As I turned, I caught a good look at him, and concern tugged at my heartstrings. He was wearing only a thin Henley and jeans. It was fifteen degrees and snowing. He had to be freezing.
“What are you doing here?” I demanded, frustrated to hell and back.
“I came to talk to you.” He looked worse than I realized up close, his eyes bloodshot and skin flushed from the cold. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days.
“You drove all the way to Vermont to talk?”
“Well, you wouldn’t answer calls or texts,” he shot back, barely breathing heavy. Fucker.
“You didn’t deserve the effort,” I replied. “How did you find me?”
He rolled his eyes. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It does. Did Lee tell you? I’ll punch her in the tit if she did.”
“No, though I tried to get it out of her,” he admitted. “She threatened to cut my dick off.”
“I’m holding her to that,” I muttered, crossing my arms. “Lee is the only person who knows where I went and where my father lives.”
He shrugged. “It was obvious where you went once you weren’t at Lee’s,” he said. “And other people know where he lives.”
“Who? I demanded.
“Don’t worry about it. I have my ways.”
Anger came rushing forth, replacing the sadness that struck at every glance. “Did you have someone track me down like an animal?”
“No. Justin told me.”
Out of all the people I knew, the last person I’d ever guess was Justin Riker. He only visited a handful of times, complaining about the cell service the entire time. Somehow that made me a thousand times angrier than the prospect of Lee telling him.
“You reached out to my ex-fiancé? What the fuck is wrong with you?” I screeched.
He smirked. “Hey, desperate times call for desperate measures.”
I could have punched him just for that damn grin. “He told a stranger where my father lives?”
He groaned, throwing his head back. “He already knew we were together. Remember?”
“I’ll still cut his balls off.”
He looked at me, throwing his hands in the air. “You can do that later, but now you’re going to listen to me.”
“No, fuck that!” I protested. I didn’t owe him anything.
His smile fell, and he fumed right back, his nostrils flaring. “You didn’t give me a chance to explain. You took Monica at her word and ran with it like she wanted.”
“Because she had official paperwork with your marital status on it, dickhead!”
“Did you catch the date on it?” he asked, raising a brow.
I looked at him stupidly. The date? What?
“That was from over eight years ago when I was married to my ex-wife. My very ex-wife.” He reached into his back pocket, handing me a folded piece of paper.
I opened it, seeing FINAL JUDGMENT AND DECREE OF DIVORCE in bold across the top. Sure enough, it read Jason Joseph Barrett vs. Bianca Ambrosio Barrett beneath and was dated four years back.
I was going to hurl. Could you throw up from happiness? He didn’t lie. I stared at him, my visions clouded with tears. “You didn’t tell me.” If he’d only mentioned it sooner, I would have stayed to be there for him, but I ran. I ran and abandoned him when we should have been there for each other.
“It never came up. It should have, and I’m sorry. I dumped so much on you already that I wasn’t ready to throw that on too.”
I was in shock that it all happened, the time at Dad’s barely numbing the horror. “I don’t know how she knew!”
“She stole pictures from Marty’s office. Peggy sent her in there Friday to gather files when he was at lunch. He was scheduled to be fired the day everything happened. Monica found the pictures and took your personnel file. That’s why you were pulled into HR Monday morning. She laid it all out, so she’d have time to hand out copies without you noticing.”
“Pictures?” I breathed, a hand flying up to cover my mouth. “What pictures?”
“Us kissing at the carnival on our first date, outside the Ferris wheel. He was there with his wife. He took pictures as an insurance policy since he knew he was screwed.”
Nausea struck again. “That’s creepy.”
“Yup. Monica sent a packet to the Board too.”
I shook my head, unable to process it all. “I’m sorry.” It was too much, too many facts whirling at once.
He shrugged, a smile touching his lips. “It doesn’t matter. I beat them to the punch and resigned.”
“From Ithaca? Are you moving right to Chicago?” He had to be so excited to be free of that place. While the shock of what happened stung, I was relieved to escape the drama.
He smiled wider. “I'm not going to Chicago.”
“Why? Are you going to work out of Tampa again?” I asked. He seemed to like it there, but he sold his dream house.
He stared down at me, grabbing my hands in his. “I resigned from the company.”
I shook my head. “Jase, you're at the top of your career!”
He nodded. “I was. Good luck to them finding a replacement.”
“What are you talking about?” I sputtered.
He worked so hard for that job. It was everything to him.
He squeezed my hands. “I've wasted years chasing something that left me empty. When I met you, I realized that. I’m not complete unless I’m with you. That’s worth more than any job.”
I shook my head, tears falling. “You're talking crazy. You can't do that.” I wouldn’t let him throw his dreams away.
“I already did. They told me to fire you, or I was fired. I quit instead.”
He gave everything up for me. I couldn’t stop the influx of tears; guilt, happiness, confusion, and all swirling through my mind. I didn’t know how to feel. “What are you going to do?” I choked out.
He brushed my tears away. “I have some ideas, babe.”
I shook my head. He was talking nonsense. “Like what? You signed non-competes...”
He must have. That meant he was iced out of the industry–the only industry he knew. He took his career and threw it in
