by R. J. Lewis
“I’m sorry,” he cut in, turning to look at me, his eyes soft. “I was in the wrong, dove, not you.”
“I could have held back on some of the things I said.”
“I don’t want that to be our dynamic,” he replied steadfastly. “I don’t want you to hold back. I want you to feel comfortable telling me anything.”
“About Locke –”
“I need to respect your relationship with him,” he cut in quickly. “I stick by my words, though. I’ll hurt him if he ever fucks you over, dove, but I can’t stop you from working for him. I won’t interfere with your relationship with him, but…I want there to be transparency.”
I nodded quickly. “Of course.”
He levelled me with a solemn stare. “You need to tell me if anything happens.”
“I will,” I promised.
“I don’t hate him, not when it really comes down to it,” he then said, swallowing hard as he looked back at the car. “I carry a lot of guilt. It was easier to believe he was okay because…he doesn’t carry his pain on his sleeve.”
“None of you do, Conor. Not Jem, not you, and I suspect not Dominic either.”
“Dominic…” his voice broke just then, his lips trembling. “I left Dominic behind in that prison. He needed me, too.” He sucked in a breath, his eyes growing red with unshed tears. “I let them all down. They turned to me, Char. They wanted me to protect them. Jem when he lost Addison, Dominic in prison, Locke when he suffered in that hole…and I…I couldn’t help them. I was too busy playing the bully, pretending nothing affected me. I buried it down for years with the drink, with the women, with the crime, with prison terms…like all of that was going to make me some bad ass. I didn’t want emotion to touch me. I didn’t want to care about anything…until I met you.”
He turned back to me, his gaze finally meeting mine. He took me in, slowly, his body stiff, his lips parted with words he was struggling to form.
“Charlotte,” he whispered, “I see Billy, too, but not the way you do. I don’t see his form when I’m upset. I see him in random faces. I saw him…” He swallowed hard. “I saw him just the other day when I was speaking to Reid. I looked up, and there he was, peering at me behind a window. He was Kane. An innocent boy – Penny’s boy – and he had the saddest eyes, and I kept thinking…Billy was like that too. You said so yourself. You played with him. He loved you.”
Tears fell from my eyes. “I loved him as a boy, too.”
A tear escaped his eye, trailing down the side of his face. “I’m sorry I took him away, dove. I may have killed the bad man, but I killed the boy, too. I killed both of them at the same time, and I never confronted that truth in its entirety.” He shook his head to himself, the remorse bleeding out of him. “I see these little boys everywhere. I remember Max before he got taken. He needed me so much. The way he looked at me, Char, with stars in his eyes. He was so fucking innocent. I thought about him so much over the years. Sometimes I would close my eyes and try to harness time, as fucking stupid as that sounds, and I would try to believe I could rewind it. That I could start over again with this life and take better care of him and the others.
“I left prison, but I’m still caged. Everything I ever did wrong, everyone I ever hurt, all the laws I broke, all the misery I am responsible for, all of it has come together to create this monstrous form, demanding retribution.” He let out a long breath, looking lost. “I just want to be free.”
I took his face into both my hands, urgently saying, “Then you need to forgive yourself, Conor. It’ll never go away until you learn to make amends with yourself.”
He searched my eyes, frowning. “I’m scared of what that means. Dominic, Max, Jem…all of them are bound to that time in our past, and we can’t shed those little boys inside of us. I can’t…I can’t leave that cage knowing they’re still trapped in there.”
I nodded, understanding, feeling shattered for him, for the pain that he was constantly in.
“Then we’ll help them,” I told him. “We’ll help them out, one by one, and then you’ll be free, and you’ll be free with them.”
He let out a hard breath, an incredulous look taking over. “Can you imagine?” he murmured in awe. “Can you imagine us all free?”
“I can, Conor.”
“I’m so lucky, you know that? I have this strong, beautiful woman in my corner, and they have no one. It wrecks me.”
It wrecked me too.
It made me sad for Jem because he hardly even looked at women, too scarred by what the mother of his child did to him.
It made me sad for Locke, because his self-loathing was so great, he didn’t know the meaning of love.
It made me sad for Dominic, because his life had been ripped from him, and he was perpetually alone, never having ever been with a woman. I wanted to meet him so bad and be there for him and offer him light, because I had a feeling the darkness Dom was in was different to Conor’s.
“We’ll figure this out together,” I promised. “We will, all of us, right here in this cold little town.”
He took my arm and pulled me to him. Dropping his head, he kissed me softly, and this was where I belonged, him pressed against me, his mouth entwined with mine. His hands roamed down my back, cupping my ass possessively. He walked me back, so my back touched the driver’s side door of the cringy car. His entire body enveloped mine, making me feel small and his as he deepened the kiss.
“I want to fuck you like I used to,” he confessed between kisses, breathing harshly against me. “I want to watch you come undone over and over again, Charlotte.”
I groaned, pressing against his front. “I want to watch you like that, too.”
He trailed my skirt up, his fingers grazing below my ass. “You think we can do it right here, dove, in broad daylight in front of this prudish little neighbourhood?”
“Let’s find out.”
He smiled, kissing me languidly this time as his fingers continued climbing up my legs.
A car horn sounded, breaking our moment. As Conor brought my skirt down back in place, I turned my head, cringing as Jem’s truck came to a stop beside my car. He poked his head out and wolf whistled at us and I shut my eyes as Conor chuckled.
“Should I come back later, love bugs?” he teased, stepping out of the car with a bag of food and a tray of coffee.
I said no just as Conor said maybe. He looked down at me, smiling wide as he took in my blushing face.
“I don’t get it,” he whispered. “You do the wildest things in bed and yet you look like a nun when I kiss you in public.”
“Some things never change, huh?”
His face turned tender. “I like that. A lot. It feels like we’re picking up where we left off, doesn’t it?”
The hopeful look in his eye was what I’d been begging to see since I’d found him on the road, soaked and cold and looking for me.
I smiled warmly, feeling my chest swell. “Right where we left off.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Charlotte
After I’d picked up Penny, she hung around the garage at Conor’s side, getting her hands dirty. They made a freaking mess. What was once a pristine looking garage now looked like something out of a mechanic’s shop. Conor and Jem had stripped the car apart, and parts were scattered everywhere.
It was sort of nostalgic for me. How much of my time had been devoted to watching Conor work on a car? Seeing it in the flesh again was amazing.
It was really sweet of Jem to go another day without work. I ordered pizza, making sure Jem had a case of beer to drink through. I even snuck a bottle myself and nursed it in my office as I went through some more illegal paperwork, silently cursing Locke under my breath throughout. If money wasn’t so good, I’d have dramatically quit this morning, but I knew that was too impulsive. I needed this job. I needed more savings. I needed to be the one providing this time while Conor got back on his feet. After all, he’d done the same for me no questions asked all throughout my pre
gnancy. If he hadn’t stomped Billy’s head in and went away, I was positive Conor would have wanted me home with Penny.
By the time I was done squirreling people’s questionable money in a dozen different directions, I left the office and poked my head out into the garage. It was just after nine at night. My mouth dropped at the sight of Penny curled up and asleep on one of the plastic chairs, wrapped in Conor’s dirty shirt.
Still in those overalls, Conor was bent over the engine of the car. His hands and vast chest were practically black with grease. He even had tiny little spots of grease on his face that gave him a rugged edge.
Jem was on another chair, eyes glazed, a near empty bottle of beer in one hand. He was chatting away, making Conor laugh. They hadn’t noticed me yet.
“Maybe, after a couple cars, a few good pay checks, we can get out of Blackwater, go somewhere different,” Jem was saying quietly as he spun the bottle around. “I got nothing keeping me here. I get offers for the bar all the time. I think, after everything you told me today…maybe you deserve a fresh start, too.”
Conor, who was under the hood of the car, poked his head out to look at him. “Charlotte’s built a life here.”
“Not really,” Jem argued. “The house isn’t hers, and I doubt she’ll be working for Locke very long now that you’re here.”
“She might be happy here.”
“She was only here for you, Conor. She didn’t want to let you go. The town has not been too nice to her, and she’s never warmed up to anyone, either.”
Conor frowned, looking thoughtful. “I used to think starting over was something I needed to do to let go of the past, but…” His eyes suddenly flashed to mine as I stood in the doorway. “I’m not sure it matters where I go anymore. As long as I have the people I love with me, I’m alright.”
Jem followed his line of sight. When he saw me, he smiled lazily. “Hey, Char, we were just talking shit about you.”
“Oh, yeah, because I’m so horrible.”
“That’s right. You are the mostest horrible.”
“Mostest, huh?” Stepping out, I dramatically shot him a glare and replied, “You’re starting to slur, Jem. I think it’s time you retire for the evening.”
Jem set the bottle down on the ground and patted his pockets. “I gotta find my keys first.”
“As if I’m letting you drive out of here.” I pointed my thumb at the door behind me. “You can take the spare room.”
Jem shot Conor a brighter smile. “Mr Thames, she’s giving me the spare room in all my greasy state. This girl is a keeper. Better give her your name before someone else does.”
Conor smirked. “Like you, Jem?”
Jem forced himself up, wobbling slightly. “The way half the men in this town look at her, I’d be the last of your worries.”
“Alright,” I cut in, feeling my cheeks heat. “Enough talk about me. Let’s get you inside. I’ll need to dig out some spare sheets for your filthy ass. Conor, you continue messing up the garage, but you’re cleaning up when you’re done.”
Conor chuckled and Jem looked amused, muttering, “I see who wears the pants around here.”
I wrapped my arms around Penny and cradled her inside as Jem followed. Upstairs, I settled her into her bed, holding back my cringe because she hadn’t bathed and changed and she smelled a little like engine oil, but I reasoned she was dead asleep. Waking her up would be cruel, and I’d wash her and the sheets in the morning, anyway.
Jem was in the doorway, watching me tuck her in, smiling softly at me with his glazed eyes. “Feels like yesterday I was watching you fall apart over her.”
I smiled back. “I remember hearing the front door slam and thinking you had abandoned me that night.”
He shook his head solemnly, all trace of humour gone. “Never entertained the thought. Still wouldn’t. You, her, Conor, are my family.”
I swallowed back the emotion in my throat from his words. I walked past him and grabbed the spare sheets from the hallway closet. Entering the guest bedroom, I quickly set up his bed, gesturing once to the bathroom. “You can have a shower in there before you crash. I’ll have a spare change of clothes outside the door for you.”
“Thanks, Charlotte.”
I paused and looked at him gravely, shaking my head. “No, Jem, it’s me who should be thanking you for what you did down there.”
“Getting drunk in your garage?” he cheekily asked.
I stood up straight. “No,” I told him. “For getting the car, for sparking life back into Conor. I’ve been trying, you know?”
He took a step closer, frowning when he saw the fresh tears in my eyes. “You’re doing just fine.”
“No,” I disagreed, sniffing lightly. “You know something, Jem? You were right, you know, that night I asked you for help. You said he’d come back and he wouldn’t be the same, that…the Conor I knew will be dead and gone.”
Jem’s frown deepened. “I was being a fuckhead, Char. I wish I hadn’t said those things.”
“But you were right. I’m trying to bring him back, I am, but…I don’t know if I’m doing it right. Then there you are, doing it effortlessly. He looked so happy today. I wish he was like that all the time, but I see it when he doesn’t think I’m looking. I see him hurting. He’s not the same.”
Jem sighed, mulling my words over with a faraway look. “My dad was in and out of prison. I didn’t have much of a relationship with him. Every time he went away, he’d come back more fucked up than he was before. Conor would say the same about his old man. Prison alters you. Sometimes it even kills you. It’s partly why I walk the line. I can’t imagine being locked up and feeling powerless.”
“I can’t, either.”
“Conor was stronger that way. He seemed adaptable, you know? But he was never put away so long, and I knew this time it would be different.”
“But,” he added, bringing his focus back to me, “the best of Conor is still in him. It really is. I see it, too, when he looks at you and you don’t know it. He reveres you. He wants your love, your acceptance, and he’s scared. I see that, too. I see his fear. He doesn’t want to lose you, even after knowing you waited for him this whole time. He’s vulnerable. Still that lost boy in him shining through.”
“How do I help him?”
“You are helping him. Every day he wakes up to you next to him, he’s winning. You’re extraordinary, Charlotte. I mean that.” Jem looked warmly at me, letting his walls down, showing me how genuine he was. “You see the best in everyone, and that gives people strength.”
In all his greasy state, I went over to him and gave him a big hug. “Thanks, Jem. You have no idea how much I needed to hear that.”
Today had been emotional for me. I didn’t feel like I’d made the most of my day because of the way I behaved. I regretted storming into Locke’s office and putting him on the spot. I hated thinking in that moment he might not think I would be there for him if he needed me. There was nothing extraordinary about the way I conducted myself.
And Conor had needed my patience this morning. I had fled the room the second I saw the old anger inside him creep back. Deep inside me, I knew that was what bothered me the most. I had spent too much time obsessed about keeping the violent parts of him out. It was wrong because he needed to be allowed to be human, and he needed my patience.
“A man doesn’t need his woman the most when he’s great,” Billy whispered as I walked out of the room and down the hallway, his presence following me. “A man needs his woman the most when he’s at his worst.”
I looked over my shoulder at him, smiling kindly at my ghost.
I promised myself I wouldn’t let Conor down again.
Thames
His endorphins hadn’t stopped soaring since he cracked the hood of this car and began tearing it apart. A rush he hadn’t felt in years ran through him, making the tips of his fingers shake – but in a good way, the kind of way that was akin to fucking Charlotte.
His heart was th
udding inside his chest as he remembered the process of restoring a car to pristine condition. It was like riding a bike. The second he started, pulling it apart from carb to pan, all of it came back to him and he felt…elated.
Cars weren’t made to last forever. Breathing new life into the vehicle consisted of many steps, and it eased him following every step to a tee. Rebuilding it, one component at a time, required patience and diligence. It needed his complete attention, and being immersed in a project like that meant blocking out the world, and god, there was no better way to do it.
Like Reid, most people loved their modern brand new sportscar, but Thames was in love with the past, when a car was simpler and made with more care than today’s desire to just push out car after car. Nowadays, it was how many bells and whistles you could cram into these moving beasts. Its beauty had long gone forgotten. Today, a car was usually marked as a sign of wealth and not a declaration of personal taste and style.
Doing this, babying the vehicle, watching it transform into a work of art was where it was at for Thames. He felt that familiar passion, and it put him at ease.
He might be okay. He told himself. He was good at this. He didn’t need to be out in the real world. He could work for himself and provide like he used to. The opportunities were endless, and the future seemed brighter than it was just this morning.
“My sexy, greasy man,” Charlotte murmured from behind him.
He turned, smiling broadly at the sight of her coming out to join him. The little minx was back in her silk nightgown. Dear God, that fucking nightgown. He could smell her fresh bodywash from here and her creams too. They always made her skin so fucking soft. She took a seat on the chair, hands in her lap, tired eyes studying him.
“I feel good, babe,” he said, unable to hold back as the excitement flooded out of him. “I feel…revived.”
She smiled warmly at him. “Of course you do, you’re doing what you love.”
He grabbed a work cloth and wiped his hands. “I need to stop now, or else I’ll be out here all night.”
