“Tess, look—”
“No, forgive me, Mr. Carter.” She put on her coolest boardroom tone, even as it was hard to breathe. “Certainly your daily responsibilities have nothing to do with me. The assumption was my mistake, based on emotion and our history. I won’t let that happen again.”
“Stop it,” he spat. “Don’t go all Ice Queen on me. Clearly you’re mad, but just hear—”
“Tell me about Annmarie,” she said.
“Dammit, Tess—”
“Please tell me what’s going on with her,” Tess insisted. “That’s all I want to know at this point.”
He swore under his breath, then said tersely, “She’s getting weak. She called me three days ago because she’d fallen and didn’t have the strength to get up. I had to scoop her off her bedroom floor. Scans show the cancer’s in her bones now. So yeah, it doesn’t get better from here, only worse.”
“I’m so sorry,” she murmured, her eyes closing. Damn. Damn it all to hell. “I wish you’d told me.”
“You’re pregnant,” he bit out. “I thought upsetting you needlessly wasn’t good for you and the baby.”
“I’m pregnant,” she echoed, “but I’m not some delicate flower. I’m in perfect health. You don’t have to spare me from things.” She drew a shaky breath. “I thought . . . I thought we were a team. What happened to that?”
“You’re gone,” he said, and the seething anger she heard shook her to the core. “This isn’t your problem, it’s not your responsibility, it’s not your anything.”
She thought she might throw up. She swallowed back bile, then swallowed again to try to loosen the lump in her throat. Finally, she managed softly, “Again, forgive me. I thought we were close. I thought we meant a lot to each other.”
“Tess—”
“Even though I’m not physically there, I wanted to continue to support you however possible. I see now you don’t want that, and I was mistaken. My apologies. Please send Annmarie my best. I won’t call you again.” She ended the call and tossed the phone onto the couch.
She realized her hands were trembling. So were her insides. What the hell had happened? Why was he being like this? Working so hard to push her away? She wrapped her arms around her middle and started to cry. It didn’t matter. Clearly he felt nothing for her like she felt for him. She’d misread him horribly and felt like a fool. Hurting, angry, and upset about Annmarie, Tess sank onto the couch, dropped her head into her hands, and cried.
* * *
“Jesus Christ, you’re a hot mess.”
Logan looked up from his untouched lunch. “What are you talking about?”
“You. You’re moping.” Annmarie shook her head slowly. “I mean, you’ve been a wreck since Tess left, but you’re in rare form today. What happened?”
“Don’t wanna talk about it,” he grumbled, looking back down at his plate. He nudged the wild rice around aimlessly with his fork, pushing it into a pile beside the roasted chicken he had no appetite for.
“It might help to talk about it,” she said.
He glanced up at her. “Nope.”
“Oh boy. This is classic Logan. Old Logan, the one I thought was gone. Pfffft.” She tsked and reached for her water glass with a slow hand. After she took a few sips, she said, “So you want to hear what I was thinking?”
“Sure.”
“I was thinking after I die, you should move to New York and marry Tess.”
He snorted and laughed ruefully. “Not gonna happen.”
“Why not? You love her, she loves you. Why the hell not?”
His eyes rested on her drawn face. “She loves me, huh?”
“Of course she does,” Annmarie scoffed. “I’ve never seen a woman so in love. And I’ll tell you something else. I never once saw Rachel look at you the way Tess does. Not once, in all those years.”
Logan’s eyes widened. He didn’t say a word. He reached for his water glass and gulped before saying, “She’s not in love with me, Mom.”
Annmarie scoured his features, then her mouth made a little twist. “My God . . . You never said the words to her, did you?” she murmured. Her gaze locked on his like a hawk. “Tell me the truth. You’ve never said it to her, have you? Told her you love her.”