They needed people in their lives who will stay. People they can count on. I was the furthest thing from that to ever exist—but he deserved to hear that from me, not to be left the way I almost did. And even that just thrust me deeper into my belief that I wasn’t good for anyone. Not the way I currently was.

“I need to see him,” I said. “Before we go. I have to tell him in person.”

She nodded. “All right. We’ll take you there tomorrow.”

“And then what?”

“It’s my turn to pick,” she said. “I get to pick two times in a row. That was the deal.”

I wiped under my eyes. “Okay. So where are we going?”

“Somewhere you always should have been.”

CHAPTER 44 JUSTIN

I went home like Maddy said, and I waited. Emma texted me around 10:00 p.m. and told me she was coming to talk to me tomorrow morning.

I didn’t sleep all night.

The kids kept asking where she was. I didn’t know what to say.

She’d left her key on the credenza. I couldn’t touch it. I couldn’t move it. I felt like the second I acknowledged it was there, the reason why she’d left it would be real.

I kept thinking about what Maddy said, to never let her leave, because if she leaves, she won’t come back.

I should have never let her out of my sight. I should have gone with her to talk to Amber. She was vulnerable and she wasn’t okay, I should have seen that. And now even though she was coming home, I had a feeling she wasn’t.

I wanted to be wrong. I pictured her showing up at the door with her bags and apologizing for leaving and I’d hug her and take her inside and life as we knew it would continue, and we’d never think about this blip again. She didn’t take off on me and the kids because she intended to never come back, she was just freaked out. This was a knee-jerk reaction to what happened, understandable.

But when the morning came and she finally got here and I ran to the door and threw it open, it was just her. Nothing was with her. No luggage. And Maddy was parked behind her in front of the house with the car running.

My heart sank.

“Can we talk in the living room?” she asked, still standing in the doorway.

“We could go upstairs,” I said. “We could sleep for a bit and talk when we feel better,” I said hopefully. I felt like if I could get her to my room, I could derail this. Nestle her back down into the life we’d been living, remind her it was good and she wanted it.

“I think the living room is better.”

I swallowed hard and let her take me to the sofa.

It didn’t escape me that all the worst news I’d ever gotten in my life was delivered on this sofa. It was where I found out Dad had died. It’s where Mom told me she was going to prison.

I had this almost out-of-body urge to ask if we could move to the kitchen instead, but I didn’t want to taint the breakfast nook too.

She sat on the cushion next to me. Our knees touched. I wanted to grab her and take her off the cursed sofa and run away with her before she said what I thought she was going to say. I hated this. I didn’t want it to keep going.

“Please stop,” I said, before she even started.

She peered at me with a face that looked like heartbreak.

“Justin, you know I only want what’s best for you, right?”

“Whatever you’re about to do is not what’s best for me,” I said. “I don’t want it.”

She looked away. “Tell the kids I had to take a new assignment. Okay? Tell them it was an emergency and I had to go.”

“No.” I shook my head. “We’re not doing this, Emma.”

“Justin—”

“No. Whatever it is you’re going through right now, we go through it together. That’s what couples do.”

“I am not okay.” She came back to me and looked me in the eye. “I need you to hear me when I say this. I am not okay. I’m not someone who should be around the kids.”

“Let me decide that.”

“No.” Her chin quivered. “Justin, do you know what I would never wish on anyone? The instability that I grew up with. That’s what I am. I don’t know how to be a normal human being. I don’t know how to love without being terrified. I don’t know how to fight with you without my first impulse to be to pack up and leave and never see you again. I don’t know how to belong to a family who only belongs to me because I belong to you. I am not strong enough for it. And I am giving you the one thing Amber could never give to me and that’s to be honest about it and let you go.”

I felt the panic in my chest.

“Look at me, Emma. Look.” I took her hands. “We can do this. I can help you.”

“You can’t. I promise you, you cannot undo twenty-nine years of conditioning. I don’t even know if I can do it. I have cracks that I need to fill and I can’t do that here. I can’t do that with you, or them.”

“How do you know?” I asked.

“Because the more I care about all of you, the more I want to run.”

She held my gaze. “I almost left you last night without saying goodbye. Do you even know that? I would have disappeared on those kids just like Amber did to me. I almost left Maddy.” She cracked on the last word.

The words lingered in the space between us.

“I have too much to unpack,” she said. “I have triggers that I can’t control.”

I could see the pain on her face. I felt like I was looking in a mirror.

“Emma, I’m going to tell you something. And I don’t need you to say anything, I just need you to hear it.” I paused. “I’m in love with you. I’ve been in love with you since the moment I laid my eyes on you. And I know we haven’t known each other long, but I don’t care, because it’s true and it’s there, and it doesn’t matter to me if it makes sense or not. I’ve been waiting my whole life to feel like this and I thought it was a curse that nobody else ever worked out. But it wasn’t. It’s just that they weren’t you.” I had to give myself a moment. “Please. Don’t end this. I’m begging you.”

She pressed her lips together, trying not to cry. “I have to deal with my issues before I can be a partner or a parent to anyone.”

“And are you? Going to deal with your issues? Because I’ll wait.”

She shook her head. “No you won’t. You are going to take care of those kids, and you’re going to live your life and you’re going to meet someone else. You are not going to sit around hoping that one day I’m whole enough to love you and them the way they deserve.” The tears spilled down her cheeks. “I did that. I waited. I waited my entire life for her to be whole and she never was. I don’t want that for you. Or them. I don’t want to be their Amber.”

This is what finally broke her. And then it broke me. Because I knew there was nothing I could do to change it and I also knew she was right.

The kids did need stability. And she wasn’t it. I knew in my heart she was making the right choice not only for herself but also for them. Maybe even for me too. Maybe she was doing now what she would have done anyway in a month, or two, or three and she was sparing all of us the pain of being that much more attached to someone and something we could never have.