Page 168 of Wait for Him

"Why are you still waiting for her when I'm right here? When we have a perfect understanding, a perfect agreement, and we could just be happy together?"

Neither of us says anything.

Well.

Fuck.

Rian heard it too. And I can't pretend I didn't.

Why aren't I enough for you?

That's not part of the deal.

Neither is happy together.

"Just forget it. Forget what I said. I'm sorry." She rushes back across the room and pulls me into a hug I can't make my arms return, and then she's kissing my neck in frantic, scattered presses, her fingers running down my chest toward the waistband of my shorts. "Forget I said anything. Please."

I catch her hand before it gets any farther and gently pull it away.

"Let's discuss it another time. Maybe just head home tonight, yeah? I'll call you next week."

"Marcus. I'm sorry."

I meet her gaze. "Yeah. Me too."

I watch her go with defeat written across her shoulders, and when the door closes behind her I sink onto the couch and pick up Rose's card from the coffee table, reaching for her words the way I always do when I need her.

My thumb catches beneath the fold.

I stop.

What the fuck am I doing?

Rian isn't entirely wrong. I haven't heard from Rose since this card landed in my hands in February. Not a text. Not another postcard. Not a scrap of secondhand news through Jade or Bennet or anyone else. I get up every morning at 4:55 and do yoga with a woman who may not even be doing it with me anymore, because she said she would once in a birthday card months ago.

Maybe I am a fool for waiting.

Rose told me not to. She couldn't have been clearer about that part. Live your life. I took the I'm coming home and my love and built myself a loophole big enough to live in because I wasn't ready to hear the rest.

But coming home doesn't mean coming home to me.

Fuck.

That one hurts.

I look toward the door Rian just walked through.

She's here. She's been here. Rian makes a good partner. She's beautiful, brilliant, driven, funny when she forgets to be terrifying. I like being around her. I trust her in business. The sex is fucking fantastic. She clearly wants more from me than the arrangement we started with, and instead of admitting I knew that was happening, I've spent weeks pretending not to notice because pretending meant I didn't have to make a decision.

Maybe happiness isn't always the thing you hold out for. Maybe sometimes it's the thing standing in your living room asking why she isn't enough.

I could make her happy.

And maybe I could be happy with her.

Not Rose-happy.

Fuck. That's not fair.