“I don’t see anything in the cuts, but you might want to have a doctor take a look—”
“No,” was all Matias said in response, then he tugged at his hand. To my surprise, I found myself unwilling to release it.
What the hell was I doing? If the man wanted to go, I should let him go. I wanted him to go.
So then why were the next words out of my mouth, “At least let me bandage it up for you?”
I took his lack of movement as a yes. I returned to my vanity and opened the drawer where I kept the bandages. The silence was unnerving, so the chatterbox in me reared its ugly head again.
“Sorry, all I have is this,” I said as I held up the elastic bandage. “Ryan’s going through a hot-pink phase at the moment.” I winced when I realized I only had one kind of Band-Aid in my drawer. “And a glitter phase,” I murmured as I grabbed the box of shimmery Band-Aids. Matias barely acknowledged the glittery hot-pink bandages or the equally blinding elastic wrap.
Which only served to make me more nervous.
“At least the gauze is white,” I said as I deposited all the items on a little side table that I normally kept my glass of wine and book on when I was taking a bath. Since it felt awkward to be towering over Matias as he sat and I stood, I stepped into the shower to grab the teak stool I kept in there. It was only when I set it down in front of Matias and settled onto it that the verbal diarrhea started all over again.
“I keep this in the shower because I have a bad knee,” I explained as I motioned to the stool. “Not because of my age or anything,” I sputtered. “I fell. On my knee. When I was getting off the bus… years ago.”
Shut up, Sam.
“I mean, yeah, sometimes my joints start to hurt a bit after a long day and it’s nice to sit down in the shower…”
Shut up right now.
“But it’s not like I need a walker to get around yet. I have to say, though, that old adage about the weather affecting your joints as you get older seems to be true because lately I—”
I finally managed to stop talking when my eyes met Matias’s and my breath hitched. As gorgeous as his chocolate-colored eyes were, it was the way he was looking at me that had me unable to breathe. He was watching me like… like…
I had no comparison because no one had ever looked at me that way. Not even Mac.
The shame of betraying the memory of the man who’d been my entire life from the moment I’d met him was like a physical blow and I found myself actually recoiling from it… from Matias. But in my effort to escape the far too dangerous man in front of me, I tripped over the stool and promptly hit the floor hard. Matias’s fingers closed around my upper arm, presumably to try and stop my downward trajectory, but all the move managed to do was have him bent over me when I crashed to the ground.
I welcomed the pain as the hard surface and my body made contact. But the sting didn’t last long enough to drown out any of the guilt that was winding throughout my entire body like the most invasive of vines. When Matias tried to help me sit up, I shook my head and jerked away from him. I practically crawled across the floor to escape his damning touch. Thankfully, he didn’t follow me.
“Sam—”
“Don’t!” I croaked. “Please, just go.” My voice cracked as I whispered “Please” again.
I didn’t dare look at him because I knew I’d cry if I did. Or worse, I’d do something like beg him just to hold me for a little while. To let me pretend he was Mac.
Strong, kind, bigger-than-life-itself Mac. The man who’d loved me when no one else had. The man who’d wanted to call me his husband and who’d given me the child that had carried his blood but had been born of both our hearts. The only man I’d ever given not only my body to, but my heart as well.
What kind of man did it make me that I was even wondering anything about another man when I’d already had the perfect one in my life?
"Please, just go," I whispered. I was too much of a coward to look up at him, so the only proof I had that he was actually listening to my request was when I heard his footsteps moving away from me. I heard a door slam shut and, judging from the distance, I figured it was either the back door or the front one. I didn't really care which. All I cared about was that the mysterious, dangerous man who'd made me feel things he shouldn't have was gone.
It took me several long minutes to pull myself together enough to climb to my feet. I turned around and faced the sink so I could wash my face. I tried not to look in the mirror, but it was inevitable. My face was blotchy and my eyes were red and puffy. My throat felt tight and my chest hurt. It was almost like I’d just learned of Mac's death. That mantra of crap that people said about a loved one dying like “it will get better” or “time heals all” was complete bullshit. I missed Mac every day of my life and I missed him as much today as I had every day since the moment the chief of police and a pastor had shown up on my doorstep. The grief might not have been as crippling today as it had been back then, but it was still there.
I turned the water on and waited until it was at its coldest before plunging my hands beneath it and scooping up some of the icy liquid. I washed my face and then shut the water off before reaching for a hand towel. My fingers had just closed around the soft material when I heard it.
A pounding sound.
Was someone knocking at my door? Had Matias returned?
I hated the little flutter of excitement in my belly as I considered that last question. I forced myself to ignore the sound, but when it didn't stop, my anger grew and the need to lash out got stronger. I let out a muffled curse and then stomped out of the bathroom, intent on laying into the man who'd had no right to mess up my nice quiet life. Okay, granted, it had already been pretty messed up considering my former personal assistant had tried to kill my family, but it wasn't like I could take my rage out on him since Matias had taken care of that for me.
I was headed toward the front door when the pounding began again and I realized it wasn't coming from outside the house at all.
"What the hell?" I muttered. I turned in the direction of the sound and realized it was coming from my son’s bedroom. When I reached the room that was covered in dinosaur wall decals, I stared in disbelief at the sight that greeted me. His back to me, Matias was boarding up the broken window, using the very board I'd retrieved from the shed. The fact that not only had the man not left like I’d told him to, but that he'd taken it upon himself to fix my son’s window should've pissed me off.
And it kind of did.
But when I saw Matias notice some blood on the wood and then try to use first his arm and then the hem of his shirt to wipe it off, all I felt was angry at myself. The guy might have been a dick, but I wasn't. I'd always believed in setting an example for my children, but I was more than a little glad they hadn't seen me like this. I wasn't someone who got angry and lashed out at others, either physically or verbally. And I most certainly wasn't someone who turned away an individual in need.
I spun around and went back to my bathroom to gather the medical supplies. By the time I returned to Ryan's room, Matias was finishing up with nailing the piece of wood over the broken window. I couldn't help but watch as his strong fingers gripped the hammer and he effortlessly knocked the nails into the molding. I'd always been turned off by overly strong men, probably because they’d reminded me too much of my domineering father. Mac had been the exception to the rule. He'd been the exception to a lot of rules, actually.