Missing Hart (22 page)

Dr. Tyler and I were sitting next to Leah’s bed talking quietly as we waited for Dillon’s arrival. I think that he would have left, but when I came back in from talking to Dillon I was a mess and nothing I did or said fooled him into believing that I was okay. To put me at ease, he started talking to me about his daughters.

“My Brooke is just your age and I think you would get on like gangbusters. She’s a softhearted angel, which obviously means that she takes after my wife. Then there’s my oldest daughter, Sabrina. My wife says she’s me in a dress with a better disposition.”

Reaching into his pocket, he got his wallet out and showed me a few photos of the girls. Not surprisingly, they were beautiful. I’d expected that going by how handsome Dr. Tyler was. Once again I found myself envious of his two daughters. To know the love of a parent instead of the pain was something I would never have.

Our conversation came to a halt when the door opened and Dillon stepped into the room. My heart skipped a beat before resuming at triple the pace it had been before he arrived. Even looking emotionally wrecked and full of despair, he was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen in my life. My body literally ached to run into his arms, but that was no longer an option for me and my heart broke all over again.

He did everything that he could to avoid looking at me, instead turning to look at who I was sitting next to. Doing a double take he blurted, “Doctor Jack?”

Well. That was news. Dr. Tyler and the Doctor Jack that Dillon and his boss had created the love garden for were one and the same. Vacating his seat, Dr. Tyler walked around the bed to Dillon.

“Oh Dillon… I had no idea that Leah was your sister. I’m so sorry, son.”

Gesturing in my general direction, again without looking directly at me, Dillon replied, “She told me what happened to Leah. Is my sister… will my sister be okay?”

“She’s been through hell but she’s a very strong girl. Your sister will need the help of a good therapist, but yes, I believe that she will eventually be okay. She’s been very brave.”

Stepping closer to Leah’s hospital bed and really looking at her, Dillon let out a sound of pure agony.

“Who did this to my sister and where is he?”

Going to Dillon’s side, Dr. Tyler laid his hand on his shoulder. “The police have all of his information and have already gone to arrest him. Dillon, I know this is hard and believe me, if it were my daughter or my sister, I’d be just as angry as you are right now. I’m not related to Leah but I want to beat that scum with my bare hands. Unfortunately, that isn’t going to convict his sorry ass and it isn’t going to help your sister. You need to put that anger aside for now, for her. The police will deal with that monster. Your job is to make sure that your sister heals. Stay focused.”

Dillon nodded like he understood, and I believed that he would harness his anger when Leah was around, but I knew he wasn’t going to be able to put his anger aside. I thought about how Dante, Damien or Spencer would react if this had happened to Delilah or me and I knew that no matter what Dr. Tyler or anyone else said, Dillon was going to have trouble controlling his rage. The caveman protective gene was too strong in these men, and there was no way in hell any of them could watch someone they loved hurt without doing everything within their power to make the person responsible suffer. I’d never found an off switch for my brothers and I didn’t think there was much hope that Dillon had an off switch, either.

My thoughts came to a halt when Leah stirred and slowly opened her eyes. She started to quietly cry when she saw her brother. “I’m so sorry Dill…”

In seconds he was over her bed caressing her face. “Don’t you ever apologize to me or anyone else for this Leah Cooper. Nothing that happened to you was your fault and you need to get any thought that tells you that it was out of your head. I’m going to get you through this just like you’ve gotten me through all of my stuff. The Cooper kids don’t quit, remember?”

She tried to smile at him, but her lip was so swollen that what came across was heartbreaking to look at. “I remember.”

He held her as best he could given all of her injuries, stroking her hair as he told her how much he loved her and how proud he was of her for reporting the rape. For the first time since I had picked her up from her house, I saw a little bit of the tension leave her body as she relaxed into his arms.

A few minutes later Dr. Tyler took his leave, but not before he also told Leah how proud he was of her. “You’re the bravest of the brave Leah, and I have faith in your ability to go on from this. If you need anything, don’t hesitate to call me.”

When Dillon walked out into the hallway with Dr. Tyler, Leah took hold of my hand. “You’re my knight in shining armor Minnie, and I will never forget what you did for me tonight. I can see that it’s tearing you apart to be in the same room with my brother. It’s okay for you to go now. I think I’m going to stay with him for a while and I want you to promise me that the second I tell you the coast is clear, you’ll come see me.”

Standing up, I leaned over the bed and kissed her forehead. “Whenever you need me, I’ll always be there. I’m going to be a pest calling and texting to check up on you, so tell me if I’m getting on your last nerve.”

I heard the door open and knew that Dillon was back. It was past time for me to get the hell out of dodge. It hurt too much to see him.

Kissing her forehead again I whispered, “I love you Leah, and I’m very proud of you. I’ll call you later today, but if you need anything or you want to talk, you know where I am.”

Her eyes shone with tears as she nodded. “You’ve been the best friend I could ever have asked for. Now go home and get some rest.”

Stepping back from her side, I grabbed my purse and blew past Dillon as I made a beeline for the door.

He never said a word to me.

The first few months after seeing Dillon again were the hardest. It hurt like hell to have been in the same room with him only to have him ignore me like I was nothing to him.

At first I was just sad, but eventually, I got pissed off. Just who in the hell did he think he was? I felt judged by him and I resented the hell out of it. He didn’t know what I had been through, and for the first time, I assigned some blame to him. If he hadn’t kicked me out of his house and cut me out of his life like I was a leper… If he’d listened to me instead of turning on me like a rabid dog… If he hadn’t turned into an asshole right before my very eyes, our child would be alive. The more I thought about it, the angrier I got. He knew we’d had unprotected sex and he never even thought to ask if I was pregnant.

All his words of love hadn’t meant a thing. When the chips were down, he dropped me like a hot potato. It cut me to the core that he had disassociated from me with no problem. Why was it so easy for him to move on and never look back, but I couldn’t stop looking at the broken pieces in my rearview mirror?

That’s when I realized the truth. It wasn’t just Dillon that didn’t keep his word-it was all men in general. Even my brothers were nothing but glorified man-whores. They treated my sister and I like gold, just like how Dillon treated Leah, but when it came to the rest of the female population, it was game on.

I looked to them to prove me wrong, but they were brutally honest about the fact that they fucked and ran. Sure, they dolled it up and never used that kind of language to Delilah and me, but that’s exactly what they do.

For a long time I thought that Spencer would be the one to break the mold once he and my sister took the next step in their relationship. When he didn’t immediately cut himself off from the parade of sluts, I was beyond disappointed. Angry as I had grown to be with Dillon, I still admired him for spending seven years in a sexless marriage and staying faithful even though it wasn’t even something his wife wanted! To me that showed that, if you had the will, it could be done. Clearly, Spencer Cross didn’t have the will and I found it damn disappointing. My brothers and Spencer used sex like an all you can eat buffet to keep themselves safe from any kind of real emotion and I thought it was sad, all things considered. The three of them would be real catches if they got their shit together.

My sister made excuses for Spencer like it was her job, but I didn’t understand why she wasn’t angry with him. I believe that at some point Spencer will get his shit together and be committed to my sister, but by that time he’s going to have done some serious damage to her confidence. I said that to Delilah once and she crumbled in front of my eyes, crying that if I hated Spencer, she would never forgive herself. I tried to explain to her that I don’t hate Spencer, I hate his actions, but she was so upset that I dropped it. That was a lesson to me never to open my stupid mouth again about the complexities of their relationship.

For me, the idea of being touched by a man that wasn’t Dillon was completely abhorrent and that meant I was firmly in “no relationship” territory. It wasn’t that hard seeing as how I wasn’t the odd man out; since Delilah and Spencer couldn’t be together, she didn’t date either.

My family has always been very big on family dinners. It’s something that my Aunt Sandra started as soon as she came into our lives, and my brothers took the idea and ran with it. Because my brothers and Spencer were glorified sluts, my Aunt Sandra was a saint and Delilah and I didn’t date, family dinners were exclusive just to family.

No one outside of the seven of us had ever come to a family dinner, so I was completely stunned when Delilah called and told me that Dante was bringing two people with him.

“Apparently he’s gotten very friendly with his new assistant and he’s bringing her and her sister to dinner. I hate to admit that at first I wondered if he was just trying to work the sister angle, but when I joked to him about it, he ripped my head off. Oh! And even bigger news-we’re having family dinner in a restaurant because he and the assistant are going to be somewhere all day and he doesn’t have time to cook.”

I wondered if hell was freezing over or if a miracle was occurring, and Delilah admitted she was thinking along the same lines. Both of us wanted so much more for our brothers than the shallow sex-a-thons that they called living.

Delilah and I pulled up to the restaurant at the same time-typical twin move-and headed inside to greet Damien. He had been away for weeks and I had missed him like crazy. We only got to talk for a few minutes before Spencer showed up. He made some crack about how weird it was that Dante was bringing outsiders to dinner and I felt Delilah’s hackles rising just before she gave him a verbal slap down. Giving her a nod of approval, I wondered if maybe she was finally going to start putting her foot down about Spencer and his sexual bullshit.

When Dante arrived with his assistant and her sister, I couldn’t believe my eyes because it was Dr. Tyler’s daughters. I’ll never forget the night that Leah called me to tell me that Dillon’s old boss had come to town and had taken him to dinner. Over the course of dinner Rick told him that the reason he had been in LA was to attend Dr. Tyler’s funeral. It was heartbreaking to hear that Dr. Tyler and his wife had been killed together in a traffic accident. Seeing the daughters that he’d talked about with such pride and love was emotional, but I did my best to hide it. I wanted to tell them that their father had saved my life, but I never talked about the accident-especially in front of my family.

It was no surprise to me that both Sabrina and Brooke were great girls. Just like Dr. Tyler had said, Sabrina in particular really took after him. When I found out that Brooke went to UCLA I was thrilled. She was sweet and easy to talk to but there was a sadness about her that touched my heart because I knew just why she was sad. As far as I was concerned her father had all but walked on water, and it felt right to reach out to his girls. I remembered him telling me that he hoped that if his girls were hurting, someone would show them kindness. Brooke Tyler was clearly hurting, and although I wouldn’t tell her that I had known her father, I could try to repay the kindness that he had shown me in my darkest hour.

I didn’t think that I was going to really get the chance to do the same for Sabrina, because Dante definitely had that covered. I’d never seen him so interested in someone before, nothing had even come close. It amused me to no end that he was trying to play it off like he just thought of her as a friend, when anyone that knew him well enough could easily see that for the lie that it was.

Because I was so connected to Damien I couldn’t help but notice that he spent an inordinate amount of time surreptitiously sneaking glances at Brooke. It was the first time I’d ever seen him look at a girl he found beautiful without the cocky certainty that he would be nailing her soon. Instead of his usual ‘you’ll be under me later’ assuredness, he looked scared of her. I didn’t hold out much hope for Damien changing his lothario ways, so I decided that I would keep an eye on his behavior toward Brooke. If anything changed or he seemed to be going over the line, I’d be nipping that right in the bud.

By the time dinner was wrapping up, I had definitely decided to take Brooke under my wing. It didn’t hurt that Delilah had made a similar decision, although she didn’t yet realize why Brooke needed us to invest time in her. After hugging everyone and making arrangements for Brooke to shop with Delilah and me the following day, I headed out for the night.

For the first time since the night that she was raped, I had finally talked Leah into coming out for the night. She’s done an amazing job of healing, but she is very clear about the fact that she isn’t ready for any kind of a relationship just yet.

In order to accommodate her anxiety about being in a bar filled with men on the hunt, I’d decided to take her to a gay bar that I had just found out about. Some industrious promoter kept papering the parking lot at my apartment with flyers that said the bar was “The place to be if you don’t want to feel like you’re in a meat market.” That alone made the flyer stand out to me, and I figured that it would be a great way to get Leah out on the town. Getting her dressed up and out at night was such a victory that I would have gone to tunnel with her if that’s what she needed me to do. The fact that I couldn’t stand to have men touching me made the choice of the club ideal for me, too.