming clearer.

“… can’t believe this, Jordan.”

I hear him sigh. “I know, Dad. I’ve fucked up.”

His dad’s home? I smile at the thought of meeting his dad, but when Jordan continues talking, his words wipe the smile off my face.

“I was going to tell her, but … I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I couldn’t find the words to start with.”

“The truth, Jordan. You start with the truth. I knew I should have come home the day I told you. It’s why I’ve come home today because you’ve been avoiding my calls. I knew there was something up.” A sigh. “I thought maybe you and Mia, had argued about it … I just didn’t want to believe you hadn’t told her because it’s not how I raised you. I know you really care about Mia, but you can’t just carry on with her, all the while keeping the truth from her. It’s not right. How do you think she’s going to feel when she finds out that you’ve known the truth about her mother for days and not told her?”

My heart stops dead in my chest, my stomach clenching in painful, sick inducing knots. I curl my fingers into my hand, digging my nails into the soft skin.

“Shit…” Jordan says, sounding like he’s in pain. “I’ve fucked up badly. I thought she wouldn’t forgive me before … she’ll never forgive me now. She knew – she knew something was up, and I just kept telling her everything was okay.”

“Do you want me to be with you when you tell her?”

“No.” Jordan sighs. “I’ll tell her alone. I don’t want to bulldoze her with the two of us. I’ll go speak to her now.” The determination in his voice, and his heavy footsteps across the floor, have me turning to run back down the stairs.

I know I have no chance of making it, but still I try.

I hear the door open and Jordan say, “Mia,” in a tone that can only be described as fearful. I have no choice but to turn around.

The fear in his voice matches the fear on his face, but it’s the look in his eyes that’s the worst. He looks hopeless. Like he’s about to lose everything. Or maybe it’s me that’s about to lose everything.

And the sick I was feeling worsens.

Chapter Twenty-One

Jordan

When I was fourteen years old, Maisy Richards kicked me in the nuts at Ben Castle’s birthday party because she’d given me a handjob in the hall closet, then caught me making out with Sophie Jenkins an hour later.

It literally feels like your testicles have exploded and the flying debris is obliterating your insides like a dirty bomb, leaving you feeling pain of the unimaginable kind.

Up until exactly thirty seconds ago, I’d believed that was the most painful thing I would ever feel.

I was wrong.

Because standing here, seeing the crumpled look of devastation on Mia’s face after telling her that her mother—the mother who left her behind to be raised by a father who repeatedly beat her—is, in fact, the woman who raised me.

“I-I don’t understand…” She stumbles back, her knee making contact with the office desk with a sickening thud.

I reach for her, but she doesn’t even seem to have registered the pain, which only aids to show me how bad this is.

How badly I’ve screwed up.

“I’m so sorry.” I shake my head, disconsolate.

“She’s … my … your mom … dead.” Her hand grips her stomach as if she’s in actual pain.

“Mia…” I step toward her, needing to be close to her.

Her hand goes up, stopping me.

“Mia,” my dad says in his gentle ‘cop’ voice. “You should sit down. It’s a terrible shock you’ve had … sit. Let me get you a glass of water.”

She looks at my dad with a confused look on her face. Then her eyes slice back to me, and the way she looks at me … through me. Her eyes are ice-cold. The pain slides through me as easily as a hot knife in butter.

Then her eyes drift across the room to the wall, and I know what she’s looking at without me even needing to turn.

She’s looking at the framed photo of me, Dad and Mom. It was the last picture we had taken together before she died. The day I was leaving to go traveling.

Her face crumbles, and tears fall from her eyes.

She covers her face with her hands. I hear a sob emit from her, so painful it shatters my heart, leaving nothing but dust in its place.

I can’t stay away.

I cross the room in quick strides, and wrap my arms around her.

It’s only a second before she’s pushing me off with a strength I didn’t know she had.

“Don’t touch me … don’t ever touch me again.” She dries her face on her sleeve, turns and runs out the office.

I look at my dad for guidance because I literally don’t know what the hell to do.

“Go after her,” he urges.

I’m out of the door a second later.

I catch sight of Mia disappearing into her room. I run down the hall, expecting her door to be closed, but it’s not. It’s wide open.

I don’t go in the room out of respect for her space. So I stand in the doorway, gripping the frame to keep myself from going to her.