Page 25 of American Sweethearts

I didn’t know why this was getting to me as much as it was. I wondered if he knew what it would do to me to see this room. Onsecond thought, I didn’t need to wonder. He knewexactlywhat I was thinking. Without any fucking warning, my mouth started moving.

“You know what’s funny?” I asked, giving my back to him as I studied the shelf where he’d put all the travel books we’d pored over before our many trips together. So many years of shared moments with J and here I was, walking into the place he’d been living for almost two years. The person that knew me the most in the whole world was in so many ways a stranger now.

That thought filled me with sadness, and soon it was all coming out of me. “I always thought I was the one who wanted all this,” I said, as I lifted a hand to the framed photographs on the wall. “That part of the reason things seemed to always go awry was because I wanted something you didn’t.”

I sat on the arm of the couch, listening to the soft snores of Tita and Pepe who were snuggled up on their little dog beds in one corner of the room. J, who was never one to rush into an answer, especially one that might lead to an argument, took me in. His stance closed off. Cautious.

His arms crossed over his chest and his eyes focused on something far away. I looked at him and thought once again, how much I missed having him in my life. How I wished things could be different, thatIcould be different, and able to let go more. When he finally spoke, it was like thunder crackling through the room.

“When have you ever known me to do something I didn’t want to do?” He pushed off the mantel and walked over to stand in front of me. And because when it came to Juan Pablo Campos my body was a traitorous bitch, I had to dig my fingernails into my palms to keep from touching him. “The issues we’ve had were never about us not wanting the same things. They were about us being too stubborn to make the changes we needed to make for that to happen.”

I could feel my hackles going up, my mouth pursing, ready to curse him out. Tell him that it was easy for him to call me stubborn when he’d never had to wonder if his choices would trap him. But like he’d been doing since we got on that plane to the DR, Juan Pablo surprised me.

“And you know, that’s not fair for me to say. I never had to wonder what I’d lose when I decided not to go to the academy. I knew I had a backup plan and Nonno would help me with grad school if I wanted that. I knew my parents didn’t need my help or would in the future. Your choices were always harder, and you’ve never shied away from them.”

He smiled bitterly then, and looked up to the ceiling. “My choices were never that hard, and when it came down to a difficult one, I bailed on the idea of being a cop without a second thought. Even when it meant breaking my promise to you.”

I’d been waiting for him to say that for over ten years, to admit that he’d broken my trust, and it left me cold to realize that hearing the guilt and sadness as he spoke brought me no relief.

I shifted where I was sitting again, trying to keep myself from reaching out to him. “We were kids, J, and becoming a cop isn’t exactly something you want to do just to keep your girlfriend happy.” I let myself slide onto the chair, since it was clear this conversation was long from over. “I was unreasonable, and I wonder now…”

Shit, this was something I’d avoided telling even myself, and because this new Juan Pablo always seemed to know the right thing to do, he sat down on the couch next to me and waited me out. “I wonder if the reason why I could never get past you backing out of the academy was because I was scared I’d made a mistake by joining.”

At that his eyes widened, as if he couldn’t really believe he’d heard me right.

“It’s hard to remember sometimes that the hard ass thing is not who you are.” He shook his head and closed his eyes as if the words he needed were somewhere deep inside, in a place where he didn’t think he’d need to go looking ever again. “I never pushed or asked if things weren’t going well because I thought if I did, it would just start a fight. Like you’d forget I’d bailed on you and bringing it up would remind you.”

He was still regarding me with that knowing gaze he’d been sending my way lately, and I decided to say the last of this, and be done. “It’s not that I did this against my will. I like being a cop. I feel useful and it gives me purpose. But it hasn’t been easy and I think in those moments when I want to quit—when I wonder if I can keep tolerating the toxic shit that always seems to be sitting right under the surface—that if I vent to you, I’d get a big ‘I told you so.’ If I mention it to my parents, that they’d be disappointed.”

The relief of being able to say that felt like an anvil had been lifted off my shoulders. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise that in the end, it was to J I’d been able to say what I’d been holding in for what felt like eons.

He looked down at the little marble top roundtable between us. I could tell he was trying hard to figure out how to say whatever he was thinking. “I’m going to say this now, too late probably for it to make a real difference.” His voice was earnest, like he needed me to hear how important this was. “I’m sorry I ever made you feel like you couldn’t tell me how you were feeling.”

I swallowed hard and took a few deep breaths. This was so much more than I’d been ready to deal with today. It felt good to hear him say that though, and I knew it was the truth because despite all the ups and downs, he was right, Juan Pablo had never lied to me. When I finally opened my mouth to speak, I found that I felt light. Freer somehow.

“Thank you, and don’t whine when I’m over here all the time complaining about everything. You asked for it, Juan Pablo.” I winked at him and he blushed again. I leaned in closer, just because the more I sat here with him, the less sense it made to have any distance between us. That old ache of constant want that ravaged me when he was close wreaking havoc on all my boundaries.

My breath caught when his tongue slid over his upper lip, a gesture that was usually a prelude to him doing some inflammatory shit that ended with us in bed. “I feel like this is some sort of truce and I don’t want to ruin it by letting my dick call the shots.”

I actually clapped a hand to my mouth to keep the bark of laughter from coming out, but the way his face broke out into a huge smile told me my eyes were communicating my current state loud and clear.

“What?” He was barely able to choke that out and his cheeks were practically by his eyes. “You know we keep it real, Pris. I’m glad we could talk, because I’m not gonna lie to you, I’ve been really fucked up about how things have been with us.” He shook his head and the regret there had to be a mirror image of mine. “I hate it.”

I wanted to glom all this up. To take it all in, tell him we were good to go and that we could start where we’d left off. But I was scared. The last time everything had blown up between us had changed something in me. It had hurt so much and for so long, I could still remember the pain. The way that I couldn’t take a deep breath for weeks. How for months after, it would hit me out of nowhere that I couldn’t call him when I needed him and I’d just burst into tears. Even now, just recalling it made me flinch. The pain of losing the only person whom I could really be myself with. And that wasn’t even true either. I had friends and family who loved me just like I was, whom I could be myself with, butthey weren’t Juan Pablo. No one could ever be what he was to me.

And because that truth was so massive that it felt like it was the load-bearing beam of my life, I stood up from my chair, went over to stand in front of him and pulled him up for a kiss.

chapter seventeen

juan pablo

If anyone ever asked me about the place where everything made sense, I would unequivocally say it was with Priscilla Gutierrez’s arms wrapped around my neck.

She didn’t give me a chance to think or to even ask if she was sure before she’d pressed herself against me, her lips scoring my skin. Leaving a trail of heat and firing up all the places that I thought would never be stoked alive again.

“Pris,” I said reluctantly, but I’d never been too strong when it came to her. I licked into her mouth, my hands already roaming to touch and grip those places that had been mine for so long. The ones that I’d owned with my mouth and my hands hundreds of times. The ones I’d given up on having again.

Her teeth and tongue on my neck had me panting, and I grabbed her tight, trying to ground myself for a second, because I had to ask. “Are you sure about this?”