Can't Stand the Heat - Louisa Edwards [105]
Getting right to the heart of the matter, she said, “I want you to quit your job. Meet some people your own age. If you stay away from Frankie, these feelings will fade. You’ll see. In a few weeks, it’ll be like ‘Frankie who?’ ”
“And now we’re back to this again.” Jess pushed away from the wall and stalked past Miranda. She caught at his shirtsleeve but he shrugged her off, only turning to glare at her.
“Once you’re not seeing him every single day, you’ll—”
“I like working at Market. I like the people there. Grant’s been really good to me, and Adam gave me a shot when no one else would’ve.” Jess sighed. “And honestly, I love seeing Frankie every day. I don’t want to give that up. I’m not giving him up, Miranda.”
She drew breath to argue, but Jess cut her off with a sharp hand gesture. “The issue of Frankie aside, I can’t afford to quit.” He squared his shoulders. “You don’t want me working my way through college, but I need to help pay for my own education. It’s important to me. And I know you don’t really have the money for NYU.”
“You could get another job, somewhere else,” she tried, knowing already that it was unlikely. Waiting tables at an upscale place like Market was a lucrative proposition for a student. Most restaurants at that level wouldn’t hire someone with Jess’s scant experience, and two weeks at Market followed by a precipitate departure would hardly be inspiring résumé material.
“Will you at least come home and stay with me?” Miranda asked around the hard, scratchy lump in her throat.
Jess smiled tremulously, and there he was, the sweet boy Miranda’d raised, not so far under the surface after all. “If you’ll still have me.”
“Of course I will,” Miranda said, fighting not to sob out loud. He looked almost surprised, but very glad, and Miranda braved another shrug-off to get her arms around him. This time he allowed the contact, and even hugged back, clinging a little.
“I would never turn you away.” Miranda spoke fiercely into his shirt. “Not for any reason. Promise me you’ll always remember that.”
“I promise,” Jess said, his voice thick with tears.
Miranda stroked her baby brother’s back soothingly and closed her eyes.
She’d always said she’d do anything to keep Jess safe; this was the true test. Would she sell her integrity down the river? Would she betray the people she’d worked with, laughed and talked with, for the last two weeks?
Would she give up her chance at making up with Adam and getting him to fall in love with her?
With a sharp shudder of agony, Miranda acknowledged the answer.
Yes.
Jess was right. She didn’t have the money to pay for his tuition—unless she delivered that manuscript and cashed the check from the publisher. It all came down to money, in the end. If she had that check, she could afford to send Jess to school. If she had that check, she could talk him into quitting his job at Market, she knew she could.
If she had that check, she could get Frankie Boyd out of Jess’s life and give Jess a chance to fall in love with someone his own age. To have the freedom to meet new people at school and stretch his wings, to be himself, without being tied to a man who couldn’t truly care for him the way he deserved.
When she looked at it like that, the decision was really very simple. Heart-wrenching, gut-twisting, but simple.
Later that afternoon, as her finger hovered over the send button, hesitating to make that one final movement that would deliver her manuscript to Empire Publishing, Miranda berated herself.
This is no time to get squeamish. Think about what Mom and Dad would’ve wanted. Think about Jess.
Whatever you do, don’t think about Adam Temple.
Don’t think about his hands, his quick smile, his happy laugh, oh, God, that dimple . . . Don’t think about the way he makes your whole body buzz with energy or the way he loves to hear you talk. Don’t think about how much you lov—
She blanked her mind, and pushed the button.
TWENTY-FIVE
Adam cursed loudly and inventively. A Sunday-night service should not be this fucking