It wasn’t a question. “That’s not true,” she said softly. She cared about him a lot, but he was asking for a commitment from her she couldn’t make. Love? When did she have time to love someone fully? The way they deserved? The way he deserved?

He stared at his feet. Silent.

The tension around them was suffocating.

“So, that’s it?”

The hurt in his voice was unbearable, but words refused to come. The right words, at least. “I don’t know how to do this, Reed.”

A glimmer of hope reflected in his eyes, like a tiny life preserver she wished she had the courage to grab.

“Can you trust me to help you figure it out?”

She wanted to, but, “What if I don’t get there? Where you are?”

“Are you willing to try?”

It was a fair question, but he wouldn’t be satisfied with her answer. “Not if it means sacrificing my career or not giving my patients my best.”

He looked defeated as he nodded. “Then I guess I should go.”

No! Her heart screamed at her to do the right thing. For once in her life to take a chance on something that didn’t make sense. But years of ignoring her heart made it easy to silence it now. She nodded.

“And Christmas...?”

God, she wanted to give him the answer he was hoping for. But making another false promise would be too cruel.

“No.”

“Okay.” He hit the button for the elevator door and she resisted the overwhelming urge to reach for him, to touch him one more time, to kiss him one more time... She couldn’t. That would be selfish. She had to let him go. And if those arms wrapped around her, those lips touched hers, she wouldn’t have the strength.

“Bye, Erika,” he said as he left the elevator. Turning back, he added, “You were wrong, you know.”

No doubt she was wrong about a lot of things. “About what?”

“It doesn’t hurt less when you’re not expecting it.” Then he headed toward the front door.

Her legs felt unsteady beneath her and she craved the safety and privacy of her office as tears threatened to fall, but the flashing lights of an incoming ambulance illuminated Reed’s disappearing figure and the sound of sirens drowned out the breaking of her heart.

* * *

REED STARED THROUGH the frosted window of his truck at the Anchorage Addictions Treatment Center. What the hell was he doing here? Leaving the hospital, he’d been in a fog. When his surprise visit to Erika had crashed and burned he should have headed back to Wild River. Instead, he’d driven here.

Nothing good would come of this stop either.