Pulled Within (8 page)

Hart hadn’t been an instigator in high school, and I’d never seen
him in a fight—mostly because nobody had ever tried to fuck with
him.
Everyone had known that he stood up for what he believed in and
didn’t take any shit. It made disliking him even more difficult.

I couldn’t think about any of that now.

Using my key, I trundled inside Brady’s apartment, pausing in
the middle of the living room to scan it all. He’d lived here for at
least a
few years. It was a good apartment. Great memories…some bad
ones, too. Like the most recent ones of him detoxing on his bed.

Hart was suddenly in the doorway. “I think we’re going to need a bigger SUV,” he said. I glanced at my side, watching his eyes travel over the couch and the kitchen table, the pots and pans that covered the counter. “Do you want me to go
—
”

“None of this is mine.” I moved into the bedroom, opened my suitcase and threw in all my clothes that were on the floor. I loaded it until it was so full I could barely get it closed. I packed the rest into
garbage bags. Then I went into the bathroom and removed
everything
that was mine, making sure the lids were on tight before I stuck
them in the same bag as my clothes.

“Do you have any boxes? I can start packing the rest.”

“There’s nothing else to pack.” He stood in the entryway of the bathroom, and I moved past him, dragging the suitcase and the two
plastic bags over to the front door. I checked all the surfaces one final
time; there was nothing else that was mine. And since I didn’t have
enough room in Hart’s SUV to load Brady’s stuff, this would have to do.

I was going to miss this place.

“This is everything I own.” The humiliation of it suddenly registered. I slowly met his eyes. In my head, I created so many
different reactions that would come out of him, imagining his expressions, his words. His pity. I was waiting for one of those…or all.

He approached me and took everything out of my hands. “I’ll carry this all downstairs. Do what you need to in here, and I’ll meet
you
outside.” His voice was gentle—a whisper. Compassionate. It wasn’t
one of the reactions I’d expected. “Don’t worry about the
landlord…I’ll take care of him if I have to.”

I watched him move into the hallway, focusing on the
provocative curves of his hand as it gripped the knob and pulled the door shut.

I sat on the sticky floor, tucked my knees into my chest, and
wrapped
my arms around them. The air left my lungs. I tried to suck it back
in.

Back and forth
.

I hadn’t shown any emotion while Hart had been in here. But
now it was everywhere. In my liquid eyes, in my quivering lips, in my shuddering heart. Other than Brady and Shane, no one had seen me
cry since the day I’d gotten my scar. And now Brady wasn’t even
here to see this. To hold me. To save me.

Back and forth
.

I didn’t need this apartment to remind me how alone I was. Brady’s boys were always around and available, but they were
superficial. I
needed someone much deeper. I needed Brady, and I couldn’t have
him. And no one else was here, because people like me didn’t show their
wounds easily. No one wanted to see this kind of damage. It was
violent and disgusting, dirty and evil. It was destructive.

It had ruined me.

My face, my skin, and my soul.

I tried to control my breathing, to stop the tears from seeping out of my lids by rubbing my eyes over the knees of my jeans. A black smudge from the liner had smeared across the fabric. Brady didn’t
have detergent…he didn’t even have hand soap. But I didn’t have
time to scrub it out, anyway. I didn’t want the landlord to start mouthing off to Hart because I was taking too long. I’d dragged him into this
situation, and it wasn’t fair to keep him in it any longer than
necessary.
I wondered what he was thinking as he packed my shit into his
pristine, gleaming Range Rover. I know what I thought.

That I was trash, littering his perfection with my fear and my failure.

Fuck.

I uncurled my body and went into the bathroom. My eyes
lingered in the mirror above the sink. I couldn’t stop staring. My mascara had
dripped into my scar. The black mixed against the damaged skin,
creating a deep, bruised purple. Like a storm gathering on the surface of my skin. It would have been perfect if this were Halloween. But this
wasn’t a costume; I couldn’t take it off at the end of the night and
return
to the smooth, wanted face beneath it. My scar was permanent, a
storm that would never pass. It glared back at me every day. It called out its existence whenever I touched my face.

It haunted my dreams.

“LET ME BRING
this stuff to your new place,” Hart said, moving to the back of his SUV. “I don’t want you carrying it all by yourself.”

He opened his trunk and placed the gas can back inside that he’d
used to fill my tank. It gave me a second to think. If I agreed, he’d
follow
me to my new apartment and help me carry the two bags and
suitcase
inside. The problem was…there was no new apartment. And this
was the second time he’d asked; the first happened just after he bought me the gas. I’d refused then, too.

This time was no different.

“I’ll be fine.” I glanced at the B&B again. It was going to make a
perfect spa. It was horseshoe-shaped, which meant the whole
backside would face the water. I remembered how relaxing it was to stare at
the ocean from Saint’s boat. A vision passed through my mind—a
dream, really, of me somehow working in the spa, doing something I loved,
with the sea being part of my daily view. It would be a long time
before
this place was ready for anyone to work here. And even beyond that, I wasn’t willing to spend any more time with Hart than I already had.

Stupid dream, Rae.

“Thanks for your help,” I told him sincerely. “You made this
morning suck a little less.”

He sat on the edge of the trunk, his knees spread far apart. One of them brushed against the side of mine. It tingled. “The morning doesn’t have to be over,” he said.

Sex drizzled from his mouth. He didn’t even have to try. The
way
his gaze took all of me in didn’t help matters. I knew if I spent any
more
time alone with him, I would be naked before noon. The tears I’d sobbed on the floor of Brady’s apartment and the fact that I was
homeless would
be forgotten…until I got back into my car and had nowhere to drive
to.

Spreading my legs for this man would just add to the day’s problems.

That didn’t mean my desire for him had disappeared. There was a lot of it, actually. And I didn’t think I was the only one feeling that way. For someone who had left me so easily before, he seemed to be having difficulty doing it this time.

I didn’t understand it. But I guess I didn’t have to.

I reached around him and grabbed the two trash bags, leaving the suitcase for him to roll. “I have to go, Hart.”

“Have to…or want to?”

Instead of answering him, I turned around and began walking. I placed the bags inside my trunk and held it open so he could do the
same. I avoided his gaze as I moved to the side and unlocked the
driver’s door. I could feel him behind me
—
the heat of his silvery eyes as they examined my legs, my ass, the outline of my torso that could be seen through my jacket.

When I tried to duck inside the car, he blocked me.

“Look at me, Rae.”

My lids closed and I took a deep breath. As calmly as I could, I
turned. When I opened my eyes again, my vision was drawn to the spot where his jawline protruded as it met his cheekbones and angled up to his forehead. I remembered how my hands had once fit
so perfectly
there. I remembered too that after he was gone, my fingers still
craved the feel of his skin.

It hurt to see him.

“What do you want from me, Hart?” I blurted out.

“I don’t want you to leave. Just give me a few more minutes.”

I wasn’t holding back the pain or the anger anymore. “And what will you do with those minutes that will make any difference at this point?”

He moved closer, so I backed up. The frame of the door pressed
into me…and his fingers, at the spot where we both held the
window.
“I won’t be able to take it back,” he admitted. “None of it. I know
that. And you won’t understand why I did it, but at least hear me out.”

I didn’t know if I wanted to hear any of it—especially today.
Still, whether or not I wanted to, it felt like something he needed to say. In return for helping me, I’d give that to him. But nothing else.

“Okay. Tell me.”

He scanned my eyes, his irises sliding
back and forth
. I had to
force my body not to sway in the same rhythm. “I didn’t want to go. My parents and coaches were telling me to leave because it was the best
thing for my future.” He sighed, a breath that sounded painful for
him.
“I believed them; that’s what kids do. But I didn’t want to leave everything I knew, everyone who mattered to me: you.” His arms blocked me in. Every time he shifted, another gust of his scent filled
me. He was cedar and musk, blending with the tangy smell of his skin. It only added to the other triggers that caused lightning flashes in my
stomach. “When I tried to have a voice, they overpowered me.
According to them, I didn’t know what was best for me.” There was a change in his tone, an underlying anger. I felt it, and felt for him because of it.
“So they packed up my stuff and they sent me to a place where I
could be a star. And it worked…until the injury happened in college.”

He held my gaze as I tried to find the answer somewhere in
there.
The answer I’d been waiting to hear all these years. I couldn’t see
anything but myself staring back. “I haven’t heard it yet.”

“Heard what?”

I took a gulp of the cold air and held it in my lungs. “The reason you didn’t say good-bye.”

His fingers tightened on the window. They weren’t squeezing me, but I could sense their strength just the same. “If my parents had
given me the opportunity, I wouldn’t have left at all. They knew
that. I
don’t blame them for waking me up in the middle of the night,
packing
my clothes into the car and driving me away. That was smart. Had
they given me even a little space, I wouldn’t have gone.”

I hadn’t wanted to hear anything he had to say, and now
suddenly I was addicted to his answers. But that one wasn’t good enough.

“Do they not have phones in prep school?”

His body hadn’t moved, but somehow it felt as if he was even closer now. “You’re right. I should have called. But it was hard
enough to know I wouldn’t be with you anymore…”

“Maybe that didn’t have to happen. Maybe I could have been there with you.” They were so irrational, the thoughts of my younger self.

“You were in school, Rae.”

“I would have chosen you over school, if you’d asked.”

I couldn’t believe I’d just told him that.

“You would have dropped out your sophomore year to be with
me? Left your friends and family? I would never have let you do
that. And even if I’d been that selfish, I didn’t have the means to support you back then.”

“So instead, you decided to never speak to me again?”

His gaze moved to my lips, then lifted once more. “I wouldn’t
have
been able to live with myself if I’d heard how much I hurt you. I
didn’t want to be your pain, and I didn’t want you to hear mine.” His face clouded over. “I realized long ago how shitty that was.”

I tried to move away from him. He wouldn’t let me, but he kept his hands off me just the same. “Shitty? It’s way more than that. It’s
unfair
, Hart. You didn’t even give me a chance. I deserved that from you, at the very least.”

“I would have told you to wait for me
—
I was ready to tell you, even as they were driving me out of town.
That
wouldn’t have been fair, because I knew you would have.”

He was right; I would have waited. He’d meant that much to
me—
more than Saint or any of the guys I had dated in between. All my
relationships after Hart were about healing, finding others with
the same wounds I’d suffered and trying to close them—with my
hands,
my heart, my body. With my words and my loyalty. But Hart was
the only one I’d been with who hadn’t needed to be fixed.

He was also the only one who’d been there before my scar. All
the others came afterward.

I wasn’t too blind to recognize that, in trying to heal them, I was also trying to heal myself.

“What are you doing back in Bar Harbor, then?” It came out as a whisper, and even that stung my already-burning throat.

His hand slid over mine and stopped just on the other side of my palm. “I’m building a spa.”

“No, what are you
doing
here
?” He could be as evasive as he
wanted. I couldn’t anymore.

Tiny flakes started falling from the sky. I felt them on my face. I
glanced up, greeting the white specks of cold. They stuck to my
eyelashes and melted on my lips.