“Tell me the truth? Funny thing about that, Jake. I saw you even after I quit calling in the middle of the night. We’ve met for lunch how many times over the years? For God’s sake, we were stuck in the freaking jungle together two months ago and thought we were going to die! I talked about Mikey then, and you still didn’t tell me!”
She turned her back on them both and ran a frustrated hand through her hair.
“That wasn’t the right time—”
Olivia swung back around. “I can’t believe this.”
The man she loved and the brother she’d thought was lost, were less than three feet away from her, yet she felt more alone than she’d ever been in her life.
Olivia looked back into Jake’s eyes. “I thought that we...” She swallowed hard. “I can’t believe I actually thought...” She swallowed again, this time to push back the bile threatening to fill her mouth. “God, Jake. I slept with you for Christ’s sake!”
The memory of his hands running over her body, the pleasure he’d brought to her now tainted forever. He’d been lying to her that entire time about something so huge...something so unforgivable. It made her wonder, what else had he lied about?
“You said you loved me—”
“Hold up. You slept with him?” Mikey asked surprised, as if that was the most outrageous part of this conversation.
“Shut up, Mikey,” Jake and Olivia both said in unison, never once taking their eyes off each other.
It was something they’d done countless times when they’d been younger. She would have laughed had the situation not been so totally screwed all to hell.
“So what was that? Huh, Jake? Did you sleep with me because you felt guilty for lying to me? Or did you just feel so sorry for me, that you thought you’d give me a few pity-fucks? You know, use my feelings for you against me to make yourself feel better? Tell me something...did it work?”
Jake’s eyes burned into hers. He closed the distance between them in three long strides, and grabbed her shoulders, his grip just this side of painful. Even in the midst of this new insanity, Olivia knew Jake would never physically hurt her.
“Don’t you ever say that again! Yeah, I lied to you, Olivia. For ten fucking years, I’ve lied, but I did it to protect you. To protect your brother and Pops. What happened between us had nothing to do with that. It sure as hell was more than some quick lays to appease my guilt.”
Jake’s nostrils flared as he drew in several quick breaths, the anger and pain in his eyes almost too much for her to bear.
“All I’ve ever wanted was to be with you. To give you every part of me...the good and the bad. Holding this back, keeping this from you for so long...that was the worst kind of torture for me. So, no, Liv. The sex didn’t ease my guilt. It made it worse. But being with you was worth it, because I love you, sweetheart. I love you more than life itself, so don’t you dare stand there and cheapen what we have by saying it was just a few pity fucks.”
Olivia wanted to believe him. With every fiber of her being, she wanted to believe him. Before today, she’d truly thought Jake loved her. Never, not in a million years, would she have doubted anything he told her. But now—
“Had, Jake. What we had. And I don’t even know what that was anymore. But, hey...look at it this way. At least now you won’t have poor Olivia to constantly watch out for. To always have to protect. You’re off the hook. Yay, for you.”
She jerked away from his grasp and turned toward the hallway to get her things.
“Olivia, listen to me. I know you’re pissed, and you have every right to be, but you can’t just leave like this.”
Olivia stopped and threw her hands in the air, her frustration palpable as she turned to face them again. She’d been betrayed by the two men who always said they’d protect her, who claimed to love her, and it all came crashing down on her.
“I am so tired of men thinking they have the right to control me. To dictate how I live my life, or hell, whether or not I even get to have a life. First it was Cetro, then that crazed Carlos guy. Now you two want to stand there and try to explain away a lifetime of lies and pain and loss. And I’m supposed to do what, exactly? Just roll over like the good little sister and...whatever I was to you?” She gestured toward Jake. “Do you honestly expect me to just say, ‘Okay, I understand. All is forgiven’? Well, fuck that. And fuck the both of you. This is my life, and I’ll be damned if I let one more man decide what I’m going to do with it!”
This time, when Olivia walked away, neither man said a word. And when they heard the bedroom door slam shut, they both flinched.
Chapter 10
Jake was numb. He stood there with his hands resting low on his hips as he stared at those closed doors.
The last few days with Liv had been as close to perfect as he’d ever had. Just the two of them, talking and laughing. Making love for hours on end. Now, he’d be lucky if she ever spoke to him again.
Tears pricked the corners of his eyes as he pictured the way she’d looked at him when she realized he’d known about Mike all along. The betrayal she felt was a living, breathing thing.
For the first time in his life, Olivia had looked at him as if he was a stranger. The love they’d finally allowed themselves to embrace had been damaged, most likely beyond repair. He’d done
