She’s pushing her feet into her sneakers and grabbing her purse.

“Mia?”

She ignores me, pulling her jacket on.

“Mia, please. Talk to me.”

She grabs her car keys, swings her purse over her shoulder, and without a word she pushes past me and walks quickly down the hall.

I’m at her heel, following, trying to talk to her.

“Please don’t go … just wait … I know how hard this must be for you … how much you’re hurting right now … but if you’ll just let me explain…”

She stops outside on the porch—the porch where I made love to her only a few hours ago, when I lied to her again—and slowly turns around.

The cold in her eyes, and the dead look on her face, tell me what I already fear.

I’ve lost her.

There is no getting past this.

I lied to her. I let her down. Men have been letting Mia down her whole life, and now I’ve just added my name to that list.

“Explain? You want to explain now? You’ve had DAYS TO EXPLAIN!” she yells. “DAYS TO TELL ME THE TRUTH, BUT YOU LIED … you lied.” Her voice drops to a whisper. “She loved you … not me – you. She left me with him. God, she must have hated me…”

“No, Mia. No. You need to hear everything, you need to let me explain.”

“I DON’T WANT TO HEAR ANYTHING MORE!” she screams. Tears are streaming down her face, and her hand is clutching her stomach again.

My eyes are stinging from her pain. I rub them roughly with my hand.

“I have to go,” she says in an eerily small voice, her eyes sweeping to her car. “I have to get out of here.”

A fist of absolute agony twists in my chest.

She runs for her car, unlocking it on her approach. I scramble after her, grabbing her arm, trying to keep her with me.

“Don’t go,” I plead. “Not like this. Please, Mia. Just stay, talk to me. I can fix this. I will fix this.”

Her empty eyes lift to mine. “This isn’t fixable … I’m not fixable. I was broken a long time ago beyond repair.”

She yanks her arm from my hand, climbs in her car, and drives away, leaving me in a cloud of dust and agony.

I don’t realize I’m sitting on the gravel until I feel Dad’s hand on my shoulder.

“I’m so sorry, Jordan. I’m sorry that you’re paying for the mistakes Belle made a long time ago.”

I scrub my face with my hands, then get to my feet.

“No … I just … I can’t lose her. I have to make this right. I’m gonna go after her—”

“No.” He places a firm hand on my shoulder, holding me in place. “That’s not a good idea. If you go after her now, it could only make things worse. Give her time to cool down, process her hurt.”

“But what if she doesn’t come back?” The pain in my chest twists to pure fucking agony. I rub at the ache, feeling breathless.

“Her things are here, Jordan. She has to come back for them.”

“No.” I shake my head, knowing how she left everything she owned behind in Boston when she ran. “Material things don’t matter to her. She left everything behind in Boston, so a few clothes left behind won’t make her come back here.”

A look of concern twists his expression for a moment. Then he pats my shoulder. “She cares about you, a lot. She’ll come back. If she doesn’t, then we’ll find her.”

“How?”

He puts his arm around my shoulders, and starts to steer me back inside. “Have you forgotten that your old man used to be a cop? Finding people is what I’m good at.” He smiles, trying to be helpful, positive, encouraging.

I nod, not really feeling it because my fear isn’t not finding her. I’ll track the earth until the day I do.

No, my fear is what will be waiting for me when I do see her again.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Mia

There’s nothing.

No thoughts in my mind.

No pain in my body.

No ache in my heart.

Just one focus. One aim.

I slam on the brakes in the grocery store parking lot.

Sliding my sunglasses on, I grab my purse and head inside.

I get a cart. Then I hit the aisles.

There’s no conscious thought. Just need. Only need.

My cart is filling quickly. I’m eating already. A bag of chips already torn open and gone. A pack of candy half-eaten.

If people are staring, I don’t care to see.

The cashier attempts small talk. I don’t reply.

I bag my food, pay and leave.

Then I drive my car to the motel at the edge of town, the one I came to the other day.

Most people come to motels during the day to have affairs. I come to eat. To hide my shame.

Yet, in this moment it doesn’t feel so shameful anymore.

Just necessary.

A means to an end … an end I can’t currently see.

I check in at the desk. One night. I don’t need any more than that.

I just need to get this out of my system. Then I’m leaving town.

Once I have the key to my room, I go back to my car and get my bags of food.

I let myself in the room and dump the bags on the bed.

It’s not the room I was in the other day, but it looks exactly the same.

The same cheap, dirty, stale overused room. It feels right to be here.

That’s what I am. Cheap, stale and overused.

I foolishly let myself think otherwise. Let myself think I was worth something … that I meant something to someone … him.

Jordan.

It hurts to think his name.

I bang my hands against my forehead, forcing him out, but he won’t go.

So I go over to the age old television and turn it on. I want to drown out the pain in my head with meaningless, but the knowledge still creeps in and cripples me.

Music from the television flows into the room, filling every empty corner with Rihanna’s “Diamonds”.

Pain lances through me. I catch a sob with a fist to my mouth as I sink to the floor.

How could he…? How could she…?

Stop, Mia. Stop now.

You know how to take the pain away.

I crawl over to the bed and rip open the first thing I lay my hand on.

Shoving it in my mouth, I chew quickly, swallowing. There’s no taste. Just relief. The relief that always comes with this.

I drag a bag down from the bed, emptying its contents to the floor.

I tear open another packet – cookies. I shove them in my mouth, chewing, trying to eat as many as I can as quickly as possible.

But the food is sticking, like my body is ready to reject already.

I swallow hard, forcing it down, and grab the bottle of soda I bought, downing some, lubricating my dry throat.

Then I start in, eating harder than I ever have before.

***

I’m laying on the dirty floor of the room, staring up at the cracked ceiling. Nearly all the food is gone, my body is drenched in sweat, and my stomach hurts like I’ve never known before.

I’ve eaten more than I ever have before.

But the feeling is soothing because it’s better to feel the painful ache of the food in my stomach, than to feel the crippling agony threatening to shred my heart to pieces.

My mother abandoned me to raise him.

Jordan.

The man I’m in love with.

I’m truly that worthless.

I struggle to my feet. I’m going to be sick. But I hold it back.

I need the relief of doing this to myself.

Struggling my way to the bathroom, I kneel at the toilet. Fingers pressed together, I push back in my throat, and rid myself of the pain trying to consume me.

***

It’s still here. It didn’t work.

No.

They’ve taken this from me too.

My ability to stop feeling. To stop the pain from taking me over. And now it’s here, and my ribs feel as if they’re going to crack from the absolute agony that’s tearing through me.

No. No. No. No!

I hate him.

I hate her.

I’m glad she’s dead.

Crawling out of the bathroom, I struggle to my feet. My legs feel numb, my head woozy.

I stagger over to the bed. Scouring through the mess of empty bags and wrappers and containers that litter the bed and floor, I find some food. A bag of popcorn and some peanut butter cups.

No! I need more than this.

I check the bed for more food, but nothing.

Ripping open the popcorn, I shove it into my mouth, handfuls at a time, retching as I swallow, but I don’t care, I push through. Then I switch to the peanut butter cups. When they’re gone, I get down on my hands and knees, rummaging through the trash on the floor.

I find a jar of chocolate spread which had rolled under the bed. I crack it open and start scooping it out with my hand, shoveling it in my mouth.

Then the food’s gone, and I’m nowhere near full, but it’ll have to do. I stumble back to the bathroom, stand over the sink, and force the food back up.

Running the water, I try to wash the sick away, but the plug is blocked. There’s chocolate all over my hands and arms. Vomit in the sink. I lift my head and see myself in the mirror above it.

Disgusting.

Food is smeared across my mouth, my face … in my hair. There’s vomit on me.

I’m disgusting.

I don’t hate them – Jordan. Anna.

I hate me.

Anger that I’ve never allowed myself to feel tears through me. I slam my fist into the mirror.

It shatters, small shards falling into the sink.

Blood drips down from my hand landing on the white tiles beneath my feet.

But I don’t feel the pain in my hand, only the pain in my heart.

I close my eyes on the flood.

The self-hate. The disgust. The loss. The helplessness.

The gates open up, and it all comes washing in – fierce, like the force of a tsunami.

I grip the sink, opening my eyes, but I can’t see for the hot, burning tears.

I need to get out of here. I need more … something, anything.

Moving too quickly, shadows dance before my eyes, blinding me, taunting me. I stumble around the bathroom, searching for the doorway.

I’ve overdone it.

I’m going to black-out.

Fuck.

I reach my hand out for support, finding none, and it’s too late, I’m going down … hard.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Jordan

“I can’t take this any longer,” I say, grabbing my car keys off the table.

I’ve waited all day, but there’s been no sign of Mia.

And now it’s getting late.

And I’m beyond fucking worried.

I tried calling her cell a few hours ago. I got her number from the booking in sheet. How bad is that – I didn’t even know her cell number. But then I’ve never needed to call her, and I’ve not once seen her with a cell in all the time I’ve been with her. Still, I had to give it a try.

It was a dead end. It was switched off, and I couldn’t even leave a damn voicemail because her mailbox was full.

I’m frustrated, and I feel fucking helpless, so now I’m doing the only thing I can. I’m going to look for her.

“I’ll come with you.” Dad gets to his feet.

“No, stay here in case she comes back. If she does, call me right away.”