“So I take it you didn’t use the wedding as an opportunity to finally hash shit out?” Gage asked.
In the time I’d been back, I’d been trying to have the talk with Shane we so desperately needed to have, only she’d avoided me at every turn, making it damn near impossible. If it didn’t directly involve our son, she didn’t want to have a fucking thing to do with me, and she made that clear. With her uncle and her goddamn beast of a brother always standing between me and the woman I wanted, I barely got the chance to look at her, let alone talk to her.
The wedding was supposed to change all of that. It was going to be my chance to finally apologize for leaving her, a chance to beg and plead if I needed to. But more, it was supposed to be my chance to get some answers of my own. The questions I needed to ask had been plaguing me since the second I set foot back inside this town.
There were so many things I didn’t understand, and she was the only person who could sort that out for me . . . if she’d just talk to me.
“Didn’t work out the way it was supposed to,” I grumbled, the plastic of the water bottle crinkling beneath my grip as my fingers tightened.
If I was being honest, it hadn’t worked out because I’d fucked it all up. At first I hadn’t been able to concentrate on anything but how good it felt to hold her in my arms again. Seeing her in that bridesmaid dress had been a shock to my system. The way the long, flowing, copper-colored strapless dress hugged her had me fighting against getting hard the entire night. It was like being a teenager all over again with no control over my erections.
Back when we were together, I’d known every inch of her soft, silky skin, every dip and swell. I’d memorized it so well I could draw up the image of her any time I needed it, which had been a lot over the years. Time and motherhood had changed her body. Her stomach was once again flat, but her curves were more pronounced, her breasts were fuller, her hips wider, making her waist look even tinier.
Once I’d finally gotten a hold of myself and was able to talk without risk of my dick trying to bust through my pants, I’d messed it up by being an asshole. I said the absolute wrong thing, making anger and sadness spark behind those sweet amber eyes. I fucking hated myself for being the reason for that look on her face. If I’d had any doubts before, that confrontation had cleared them right up. She hated me in the most profound and absolute way. The pain of that realization was so stark, so extreme, that it was a wonder I hadn’t started bleeding out right there on the dance floor.
“Christ, Jens. We’ve been here over four months,” Gage stated, like I didn’t already know that.
I looked to my friend, a scowl firmly in place. “You stating the obvious for a reason, or just to annoy the shit out of me?”
“You gotta stop waiting for a situation to present itself and fuckin’ make one already.”
“It’s not that easy,” I insisted. “You fucking know that.”
Gage, normally a man of few words—those words usually being curses that came out in grunts or mutters—didn’t let up. “You been on pause since the day you left here, and that shit’s only gotten worse since you came back. You aren’t livin’ brother, you’re just existing. And it’s gonna stay that way until you finally nut up and go after what you want.”
“Jesus,” Laeth grunted, turning to Gage with the same shock on his face I was feeling. “Don’t think I’ve ever heard you string that many sentences together at once, man.”
“Fuck off,” he clipped, tossing the apple core across the kitchen and right into the trash can before giving me a pointed look. “You know I’m right.”
“So what are you suggesting?” I asked, lifting the water bottle and downing the whole thing. Thanks to this conversation my throat felt like I’d swallowed a bag of cotton balls, and I desperately needed the relief.
“I’m suggesting you go over there when she’s least expecting it. Blitz attack, when she doesn’t have her crew to cut you off at the pass.”
“That could blow up in his face,” Laeth stated, giving voice to exactly what I was thinking.
“It could, but it’s not like what he’s doing now is getting him anywhere.” Another good point.
The two of them kept at it, arguing over what I should or shouldn’t do to get Shane to speak to me. Instead of listening to them, I tossed the empty water bottle in the trash, shoved my phone into the back pocket of my jeans, and grabbed my keys.
“Where’re you goin’?” Laeth asked as I rounded the island and started out of the kitchen.
“Blitz attack,” I called out over my shoulder. “Lock up when you leave, and stay the hell out of my fridge.”
Chapter Five
Jensen
Eighteen years old
I knew I’d just walked into one of the many circles of hell that made up my life the moment I stepped through the front door and shut it behind me. It was in the air. It crackled with a dark, imposing energy, so stifling it was like turning the temperature all the way up on the oven and opening the door, all that heat blasting you right in the face. It could only mean one thing.
“Jensen! Get up here right now!”
And there it was. My old man was home from work early, and he was pissed—not that that was anything new. The man was a miserable old bastard on his best day. He was such a dick that even though he was gearing up to rip into me, he’d still make me come to him in order to do it.
I started for the stairs, knowing exactly what was in store, and after so many years of it, making myself numb on the inside in order to endure.
My foot hit the first step when something from the corner of my eye caught my attention. Turning my head, I spotted my mom standing at the entrance to the kitchen, an ever-present glass of wine in her hand. She might have been immaculately dressed in a tight pencil skirt, a silk blouse, heels, and diamonds, not a strand of her fake blonde hair out of place, but I could see it in the slight sway of her posture and her bloodshot eyes. She’d been at it for a while, probably well into her third bottle of wine and Christ only knew how many pills. She didn’t say a word, just gave me a disapproving sneer before turning her back on me.
She wouldn’t help me. She never did. That would’ve meant going against my father, and there was no way in hell she’d go against Whitman Rose. Not when he gave her the lifestyle she craved so damn much.
When I was six, I got locked in the closet for two days with no food or water, forced to spend all that time in soiled pants because I’d been so scared I’d wet myself. She got a diamond tennis bracelet. At ten, I was beaten so badly with my dad’s belt that I had welts and bruises for days. The only relief I’d felt the whole time was when I laid flat on my stomach and didn’t move. She got a week long spa visit that ended with a shopping spree. When he’d decided he wanted to ship me off to a boarding school in New England—all because I finally got sick of being knocked around and had the nerve to hit back—he appeased her by giving her a vacation to the Mediterranean. That was his way of keeping me under his thumb once I got too big for him to beat the shit out of. He sent me away.