The next move had to come from Serafina.
No fucking ifs and buts about it.
She had to want him enough to make the first move.
It was the only way they'd have a fighting chance.
And until then...
AIDAN WAS ALREADY BEHIND the wheel of Blake's SUV when he got the call from the repair shop. He had asked Tommy to give him a heads up if and when Serafina came for her rental, and it was just as he expected.
She was going to leave without saying goodbye.
And because his hands were still fucking tied...
Aidan's grip on the wheel tightened when he finally saw her rental drive past him. He waited for a beat before trailing behind her. The airport might only be a forty-five-minute drive away, but Aidan wasn't too keen to leave anything to chance. The weather was dangerously unpredictable this time of the year, and Aidan had borrowed his sister-in-law's SUV to make sure Serafina arrived at the airport in one piece.
Memories of Serafina flashed endlessly in his mind while Aidan tailed her slow-moving car, and a sardonic smile played over his lips. Although his brothers had the occasional tendency to rib him over the girl he dated back in high school, Aidan had never really wanted a woman to the point of thinking of her even when she wasn't around.
Serafina, however...
He had hungered for her from the very first time he saw her walk inside the diner, and everything that happened afterwards had only made Aidan want Serafina even more. She had become an instant obsession, and every fucking little thing about her had fascinated him.
He wanted her like he had never wanted a woman before. Needed her like he had never needed another person before. She was it for him, and Aidan just wished...he just fucking wished he had the slightest inkling if it was the same for her.
A fucking sign.
It might be a cliché, but at this point he would settle for anything.
Any fucking sign would do.
He just needed something to hold on to.
Needed something to help him survive the empty days ahead.
But all hope died when they made it to the airport, and all Aidan could do was watch from a distance as Serafina took her luggage out of the backseat and handed the keys of her rental to one of the parking attendants.
Look back.
That was the only sign he could hope for at this point.
Look back.
Find me.
See me.
But she never did.
Chapter Eight
I cry the moment I'm inside the plane. Nothing feels right, and every breath becomes a struggle as pain threatens to swallow me whole. I miss him. Oh God, I miss him. So, so much.
One of the flight attendants comes by and asks if I'm okay, and I manage to say yes even as the tears continue falling. And what I tell her...
It isn't a lie.
I am okay, and that's the problem. My life may look incredible from the outside, but inside it's just okay. It's always been just okay, and it's time I admitted that.
Even if it's a classy kind of okay. Even if it's a life that other people would envy me for. It's still just okay, and it will always be an okay kind of life because it's what I've taught myself to accept.
It's okay to be just okay because girls like me only end up hurt when we want more.
Been there, done that, and God knows I've tried more than once.
God knows how many times I've tried. How hard I've tried.
But I just keep getting hurt.
And that's why I'm the way I am now.
That's why I can't let myself ever forget it's okay to be just okay, and Aidan...
I can't let him change me. Can't let him make me greedy and forget everything I've learned.
Aidan is everything that's beyond okay...and that's why I can't have him.
I THROW MYSELF INTO work the moment I get back home. I say yes even to gigs that I normally decline. Hold livestreams when I can't sleep. Start a new gratitude journal just so I can remember the most important thing.
It's okay to just be okay.
Jack's been calling me every day, and though he always says at the end he's willing to wait, I know I'm only delaying the inevitable. I need to see him sooner or later, and when we do meet, I know what I must say.
I know what I must feel.
But God...
I still miss him.
I miss him so damn much.
And I don't understand why.
The actual hours Aidan and I have spent in each other's company aren't even enough to count as an entire day. The time we had is so short, I should only be remembering his name and nothing else. But instead I remember everything.
I remember the soulful darkness of his gaze and the way his face softens every time he sees me. Most of all, I remember how Aidan makes me feel every time he looks at me, and it's a feeling that no one else has made me feel.
When Aidan looks at me...I feel I don't need to pretend I'm okay with just okay.
When he looks at me, it's as if I'm back to my old self.
Unbelievably foolish. Impossibly reckless. And most of all...a girl who believes that magic exists.
AN ENTIRE WEEK HAS passed, and life has never been busier or crazier. Nearly every moment is spent in other people's company. And yet...I can't remember ever feeling this sad. Can't remember feeling so alone that I feel like I'm about to implode.
I finally succumbed to the temptation of looking Aidan up online last night, but this only made things worse. Since Aidan had never asked for my number, I had been too proud to ask for his. And besides, in the back of my mind, I had always thought I could look him up online. I always thought I had that to fall back on, but I was wrong.
Aidan might as well be a ghost with how little there is about him on the Internet. I think I'm even doing ghosts a disservice here. Even cursed dolls like Chucky and Annabelle have their own Instagram accounts, while Aidan doesn't even have a profile in LinkedIn. He's a freaking police chief of an entire town. Shouldn’t the U.S. government require all men in uniform to have Facebook accounts or anything? Police officers are supposed to be the first to respond to emergencies, but how can we even ask for help when even their work email isn't set to public?
I mean, sure there is that website of the Hartland Police Department, and it does have a phone number listed. But wouldn't it smack of desperation if I called him at his workplace? That's how most horror stories about clingy girlfriends typically begin, and I'm not even his girlfriend to start with. I don't think I even qualify as a fling or...whoa.
I've just made it to the tenants-only gym at my apartment building, and the first thing I see is little Nala executing a perfect pincha yoga pose while right beside her is Mairi, who's currently struggling to get her butt up for a simple downward facing dog pose.
Distraction, I think right away, and I quickly unroll my yoga mat next to the mother-and-daughter tandem. I tuck my legs under me and make myself comfortable while the six-year-old girl plays the patient yoga instructor to her mom.
"You can do it, Mama. Just a little..."
PLOP!
Mairi loses her balance, and both Nala and I wince as her mother collapses on the mat in an awkward tangle of limbs.
"I'm okay," Mairi says quickly.
"Um..." Mairi glares at me, and that's when I see Nala doing her best not to cry as the little girl rushes to her mom's side.