Damage Me (Crystal Gulf Book 2) (40 page)

“Our dad knows we’re coming. He knows it and expects it. Why?” She sounded confused, apprehensive even.

“If you don’t want to go, then don’t go,” I suggested. “Tyler isn’t going to give you the answers you want, baby.”

She inhaled sharply for some reason and whimpered. Still, I didn’t look at her. “What answers do I want?”

“I’m guessing you want to know what I’ve always wanted to know from my old man. Why didn’t you love me? Why didn’t you want me? What about
me
wasn’t good enough?” By the time I finish I sounded like the little boy I’d been. The one who’d stare at his father and wanted him to say it one time. Just one time. But I accepted a long time ago that my dad didn’t love me. He had sex, I was the product, and that was it. “Hill, Tyler doesn’t deserve to meet you. He doesn’t deserve to look into your beautiful, good eyes and hear your voice. He is a monster, and that’s it. Monsters don’t change or do the right thing because that’s what you want. If you’re going there for that, then he’s only going to make this worse for you.”

I didn’t look at her.

Her sob was so deep, so painful, it made my chest tighten and my own eyes dampened.

“I’d love to give you a different answer,” Bach spoke up, tone strangled. “But Dylan’s right. He doesn’t deserve you.”

No one does.

“But …” She sucked in a breath. “I feel like if I could just know my other half, see proof that it exists, then maybe I wouldn’t feel so lost.”

All of a sudden Bach shot across the highway. Horns blared, and he screeched to a halt on the side of the road. Putting his truck in park, he spun around, eyes burning. “You think he’s going to be the one who helps you find yourself? You think that son of a bitch is going to give you what you need to feel better? Please tell me you’re not relying on him to help you when you have me right here.”

“I don’t know what to do.”

So I did it.

I turned around and met her eyes.

Her broken tear soaked lost eyes.

She held me captive, yearning for so much, so much that I was afraid to give her, to want.

I expected her to do what she always did. Settle on my lap, the one place she felt safe. Instead, she brought her knees to her chest and hugged them, turning her sights away.

“I love you, Bach. But I want to see him.”

I sat back and stared out the window, feeling identical to the day I left Harley on the beach. Like everything I wanted was behind me, and I’d been the one to leave it there. Bach silently returned to the road. We all sat in silence. My left thigh burned, wanting her on it.

Maybe all that time I wasn’t the one who was safe.

Maybe she was the one who made me feel that way all along.

***

Hillary

I’d waited nineteen years for this.

I would look my father in the eye so I could finally face myself. This new me. The Hillary who’d been attacked, survived, and now had to accept that she’d never be completely like her old self. She saw things differently, and that was okay; I wanted to be okay with that.

But Dylan Meyer wasn’t helping me.

He sat in the front seat, as gorgeous and bad as the day I met him. His white shirt was tight over his chest and hugged his biceps, leaving his long tattooed arm free to ogle. His hair was a wayward mess like it had been, but he’d put some weight on. His cheekbones weren’t as hollow. His eyes weren’t as sunken. But his lie was still just as painful. This man had been my refuge, and I thanked him for that, even made peace with it—what I hadn’t expected was my heart to fall out of my body the moment I saw him.

Those cobalt eyes took one second to remind me of all that I was missing. His arms and his protection. Dylan understood how I felt. I knew he did. I felt it. He wasn’t the same man anymore either. He was a father, a soldier, a fallen man who had to stand once again. That was me. We were the same. But my darkest hour had been an inconvenience to him. How could we move past that?

I had to accept that he was gone. He wasn’t mine anymore. He hadn’t even been to begin with.

But my legs twitched, yearning to crawl to him. My heart hammered, wanting him to feel it. My tongue tingled, wanting to taste his. The man in the front seat was more noticeable to me than my own breath.

I resented him for being what I couldn’t have. He was everything I yearned for. Protection, someone who understood, and a safe place to fall apart and be held together. I had this feeling that I would never want more than that, and if he was all of those things, then what would I do later on? Over these past few weeks, I’d tried to stand on my own two feet. I tried to find comfort within myself because if I didn’t do that who else would give it to me? I struggled to remain standing. I fell down a lot, and accepted that my footing might not be stable for a long time, but as long as I could believe in my stability, eventually I’d learn to be this new me.

The drive to the prison created a palpable tension in the car. I’d begged Bach for this, fought through his denial, and had finally gotten what I wanted: my dad. Sometimes in order to win you had to face the monster. Sometimes the monster was the only proof that you were strong. I would meet the man who didn’t want me because I wanted myself. I would say goodbye to the man who never muttered hello. I would settle this want I’ve carried around with me for nineteen years, so I could finally breathe.

As we approached the prison, my heart fell. It looked so cold, so gray and unwanted. It housed the demons. Zane would end up in there one day. I knew this. He got away, but evil can only escape for so long. He’ll rot one day for what he did. I had to accept this too. I had to heal so he lost. I was an angel before my fall, and I could still fly with my scarred wings. Men like him would never know what it felt like to soar.

I would soar again.

Bach pulled into the designated visitor’s lot and cut the engine. I pretended not to notice his shaking hands. I wanted this.

“Ready?” Dylan asked, opening his door. He glanced back at me, handsome face concerned.

I wanted to kiss him. I wanted to move on.

I nodded.

“Sweets,” Bach said. “I just want you to know one thing before you go in there.” He turned around to face me, his eyes bleeding. “You’re going to be better someday. So will I. I know that won’t happen overnight, but it will happen. And it won’t be because of our dad. It will be because you’re strong. It will be because you are an amazingly good person who won. You’ll be better because of you. Not because of anyone else. Okay?”

I nodded once more and pressed my lips to his cheek. “Okay.”

“Go. You have two hours. I’ll be here.”

I scrambled out of the truck to find Dylan holding on to the edge. His face was scrunched in pain and sweat already dripped down his temple even though the air was cool this afternoon.

“I won’t be able to bring my crutches in there.” And then he did something that broke my heart.

He took a step. And then two.

I watched him, wanting him so badly at that moment it was an intense, consuming desire. Not just for right now, but for longer. I wanted to be there for the day he took a step without hurting, when he could smile without thinking about all the times he hadn’t. I wanted the man who smiled at his daughter like she was everything. I imagined a little girl with my hair and his eyes, an unblemished angel who loved her daddy the way I never loved mine.

“Don’t look at me like that,” he grunted, pausing to breathe. Pain radiated from him. He was risking pain to walk me into a prison to meet my father. It was the biggest
I’m sorry
I’d ever been given.

“You hurt me.”

“Hillary.”

“You took the worst thing in my life and made it an inconvenience. Do you have any idea how badly that hurt me?”

“Let’s. Go.”

“I love you.”

His head snapped up and his eyes latched on to mine like a lifeline. “What?”

“I love you, Dylan Meyer. I just wanted you to know that, so when we leave here and I can’t have you, that you at least knew.”

Horror painted his face. It weighed down his eyes, shone through his chest. “You don’t love me, Hillary. You can’t love me.”

“Why not? Look at you? What’s not to love? You were the only person in my life that made it easier to breathe. You gave your leg for your country. You love your daughter the way I’ve always wanted my father to love me. You are worth so much to me. Why do you think you’re not?”

My insides yearned for him. Just one second on his lap and I might be able to breathe.

“Let’s fucking go!” he snapped, doing his best to stomp away.

“You’re also an ornery jerk,” I continued, catching up. “But I think that’s just because you’re too busy trying to be strong. You like to have all the power, but I think that’s because at one point you had none. You yell sometimes. And I think that’s because you’ve got too much inside to whisper. You’re also gentle when I want you to be. You’re there. Not anymore, but you were. I wanted to thank you for that. Thank you for giving me an escape.”

“Hillary, please.” His strangled plea washed over me. “Please stop. We’re going to meet Tyler and then we’re going home.”

I held myself against his umpteenth dismissal. “I’m not going home.”

“What are you talking about?” He took a step, continuing the long journey up the dusty dirt road.

“I quit the coffee shop. I have nine hundred dollars saved. I can’t go back home. I want out.” From everyone who knew the old me and from anyone who didn’t want the new one.

For a full minute we were quiet. Our stare down rooted me in place; our pupils dilated. And then his words spilled out of him in a quiet, threatening warning.

“You are not taking off. You’re too innocent for that shit. You. Are. Not. Leaving. Me.” His cold hard eyes met mine. “You really love me? You’d really love an evil worthless douchebag? You’d give that sweet untainted soul to someone like me?”

“You’re not ev—”

“Yes or no!”

“Yes!” I screamed back. “Yes, Dylan. I love you. You’re the first man I’ve ever wanted. You’re the only one I’ll ever want again.”

“I have nothing to give you.”

Moronic man. I slipped beneath his arm and wrapped mine around his waist, taking some of his weight off his right leg. The connection within me imploded. I was sexy again. Confident. I was a woman who was okay being herself. “This is all I need from you.” I held him tighter.

He slung his arm around my shoulders and sighed. “Hillary. I—” He growled. “What do you say to making one more deal?”

It was my turn to hesitate. One more deal meant longer in his presence, and as much as I wanted that, I knew I’d suffer later when we were separated. But I loved Dylan. I think I fell in love with him the moment I awoke after my attack and heard someone screaming as loud as me, heard his pain in my heart; when our fears existed in the same room, was the exact second a part of me had attached itself to him. The connection was emotional before I’d even understood what was happening. To meet someone who knew my insides meant I’d never have to spill my guts. I could hurt because he knew it. My pain was safe to feel, and in doing so it could also heal. So I gave in, one more time to one more deal. “I’d say it’s been hell without you these past weeks and I’d do anything to have you for a few more.”

He pulled me to a stop outside of the prison that housed my father and held my face between his strong, protective hands. His eyes leaked, making me think he hadn’t been telling me the complete truth. No one can look at you like that; like their darkness is bleeding and you were the only light they’d ever have unless they felt something more.

“You come live with us. With Bach and Harley, and with Aubrey and me. You can have my bed. You get your shit together, because I need to get my shit together too. We get our shit together,
together
. I need your help to do that. Will you help me, baby? I want to kiss this sweet, good mouth every day because I couldn’t breathe without you. I’m sorry I lied. You came into my life, and I wouldn’t change that for anything. You were the best part of coming home. I didn’t tell you to go for me. I told you to go for you. I didn’t want to hurt you.”

“But you did.”

“But I did.”

“I needed you. Was that stupid of me?” I looked away. I had to. His eyes and my eyes connecting meant falling deeper. I still needed my safe zone. I probably always would. “I can’t tell.”

“I’m sorry,” he begged, holding me tenderly. But the look in his eyes looked like blue fire. “Are you telling me no?”

“I’m telling you that if I agree to this deal, what I am supposed to do when you decide you’re done making them? I have to do what’s right for me.” I stared at his chest through his shirt. He was wearing
that
cologne. I wanted to press my nose to him and inhale, hold his scent inside so I could breathe it in when he let me go. The thought spread slowly until I was screaming at my own self.
Take the damn deal!
But I was better than a temporary promise. I wanted something stronger, a promise that did not need words.

He grabbed my chin and lifted it, forcing my eyes on his. “Whatever you wanted, remember? I’ll give you whatever you want. Tell me what you want, Hillary.”

“I want … to meet my dad, and then I want to go home with you and my brother and figure out how to start living again. I just want to live again, Dylan. I feel like I’ve been stuck in this nightmare for months.” I knew I’d be stuck there until I figured out how to free myself. No one else would free me, but me. No one would call my name or break the door down. I would crawl from that bed in my skirt and open the door myself. I would smile because I deserved to. I would let my nightmares exist in the darkness because I deserved the light. I would save myself because I deserved to feel safe. “I want free of that night.”

He bent to kiss the tears that trailed down my face. His lips caressed my cheek as he spoke. “I want that too. But I feel guilty for wanting that. For wanting this.” His lips trailed beneath mine, teasing my chin. “I don’t know what to do. Damage you or protect you?”