Crystals (17 page)

Throughout her
summation of what had taken place almost five years ago, Shane listened without
interruption. He understood now. Emmie’s mother had died just before his
accident. Ollie couldn’t hurt her anymore.

“Why didn’t you
come to me?”

“You didn’t see those
photos of Mum. He had images of her leaving her house, walking through the
supermarket. God, Shane, he even had pictures of her house at night with only
her bedroom light showing! I was scared. How was I supposed to live with myself
if he’d hurt her?”

A stillness
overcame him. He had only ever felt this way a handful of times in his entire
life. Shane was glad Crystal was still in his house and needed him. Otherwise,
he would get into his car, find Ollie and commit murder.

“I understand.” He
knew she wanted to hear him say that everything was all right, but that would
be the biggest lie of his life. A part of him had lost something that
would never be replaced
, and his anger was still too close
to the surface. “I think you should leave now.”

“Are you firing
me?”

“Did I say that?”
Shane snapped giving her a sharp look.

“Not in so many
words, but…”

“Go back to the
cottage, Emmie. You’re not my favorite person right now, but I understand why
you behaved in the way you did.”

“Shane,” Emmie
called as she held open the door to leave, “please tell Crystal how sorry I
am.”

“Do you think that
will help?”

“No, maybe not.
But please tell her anyway.”

He could blame
Emmie all he liked, but one fact ate away at him. He could have contacted
Crystal, but his ego had stood in the way. In this, he was as much at fault as
her—and he would have to live with that regret for the rest of his life.

With Emmie gone,
Shane checked on their meal and made Crystal a cup of tea. Then he went in
search of her. He found her in the sitting room, perched on the window seat,
looking out the window. She appeared lost in thought, her computer forgotten
beside her.

“Did she leave?”
Crystal asked without looking away from the window.

“She’s gone back
to the cottage. Here, drink this,” Shane said handing her the cup. She accepted
it and he watched as she took a sip.

With a nod, he
moved away and added more logs to the fire. Slowly the embers caught the larger
pieces of wood and flames began to dance in the grate. He sat down on the rug
and turned to look at Crystal only to see her watching him.

“Join me?”

In silence, she
sat down the cup, got up and reached for her tablet. Without seeming thought,
when she reached him, she pulled his legs apart and sat between them. With her
resting against his chest, Shane encircled her in his arms.

“How are you
feeling?”

“Better, now that
you know.”

Shane nodded and
dropped a kiss on her neck. “What are you doing with that thing?” He asked
raising his chin in the direction of the computer.

“I had loads of
missed phone messages from my family. They worry about me when they can’t reach
me. I couldn’t face the barrage of questions I knew I had coming, so I sent
them emails.”

What she said
troubled him. He didn’t want to ask the question, but he knew he had to. “Did
you try to hurt yourself when Finn died?”

“What? No, of
course, I didn’t!”

Shane stared at
her attempting to detect anything that would indicate she wasn’t telling him
the truth. He found nothing. Just her usual open, honest expression.

“If you’re up to
it, I’d like to see those photos of Finn that you told me about.”

Crystal smiled and
turned her attention to her computer. Moments later he looked at the image of
their son for the first time. As she moved through photo after photo, Shane
made no attempt to stem his tears as he took in one of the most beautiful
sights he had ever seen.

He knew that he
would forever mourn the child he would never know. But, having never been given
that opportunity didn’t prevent him from loving him.

“He looks like me,
doesn’t he, Crys?”

“Yes, just like
you. Look at all that black hair!”

When the images
came to an end. Shane asked her to start over. Each time he viewed another
photo, he found something new to comment on. That was how they passed the rest
of the afternoon. Together—just the three of them.

Chapter 14

That night as they lay in bed, Crystal closed her eyes
and attempted to put herself in Shane’s place. At least she’d had the
opportunity to hold their son. He hadn’t, and yet his sadness was no less than
her own. Not liking the direction of her thoughts, she opened her eyes.

Pulling out of his
arms, she turned over to find Shane awake and his gaze steady on her. His eyes
were still so sad that she brushed her hand against his now clean-shaven cheek,
and she knew he was still unable to find rest.

“I want to make
love.”

“Are you sure,
Crys?”

“Yes, I’m sure.
But there’s something I have to ask you first.”

“Of course. You
can ask me anything. I’ll always be honest with you.”

“I don’t know if I
really believe that.”

“Where’s this
coming from?” Shane frowned.

“Yesterday, when
we made…”

“Tell me.”

Taking a deep
breath, she realized she had been fooling herself. There would always be
something between them. Defining that intangible emotion was where things grew
difficult. Her only certainty in a sea of ambiguity was that if they were to
move forward, whether, as friends or lovers, they had to be completely honest
with each other.

When they had made
love the night before, she had done so as a form of closure. Yes, she had
missed him and the way he made her feel. But she had gone through too much to
put herself in a position where she could be hurt again.

Being with him
like this was almost as though they had rolled back the years. In the deepest
part of her heart, she would always choose Shane. But, she wouldn’t hesitate to
walk away if they couldn’t find a common ground.

“When we made
love… when we had sex, I–”

“Why did you
change your words?”

“Because although
it felt wonderful, I don’t feel as though you were making love to me. I could
feel it—tell the difference. At first, I didn’t understand. Then earlier today,
when I told you about Finn, those emotions were real. You didn’t hold anything
back from me. Yesterday was different. I may not have understood then—but I do
now.”

“Explain what you
mean?”

Maybe he was
hedging for time or perhaps he really didn’t know what she referred to. For a
moment, Crystal questioned whether she should even try to put her feelings into
words. Seconds later she knew that she had to. She owed it to herself.

“It was like you
were showing me what I’d been missing. Showing off all the techniques you’d
learned over the time we were apart. I don’t think you were being true to
either of us. There was emotion there but, for the most part, it felt like
anger–”

“For God’s sake,
Crystal! Do you have to analyze every little thing?!”

Taken aback by the
change in his tone, she watched as he turned onto his back and threw an arm
over his eyes.

“No, not
everything. But I can’t seem to shake the feeling that sometimes you might
actually hate me.’”

Crystal didn’t
know what she had expected, but his silence wasn’t it. After a while she too
turned onto her back and peered up at the ceiling in silence.

“I tried to
convince myself that I hated you. But the moment I saw you standing in my
house, I knew I never could. I wanted to hurt you like you hurt me, or at least
the way I thought you’d calculatingly discarded me.”

“I could tell.”

“What are you
thinking?”

“That the sex was
good but the deeper connection we used to share may be gone. Maybe this is all
we can expect, after all we’re completely different people now. Perhaps we’re
here like this because, for us, this will be our last time together.”

“What’s all that
supposed to mean?”

His irritation was
back. It had never been her intention to anger him. She just wanted to be
honest. “Can you hear that… the rain’s stopped?”

“Bugger the rain!”
Shane shouted jackknifing into a sitting position. “Just say what you really
mean!”

The conversation
they needed to have couldn’t take place under the shroud of darkness, so
Crystal turned on the bedside lamp. They needed to be able to see each other’s
expressions and recognize their truth. Even with the glow of the light, the
corners of the room remained shrouded in gloom, much like the feeling that hung
over her.

When she finally
looked at Shane, his anger was still apparent. Watching him intently, after a
few more moments, she recognized another emotion he was fighting to hide. Fear.
He was fearful of what she would say next.

“Is your hatred of
me finally over, Shane? If it’s not, I need you to tell me.”

“Yes, it’s over.”

“Just like that,
in the space of one day you’ve moved from loathing to–”

“Why the fuck do
you always have to turn everything inside out?”

“Because my
feelings matter just as much as yours. I’m not going through that kind of hurt
again. Before I do that, I’ll walk away and never look back!” What she said was
the truth. But she left out the part that doing so would break her heart.

“That’s cold,
Crys.”

His comment
irritated the hell out of her and she didn’t hold back in saying what she wanted
to. “It may sound that way to you, but at least I tried to contact you during
the last five years. Can you say the same?”

“You know I
can’t.”

“How does that
make you feel now?”

“Jesus! What the
fuck is this, some kind of therapy session where I bare my soul to give you
satisfaction?” Shane shouted as he flung the covers aside, jumped out of the
bed and began pacing the floor.

“Yes, I want to
talk and so should you. I’m sorry for the things that happened to you, more
sorry than I can express. But us being here together doesn’t heal everything.
So shout all you want. Rage all you want. I feel the same way inside. The rain
may have stopped, but our past didn’t miraculously disappear with it!

“You’ve changed,”
he said as he slowly walked back and sat on the bed.

“I know. I had to.
I had to become stronger or I don’t think I would have coped with everything
that landed on me.”

Shane watched her
for endless moments and Crystal wondered what he was seeing. All she could hope
was that he finally realized she wasn’t the only one who had changed.

“For me, all those
old feelings never really went away. I buried them as deeply as I could. I
tried to leave them behind and pour everything into my new career. Seeing you
again pulled up all those old feelings of hurt. I suppose I wanted you to
experience just a fraction of what I felt back then.”

“That’s not how
love is supposed to be, Shane.”

“I know. I should
have believed in ya. I tried, Crys. But I couldn’t hold on to the feeling.
Where I come from, my life before ya… all I knew was how to protect
meself
. It was either that or end up in the same place as
me old man and brother. If I hadn’t learned that lesson well, it would ‘
ave
finished off me mum.”

Crystal believed
him. Although she was sure he didn’t realize it, he had just revealed more than
he probably intended to. His grammar had reverted to the way he spoke when she
had first met him. That alone told her, his emotions were real and they were
slowly coming to the surface.

She finally
understood why he hadn’t followed the same path as his father and brother.
Although the circumstances of his life had pushed him in that direction, he had
felt that his mother had needed him.

In the past, he
had only spoken briefly of his mother and great grandfather. When she had attempted
to find out more, he had always become reticent.

The night of her
party, Crystal had known her mother spoke the truth. After Shane’s
disappearance, she had made a point of finding out all about his family.
However, with him gone from her life, they had never had an opportunity to
speak about her findings, or Gwendolyn’s revelations. If taken at face value,
the facts said he
was best avoided
. Yet, to know the
man revealed something entirely different.

Although he had a
temper, he only showed it when
pushed
or felt that he
was being taken advantage of. Displaying his irritation was an entirely
different matter. However, his biggest fault was not believing that he was
worthy of love.

“It took me a
while, but Gwendolyn proved to me that love comes in many guises. It took the
death of our son for me to realize just how much my mother loves me. You were a
good son, Shane. I know Molly loved you. All I have to do is look at the
caliber of man she raised to see that truth.”