I read them and fell apart. I lost a part of my heart in those letters, but I won’t tell him that.

“But they didn’t matter to you?”

“You lied to me, Jackson!” I say infuriated that he continues to neglect this fact. “I told you my deal-breakers. I gave you every chance to tell me about your wife.” I throw my hands up and start to pace. “I can’t have this conversation with you now. I’m not angry, or upset, I’m not going through this again. You promised me. You fucking promised!” I yell and push against his chest. “You promised. Of course those damn letters mattered, but they don’t change anything!”

“I know.”

“You weren’t supposed to break my heart,” I say, clutching my stomach.

Jackson pulls me to his chest and his voice is thick with emotion. “You weren’t supposed to win mine. I was dead inside. I refused to ever love again, yet here we are.”

I look up and plead with him. “Please, let me go.”

His jaw sets and he releases me. “I can’t. Sit down. No more games, no more lies.”

“Jackson,” I say drawing a deep breath. “It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters. Things have changed.”

“Not for me they haven’t! I’m fucking dying without you, Catherine. My entire fucking world doesn’t make sense anymore. How is that possible? How even after the absolute hell I’ve lived through does that make sense? Because it does matter. We matter, goddammit.” He drops to his knees in front of me.

I look at his face and see it. The bags under his eyes, the pain in his eyes. He’s a mess. So am I. I sink to the couch and we continue to look at each other. I ache. I physically ache for him.

“Love shouldn’t hurt like this,” I say as he grips my hands.

“I was married for six years to a woman named Madelyn.”

“Please don’t do this.”

Jackson continues as if he didn’t hear my request. “I met her when I was active duty. I fell in love with her. She was beautiful, alluring, and I was a twenty-two-year-old idiot who thought he was invincible. The world was at my feet. I was a Navy-fucking-SEAL and she doted on me.”

I close my eyes wishing he would stop and we could say goodbye.

But he doesn’t.

“She was born into a wealthy family. Her parents gave her anything she wanted because she was born with a severe heart condition. I married her after two years thinking it was the next step. Maddie and I had everything even though we couldn’t ever have kids. Losing her was pure fucking torture.” Jackson looks at me and tears fill my eyes.

“I’m sorry you lost someone you loved.” I don’t know what else to say.

“I didn’t lose her. I was the reason she died,” he says as he grips the bridge of his nose.

My jaw falls slack. “I don’t understand.”

“This isn’t going to be easy for me. I know you think you fought feeling anything for me but you have no idea how hard I fought against you. I didn’t ever want to love again. There wasn’t a part of me that ever wanted to feel this again.” Jackson’s gaze bores through me. “If I didn’t love you, then I wouldn’t have to lose you. I wouldn’t have to feel the fucking pain and torment again. You were never supposed to get to me.”

I look at him as he traces his calloused thumb across my palm. “Jackson, we can’t do this to each other.”

“Maddie and I enjoyed our life together as long as I kept her needs first. She hated the deployments, training exercises, and most of all she hated how much I loved it. There were times I had to miss her doctor’s appointments because of the Navy, but I loved being a SEAL. We knew from the beginning we could never have kids. I was fine with it because I was gone so much.” Jackson’s eyes glaze over and he grips my hand harder.

“Her family demanded she take over Raven. The Elliotts built it from the ground up. They urged me to leave the service because I should be home to care for Madelyn. After the mission that went wrong, Maddie demanded it too. I wanted to re-enlist, but we barely saw each other as it was, and now she was going to be in New York. She hated being a military wife and I loved her, so I gave it up. We fought and argued, but ultimately her happiness came first for me.” He looks at me for the first time with tears building in his eyes.

“You don’t have to …” Watching him cry is too much.

“That last mission happened four months before my contract was up. I was on limited duty anyway, so I said fuck it and I quit. She was happy and I thought that’s all that mattered. She gained complete control of the company and we bought out her brother. I had a lot of money saved from my missions. My only request was that I start the security company. She supported it—I think she knew there was a part of me that felt dead. I hated the messages from Mark and the guys about what they were doing. I fucking wanted to crawl out of my skin staying in New York, so I made Cole Securities bid for contracts so that I could still use my skills. Of course, it meant I was gone from her again.”

“Why are you telling me this?” I ask as a tear falls from my face. I don’t want to hear about how much he loved his wife.

“Because I should’ve told you before. But I was terrified it would make everything real. It was the only piece of me I had left to give you. If you knew about her then you would see how fucking wrecked I am.” He trembles as he speaks and another tear falls from his eyes. “I would’ve sold my soul to have the rest of this story not happen. I was flying between New York and Virginia constantly. We were trying to make it work. She was getting sicker, so I couldn’t leave as often and she had to resign from Raven. None of the doctors were sure why her medication suddenly wasn’t effective. There was a problem with something in Virginia and I had to handle it … she begged me not to go. She said she felt sicker than usual, but Maddie was dramatic. She said fine, go, that she’d call her mother. So I left. What kind of man leaves his wife whose heart was starting to fail?” he asks rhetorically before beginning again.

“As much as I knew I shouldn’t go, I couldn’t stay. I got on the plane and when I landed, I had thirty missed calls. Madelyn had collapsed and was in a coma.”

I gasp and he looks up. “See, we couldn’t have kids, Catherine. I knew this, she knew this. But she must’ve come off her birth control or I don’t know, but she was pregnant.” Jackson’s hand covers his heart and he grips at his chest. “Her heart failed because she couldn’t carry a baby. I killed her and I killed our baby. Knowing I was the reason she died is beyond anything I can describe.” Jackson’s tears fall silently as he relives his grief.

He looks up at me and I sink on to the floor with him and wrap my arms around him. He’s so broken. My heart drops and I join him with my own tears as I see the anguish on his face. This isn’t what I was expecting. I thought he was divorced, not that she’d died. And he lost a baby too. How much loss can one person handle? He’s lost so many people in his life by some form of tragedy.

“I’m so sorry,” I say with tears streaming.

“The doctors said she was about four weeks, but the increased stress on her heart was too much and she never woke up. Her family blamed me for being careless and hated me for a long time. But no one can hate me more than I hate myself.”