The Freelancer – Chapter 97

“You have some nerve showing up here like this,” Daniel said the moment he opened the door.

“My flight is in a few hours.  I need to see her before I go.”

“It’s alright, Daniel,” Jenna said, walking up behind him.  “I’ll take care of this myself.”

“I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me,” he replied before he left.

Her eyes were cold when she looked at me…when she looked through me.  “What do you want, Agent Caldwell?”

Once I saw her, I wanted to hold her, but I restrained myself.  That would be the quickest way to get the door slammed in my face.  Even though she looked like she’d gotten about as much sleep as I had – which wasn’t saying a lot – she was still the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen.  I wanted to make her understand everything I felt in my heart. I wanted her to know everything I could never find the words to say.

“Well?” she asked impatiently.

“I love you, Jenna.”

She shuddered.  Then she did the one thing I never expected.  She punched me square in the jaw.  “No, you don’t!  You used me and even worse, you used the memory of my dead fiancé to get to me.”

“I swear to you, Jenna, I didn’t know about that until the second you told me.”

“Stop lying to me, Jackson!”

She had one hell of a punch.  “I’m not.  You said it yourself; the relationship was kept secret.  It wasn’t in any of the intelligence we had on you.  I’ll let you read the files if you want.”

“You are some piece of work…read the files…they’ve probably already been doctored.”  She fought to remain calm.  “Why should I believe you?”

I looked her in the eye.  “I may have lied about what I did for a living and why I was here, but I swear to God that everything between us was the truth.”

“You lie for a living.”

“Look, it may have been my job to come here, to become a part of your life, but you should know that I don’t regret meeting you.  I tried to keep everything plutonic between us to keep things from getting complicated.”

“So this is my fault now?”  She shook her head and blew out a breath.  “What is this?  I just kept on tossing myself at you and you eventually thought it might be fun?  Was it pity?”

“No, Jenna, it was all me.  I wanted you the second I laid eyes on you, but I didn’t want to hurt you so I tried to get close to you as a friend.  I thought I could handle just being friends with you.  I was wrong.  Once I realized how amazing you were, I couldn’t stay away from you.  I tried to tell myself I had to stop things with you before they went too far, but how could I not be with you, make love to you, fall in love with you?”

I watched as Jenna put her hands over face and ran them through her hair.  It looked like she was about to cry.  The last thing I wanted was to cause her more tears.  I wondered if anything I said got through to her.

“How can I believe a word you say, Jackson?  You told me your wife was dead to make me feel sorry for you.”

I sighed.  “No, the person I was supposed to be when I was undercover was never married.  When we were talking, I let her name slip and I had to tell you something.”

“But not the truth,” she said bitterly.

“If you really want to know, Melissa left me for my last partner.  Frankly, it’s easier to pretend she’s dead than to face the truth that I was the one who was dead inside.  I built this wall around my heart after that to keep it from breaking again, but you changed all of that.”

Jenna looked away.

“I have two sisters; one older, one younger.  When I was growing up, I would always hear my father tell them that whatever heartbreak they were going through would be okay.  He said that the sun would still come up and set the following day and that the world would go on despite their pain.  No offense to my father, he’s an intelligent man, but he never would have said that if he’d met you even once.”

I took her hand in mine and tapped it on my chest.

“You’re in here now.  You broke through the wall I built and you’ll be in my heart until the day I die.  Longer.  Without you in my life, the sun doesn’t rise and set for me.  My world doesn’t work unless you’re in it.”

I watched as a single tear slid down Jenna’s cheek. Then another.

“I want so much to believe you, Jackson, but I don’t know how.”

“You know in your heart I’m telling you the truth, just listen to it.”

She was silent.  I pulled her into my arms and kissed her, hoping she could feel the truth in my kiss since I couldn’t get through to her with words.  Of all the miracles I’ve ever been blessed with in my life, the most cherished was that she kissed me back.  It wasn’t a stiff kiss and it didn’t feel like a good-bye kiss.  Jenna wrapped her arms around my neck and kissed me with everything she had.  It was a perfect moment in time.

Until her body grew rigid and she pulled away.

Her soulful eyes were full of mixed emotions.  There was confusion, anger, love…There was also the silent plea for me to say something, anything, that would repair the damage I’d done.  Still keeping her in my arms, I fought to find the words to do the impossible.

“You wanted me to tell you the truth, Jenna, so here it is, as best as I can tell it.  I love you.  I love you more than I’ve ever loved anyone else and I love you more than I’ll possibly love again.”

Tears streamed down her cheeks.  “Jackson…I don’t know…”  Her voice trailed off.

“Tell me you don’t love me and I’ll leave.  If you truly don’t love me, if this entire love affair between us was all in my head, then I won’t make any trouble for you.  You’ll never have to think of me again.”  It was an awful possibility.  I took a steadying breath to continue.  “But if you can’t look me in the eye and tell me you don’t love me…I’m not going anywhere.  If you need to sleep on it, if you need more time to think…I don’t care how long it takes for you to decide.  I don’t care what I have to do to prove to you that you’re it for me.  I’ll wait right here on this doorstep for you forever if that’s what it takes.”

Jenna stared at me for a long moment.  “I don’t know how I’m supposed to respond.  I don’t know where we’re supposed to go from here.”

I hugged her close.  “Tell me that you love me, Jenna.  We have the rest of our lives to work out the details.”  I pulled back enough to look into her eyes.  “Do you love me?”

“Love you, Jackson?  I don’t even know who you are.  I don’t know that I can ever forgive you.  What did you really expect to accomplish by coming here?” she asked, shoving my arms off her.

My heart sank and I looked at the ground.  “I guess I wanted to tell you good-bye then.”

Shattered, I turned around to walk out of her life.  I paused after a few steps.  “It was real, Jenna.  All of it.”

She remained silent. The only thing in my life that felt right was gone and I had only myself to blame.  When I heard the door slam at my back, my heart died.

It was really over.

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