Wilder Love

by Rose, Emery

  “Looks that way. I’m happy for you.”

  “How’s the life of a supermodel?”

  “Busy. Hectic. Sometimes good and sometimes not so good. It had its perks.”

  He nodded, and I got the feeling that he didn’t really give a shit if my life was good or bad.

  Scooping up handfuls of soft sand, I let the grains sift through my fingers while I waited for him to say what was on his mind.

  “Are you just passing through or are you planning to stay?”

  “I’m not sure yet. But I won’t be leaving anytime soon.”

  He nodded. “Right. Don’t take this personally, Remy. But he’s been to hell and back. He doesn’t need any more trouble in his life.”

  Trouble. That was how Travis saw me. I couldn’t blame him. He was just trying to look out for Shane, not trying to make me feel like shit. But it still hurt, knowing that all I’d ever brought into Shane’s life was trouble.

  “He’s trying to get his life back together, but it’s not easy. And now…” Travis ran his hand over his buzzed hair. “he’s going through a hard time. Just do me a favor and stay away from him. If you care about him at all, just stay the fuck away, Remy.”

  Some things would never change. The universe had always conspired to keep me and Shane apart. But Travis had always been a good friend to Shane, so I couldn’t fault him for speaking his mind.

  I opened my mouth to respond but closed it again. Travis was already walking away, his board under his arm, his message delivered.

  I watched him jog back down to the water and paddle out, getting in the lineup next to Shane. Even from this distance, I could see the pissed-off expression on Shane’s face and then Shane paddled in and I knew this was it. After seven years, we were going to come face to face. My heart hammered against my ribcage as he walked toward me. I should leave. I should get up and walk away. Listen to what Travis said. But I couldn’t move.

  He’d gotten bigger, his muscles more corded. His face harder-looking. There was no warmth in his eyes, no easy smile on his lips. I couldn’t read his face like I used to, couldn’t guess what was going on behind those hazel eyes. We didn’t know each other anymore. The world had changed us. But one thing was certain—he didn’t look like a guy who was loving life, who could turn every day into an adventure.

  The magic was gone. It made my heart ache to look at him.

  I’d imagined this day so many times but now that he was actually right in front of me I didn’t know what to do or what to say.

  My breath whooshed out of my lungs as he lowered himself onto the sand next to me, sitting in the same place Travis had been only minutes ago. After all these years, he was so close. Close enough to touch. From the corner of my eye, I noticed the rigid set of his shoulders, the clenched jaw. I was too much of a coward to turn my head or look into his eyes. Too scared of what I’d see in them. Or what I wouldn’t see.

  All our unspoken words filled the empty space between us. Shouted into the silence.

  I destroyed Shane Wilder’s life and there was no coming back from that.

  28

  Shane

  “Why are you here, Remy?”

  “I just came down to watch the surfers.”

  Her voice was the same—low and husky. Sexy. The sound still went straight to my cock. Another one of her secret weapons. She had an entire arsenal at her disposal.

  I couldn’t look at her. Not really. It hurt too much. But I watched her in my periphery, my gaze on the ocean. I had seen enough as I’d walked toward her—she looked sleek and elegant in a black bikini that showed off her taut stomach and flawless caramel skin. Now, she was chipping away at the dark polish on her nails just like she always used to do when she was nervous.

  There was so much to say, yet nothing at all. I wanted to ask her how the world was treating her. If she had fallen in love. If she had found someone else. If she was sleeping with that British rock star I had seen her with on social media. But I didn’t ask any of those things. Maybe I didn’t want to hear the answers. Her life was so far removed from what it had been, from the life I’d been living for the past seven years, that I couldn’t relate. I’d seen her on a yacht in Monte Carlo, drinking champagne as the fireworks exploded above her head. At Coachella, partying with rock stars and models in their designer festival wear. She wasn’t the Remy I used to know. The world was her playground now. Doors opened for girls who looked like Remy St. Clair.

  The day I’d finally given in to my curiosity and Googled her, I’d been at an all-time low which was saying something for a man who had spent six years in prison. Seeing Remy on a catwalk, on the covers of glossy magazines, in London and Paris and Milan, had sent me spiraling down even lower. A bigger man would have been happy for her. A bigger man wouldn’t have been so angry. It was what I’d always wanted for her. To get on with her life, put her past behind her, and find a way to be happy.

  Did I want her to be broken? God, no.

  But I’d come to learn that I wasn’t a bigger man. I was angry all the time now. At John Hart who had gone after me with a vengeance, seeking retribution for his dead son. At Remy’s piece of shit mother. At a God I didn’t believe in. At the doctors who claimed there was nothing more they could do. But mostly at myself. I was holding so much anger inside that one of these days I was going to implode. The ocean was the only place where I felt some sense of peace.

  Without surfing, I would be a lost soul.

  “Why didn’t you let me visit you?” Her voice was quiet, barely audible over the sound of the waves crashing against the shore and the voices around us, but I heard her as if she’d shouted the words.

  “You know why.”

  “Because you hate me?”

  How I wished it had been that simple. Hatred was cut and dry. Clean. Simple. Remy and I didn’t inhabit a black and white world, we were shades of gray. Did I wish I had never met her? Sometimes. But other times, most of the time, I missed the girl I used to know. “Why would you think I hated you?”

  She swallowed hard, fighting back tears, her voice quavering on the words. “What else was I supposed to think?”

  “You were supposed to think that I didn’t want you waiting around and fucking up your life for me. You needed to get the hell out of here. And I was hoping you’d never look back.”

  “Shane… I would have been there for you.”

  “Well, there’s your answer. I didn’t want you to be there for me.”

  “You’re so stubborn, thinking you know what’s best. I didn’t get a vote, Shane. That’s you though, isn’t it?”

  I could call her out as a hypocrite, reminding her that she’d done the same thing when she caved to Tristan’s bullying tactics, but I didn’t want to go there. Not now. Not ever. “Yeah, I guess it is.”

  I stood to go. There was nothing left to say. I didn’t even ask what Travis had said to her. It was none of my business. She was no longer any of my business. Instead of heading back to the water, I carried my board to my Jeep. It was a sad day when I wasn’t in the mood for surfing.

  I loaded my board and peeled off my rash vest, tossing it in the back. I’d shower when I got home. As I closed the hatch, a hand wrapped around my bicep. I closed my eyes and tried to breathe.

  Don’t get so close, Remy. Don’t touch me.

  She pulled her hand away, but my skin still burned from her touch.

  “Need something, Rem?”

  “Yes. I need you to turn around and look at me.”

  Reluctantly, I turned to look at her, my brows raised in question. Her eyes roamed over my bare chest before she lifted her eyes to mine. Her aquamarine eyes were still the same. Bottomless tropical seas. I had seen them in my dreams more times than I cared to admit.

  “Don’t say anything. Just listen, okay?” she said.

  I clenched my jaw, arms crossed over my chest, my gaze fixated on a spot over her shoulder, waiting to hear what she felt she needed to say. My face and posture didn’t indicate
that I was open to listening, but I stayed where I was which had to count for something.

  “I want to… I can…” She stopped and took a breath. “Why are you making this so hard?”

  I gave her a slow, lazy smile and threw in a wink for good measure. “Just my special talent.”

  She growled. Yes, she actually growled, her hands balling into fists. It was fucking fantastic, riling up Remy. Despite everything she’d been through and all the shit in her life, Remy hadn’t lost her fire. Thank God. For a while there, she was so lost. So… broken. But she was strong. And she was resilient. I was happy that the world hadn’t broken her spirit.

  “I have money. And I can help you do whatever you want. I can help you make your dream come true, Shane. If you want to pursue a surfing career, I can—”

  I held up my hand. “Stop. Right the fuck there. I’m going to pretend I never heard those words come out of your mouth.”

  She narrowed her eyes at me, her chest heaving, hands planted on her hips. “Why not? I owe you—”

  “Fucking hell, woman. Stop. Talking.”

  I climbed into my Jeep, and slammed the door, rolling down the window when she still hadn’t budged. “Move your pretty ass before I run you over.”

  I revved the engine. She stepped out of the way, her self-preservation instincts still intact, and I hit the gas, intent on putting her words and her face and her everything behind me as I peeled out of the parking lot, leaving her in my dust.

  Why, Remy? Why did I have to fall in love with you? You would think that time and distance would have dulled the emotions. Dimmed the memories. But it was all crystal clear. Every memory, every snapshot imprinted on my brain. The good, the bad, and the ugly.

  Time and distance hadn’t stopped me from wanting her. But she didn’t belong in my world. An ocean separated us and that was how it needed to stay. Again.

  * * *

  I grabbed the grocery bags from the passenger seat and walked around the side of the house. My dad was lying in the hammock, his eyes closed, the evening sun on his face. I halted in my tracks, the grocery bags hanging at my sides.

  “I’m not dead yet,” my dad said, his eyes still closed.

  I exhaled loudly, my shoulders sagging in relief. “Don’t fucking scare me like that.”

  “It’s a sad day when a man can’t sit outside and enjoy the sunset without getting told off by his own son.”

  I refrained from mentioning that it was hard to see the sunset with your eyes closed. It was a beautiful one though. A pink and red sky that promised a good day tomorrow, if you believed the sailors’ lore. Red sky at night, sailor’s delight. I had always preferred sunrises to sunsets. Maybe because it was the start of a new day, a symbol of hope instead of the end of something.

  “Let’s never say goodbye, okay? Goodbye is the saddest word in the English language.”

  Yes, Remy. Yes, it is.

  I wasn’t ready to say goodbye. I wasn’t ready to let him go. Was anyone ever ready for something like that?

  He rolled a joint while I got the barbecue going and tossed a salad together, before throwing two swordfish steaks on the grill. We ate at the table on the patio just like we had so many nights before. My dad picked at his food, eating a few bites of everything and I nearly cried like a fucking baby when I saw that he’d only eaten half of his swordfish steak.

  I cleared our plates and tossed his uneaten food in the garbage disposal. There was no point stowing leftovers in the refrigerator. They went uneaten. After I washed up our dishes, I returned to the patio where he was smoking a joint, the scent of weed hanging in the air.

  My eyes roamed over the small vegetable garden in the backyard that my mom had planted so many years ago, my thoughts drifting to Remy. She used to love that little garden.

  I tipped back on the hind legs of my chair, my fingers laced behind my head and listened to the sounds of the neighborhood. A dog barking a few doors down, kids screaming “You’re It” in a game of tag, the rumble of a motorcycle engine as it roared past. All the little everyday things I’d always taken for granted. The stars reeled in the sky, reminding me of all those nights with Remy on the roof. Our dreams, our hopes, our dirty secrets. Her midnight black hair shimmering blue in the moonlight. The softness of her skin and the feel of her lips against mine.

  “If this is wrong, why does it feel so right?”

  “You wanna talk about it?” my dad asked, his eyes closed as he inhaled, holding the smoke in his lungs before he exhaled.

  “Nothing to talk about.”

  He chuckled. “Yeah, okay. So this mood of yours has nothing to do with Remy St. Clair coming back to town.”

  I narrowed my eyes on him. It had been two days since I saw Remy, and I hadn’t mentioned it to my dad. “How did you know she’s back?”

  “Saw her earlier.”

  “Where?”

  “She was down at the marina with her brother.”

  “What were you doing down at the marina?”

  “Now I have to report my every move to you?”

  I ran my hands through my hair and let out a frustrated breath. I didn’t like him driving and unless he walked or ran the five miles to the marina, he had to have driven.

  “Sam and I went out on his boat. We went diving.”

  “You went diving,” I repeated. “Should you be diving?”

  The answer was no. Fucking no he should not. “What if you had a seizure—”

  “I didn’t, Shane. I’m okay.” His voice was firm but gentle. I gritted my teeth. “Look at me.”

  I eyed my dad, noting the color in his face. He was always tan. Had always spent time in the sun. He was gaunter now, but he still looked okay. If you didn’t know him well, you wouldn’t notice anything was wrong. But I noticed. “Do I look like I’m ready to die today?”

  He didn’t. Looking at him, you wouldn’t realize he was dying. In some ways, that made it harder to process. He didn’t look sick. Even though he’d lost weight over the last few months, he wasn’t frail or haggard. He was out fucking riding on his buddy’s boat, deep-sea diving.

  “Did you talk to Remy?”

  “She came over to me, yeah. She’s back for you, Shane.”

  “Did she tell you that?”

  He chuckled, seeing the humor in something I failed to see. “She didn’t have to. I know she still loves you.”

  We sat in silence for a while, my dad smoking his joint, while I tried to process his words. Was it really love? Maybe she thought she still loved me, but she didn’t know me anymore. I wasn’t the same guy from seven years ago and it wouldn’t take her long to figure that out.

  “And I’m guessing you didn’t tell her what you’re going through?” I asked, eyeing him.

  “Nope.”

  I shook my head. “You’re a pain in the ass.”

  “So are you,” he said, his voice affectionate, his smile warm.

  My dad loved me. Always had. He was the least judgmental person I’d ever met and the best damn father anyone could ask for. In some ways we’d been more like friends than father and son. He had never disciplined me. Had always let me find my own way in life. But he’d been there whenever I had needed him. He had taught me to surf. Had nurtured my love of the ocean. I owed him everything and had repaid him by going to prison. All his hard work shot to hell. All his dreams for me destroyed.

  Because of my actions, he’d lost everything too, and it killed me that he’d sacrificed so much for me.

  He wanted his last months to be a celebration of life for as long as he could live it fully. I didn’t know how to do that. I didn’t know how to turn off the thoughts that someday in the near future he wouldn’t be hanging out on the back deck with me, smoking a joint and shooting the shit. Sharing his life’s wisdom, albeit warped at times, but always welcome.

  Prison was a cakewalk compared to this. I was angry all over again. Angry at the world. Angry at the precious years I’d lost with him. Angry at him.

 
“Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” I asked, my frustration so pent-up I wanted to punch a hole in the wall. Like that would solve anything. He didn’t answer for a few minutes. He knew what I was asking. Knew damn well what I was talking about. I could have had more time with him.

  “I wasn’t ready to accept it yet,” he said simply. He had always been honest with me, sometimes painfully so. Except the one time I had needed him to be. “I was still in denial.”

  I let out a ragged breath. He offered me the blunt. I shook my head.

  “No more diving,” I said, trying to exert some authority I didn’t have. He wouldn’t listen. Never had. Never will. He didn’t listen to the doctors either, thinking he knew best.

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Don’t worry about it? Yeah, okay. I won’t worry about you collapsing or getting rushed to the ER. I won’t worry that you’re taking your meds and eating your meals. I won’t worry about a damn thing.”

  “You’re struggling, Shane. You barely have the money to keep yourself afloat. And I’ll be damned if I’m going to sit back and let my son carry my burdens along with his own. You might think you’re taking care of me by mollycoddling me, but I can tell you right now, you’re not.”

  “Don’t worry about the bills. I’ve got that covered.” I sure as hell didn’t. Every day they piled up. I had a mountain of bills, but I paid off what I could. The hospital and the doctors had set up a special payment plan for me. It sucked that you couldn’t even get sick without accruing debt. Insurance didn’t cover everything. I had been the one who begged him to get the operation, holding out on the slim hope that it would give him more time. Or that they’d be able to remove the whole tumor. He hadn’t wanted to let them do a craniotomy. But he’d done it. For me. He’d suffered through rounds of chemo and radiation that made him weak and nauseous. That fucked with his quality of life.

  Until finally, one day, he said he was done. He was going to live out the remainder of his life on his own terms which was what he had wanted to do from the start. How could I argue with that? It was his life to live as he chose, right to the bitter end.