by E. K. Blair
“You should.”
“But I don’t,” I tell him, and he pulls me into his loving arms that I’ve craved since I was five years old. “All I ever wanted was this. You holding me. I’ve needed your arms so badly,” I say, the words wrapping around my throat, making it hard to speak.
“I need you to listen to me,” he says insistently, and I look up at him. “I need you to know how much I love you. I need you to know that without you, my heart is incapable of ever being complete. You . . . you are the very fibers of my being.”
I rest my head against his chest and listen to his heartbeat as he continues, “I remember the day you were born. The nurse placed you in my arms, and I was forever changed. You softened my heart instantly, and I knew I would never be the same. I’ve never been so in love like I’ve been with you. I need you to never forget that.”
“I won’t.”
“Let me look at you,” he requests when he takes my face and cranes it up to him. He shakes his head, saying, “I just can’t believe how beautiful you are. My baby, you’re all grown up.”
Reaching my hand up, I run it along his jaw where his beard used to be. “I can’t believe I found you.”
“You did. And I will forever be thankful for that. To see you, and to know you’re okay.”
He leans down, pushes the hood of my raincoat back, and kisses the top of my head. His back shudders against my hands in sadness as he continues to plant kisses in my hair.
“You and I,” he eventually says. “We’re unbreakable even when we’ve been broken.”
“I’ve never let you die, even when I believed you were dead.”
We stand here, together in the misty rain, and we’re tear-stained souls who’ve finally united when the world has kept us apart for so long.
“I can’t believe I have you back,” I weep.
He wipes my face with his hands. “No more tears, okay?”
I nod and inhale deeply to soothe myself.
When he turns his head to look up where our cars are parked, he says, “That man up there . . . He’s a good one.”
I watch Declan, who’s talking on the phone, and smile. “He’s really good to me, Dad. I don’t deserve him.”
“You do. You deserve each other. I see how he looks at you, as if it’s the last time he’ll ever look at you.” He moves to stand in front of my view of Declan. “That’s the look of a man who’s desperately in love,” he says. “Even though I love you in a very different way, it’s the same way I look at you.”
His words comfort in ways I can’t explain, and I smile up at him.
“There’s that gorgeous light,” he adulates, and then kisses my forehead. “I love your smile.”
“I love you, Dad. So much.”
“I love you too, princess.”
When he looks at his watch, he groans. “I’ve gotta run.”
He takes my hand and leads me back up to the car, and when he opens my door, he leans down and looks to Declan, giving him a nod. Declan returns the gesture without any words spoken.
“Thanks, Dad,” I tell him. “I needed this.”
“I did too, sweetheart.”
He leans in and kisses my cheek, and I kiss his before he runs his hand down the length of my face.
“Drive safe, okay?”
“You too.”
“I will never love anyone the way I love you,” he tells me before he closes my door.
Declan then takes my hand and pulls it into his lap after we pull out of the parking lot and start heading back to the hotel. I reflect on the words my dad said to me, words I’ve been longing to hear, to know that I was never disposed of. To know that he’s hurt for me like I’ve hurt for him dissolves all resentment. And he’s right, even when we were apart, we were still together as one because neither of us let the other fade from our souls. No one can break us.
Walking through the door of our hotel room, a wave of unease hits me out of the blue.
We forgot to make plans to see each other again.
“Declan, did my dad say when he was coming back?”
He shrugs his jacket off and tosses it over a chair, saying, “No.”
I watch Declan as he moves aimlessly around the suite as worriment nags me.
“Declan?”
“Yeah,” he calls out when he wanders into the bedroom, and I follow him.
“Something doesn’t feel right.”
“What do you mean?”
“He’s never not said when he’d be coming back.”
“Maybe he just forgot.”
“No. This doesn’t feel right to me.”
He runs his hands down my arms and scoops my hands up in his. “Darling . . .”
“Declan, something is wrong here, and I don’t trust it,” I say as a surge of fear takes over me. My hands start shaking. “Can you drive me by his house?”
“Why?”
“I don’t know, but my gut is telling me that something is happening here that I don’t know about,” I tell him in a tremoring voice, panging in terror.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Either you take me or I’ll go on my own. You can’t stop me and you know it.”
“Elizabeth, no.”
“Why are you fighting me on this?”
“I just don’t think it’s safe,” he says, and I plead, “You promised me you would bend. I need you to bend.”
He releases a deep breath. “Okay.”
Declan grabs the keys, and I rush out the door.
He drives with a white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel.
“Why are you so tense?”
He doesn’t speak, only reaches over to hold my hand, which does nothing for my anxiety. I stare at him as we pull into the neighborhood, and there’s a look in his eyes I’ve never seen before. My stomach holds the weight of a thousand pounds, and I want to scream at the top of my lungs to drive faster!
The moment he pulls onto Fairview, I see the sign.
I never knew the twist of fate that day held for me. But when I look back, I should’ve known. It was too much. Too much freedom. The words were too strong. The feelings were too intense. The truth was all around me, but I was too consumed with my dream come true to realize the evil nemesis that couldn’t just let me be. If I would’ve paid better attention, I would’ve said more to him. I would’ve made sure he knew every beat of my heart, the depths in which I’ve always loved him, and how utterly perfect I’ve always thought he was. He was selfish though, and I can’t blame him. Because looking back, I know he wanted to see my smile, pure and true, for one last time. There’s no way I could’ve given him that if I knew what was coming.
I sling open the door before Declan stops the car and run up to the now vacant house. In an utter panic, I yank on the front door, and when that doesn’t budge, I peer into the windows. My heart snaps loose inside of my chest and falls into the depths of fiery hell. Once again, I’m faced with the stench of tragedy.
“Where is he?” I scream out as Declan walks up the circle drive. “Where is he?”
“Baby, please.”
He reaches for me, but it isn’t his touch I want so I slap his hand away, seething, “Don’t fucking touch me!”
He reeks of guilt.
“Tell me where he is!”
He stares at me with pity. “He’s gone.”
“Where?”
“Let’s get back in the car.”
“NO!”
I can’t move.
I can’t breathe.
All I can do is stand here, a bleeding mess as every part of what makes me human blisters in monumental agony. They grow, filling with the acid of heartache only to pop and sear me from the inside out.
“You knew,” I accuse bitterly, my hands fisting at my sides. “You knew, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“You unimaginable bastard!” I shriek, slapping him across his face, and he takes it. I slap him again, and then hammer my fists against his
chest, causing him to stumble back.
He doesn’t fight me as I yell at him through my tears, “How could you?”
Another searing slap.
“Are you done hitting me?”
“No!” I spit out as I ram my palm into his shoulder, and that’s when he grabs ahold of my wrist.
“How could you not tell me?”
He jerks my wrist, forcing me into his arms, but I don’t want his embrace—I want my dad.
I fight against his hold, but he dominates my strength and forces me back down the driveway and into the car. Shock riddles my system as I stare at the For Sale sign in the front yard.
Declan gets into the car and speaks in an even and controlled tone. “I am so sorry, baby.”
The salt of my pain eats away at my flesh when I turn to face him. “I need answers.”
“He got caught,” he confesses.
“No, he didn’t,” I cry, unwilling to believe him.
“They allowed him to have this one last day with you while they emptied the house.”
“No.”
“He’s gone.”
“NO!”
And it was in that moment the world fell from its axis and tumbled into nothingness. I only existed in a realm of blank space. I don’t know what happened next. I don’t remember the drive back to the hotel. I don’t remember going to bed. Nothing existed that night. I suppose the pain must’ve been so incredibly excruciating that I couldn’t tolerate it and all my senses seized. Maybe it was something greater that was sparing me of having to carry that memory around with me for a lifetime. Whatever it was that saved me from the horror of that night—thank you.
I SIT IN my car with my gun and watch Archer and his daughter on the beach. I’m far enough away from their cars, so they don’t take notice of me, but my eyes never leave them.
I’ve been anxious ever since I got the phone call on their new whereabouts, and that anxiety is at an all-time high now that I’m here. When someone does you wrong, it doesn’t simply disappear. It festers and marinates, growing like wildfire. I think of my brother who lost his freedom. He’s been sitting in prison for over a decade. His wife lost her husband. His children lost their father. My parents lost their son. It’s a ripple of destruction, and Archer will pay for all that he’s destroyed. But this isn’t my payback—it’s my brother’s.
As this little family reunion wraps up, I go ahead and pull my car out and wait down the street for Steve’s car to pass. It doesn’t take long for him to leave, and I cautiously trail behind him. Once we make it over to Gig Harbor, the traffic thins out. Winding through the heavily wooded backstreets, it’s go time.
I hammer my foot on the accelerator, and swerve across the double-lines. When my car evens up to his, I jerk the wheel and run him off the road into a ditch. In rapid-fire movements, I’m over to his car with my gun aimed on him.
“Open the fucking door.”
He does, begging, “Take whatever you want, but pl—”
“No talking.” I shove the muzzle to his forehead as he looks at me in horror. “This is vengeance for my brother. You ratted Carlos Montego out to the feds, and now he’s spending the rest of his life behind bars.” His eyes flinch when I mention my brother’s name. “He told me to kill you, but I’m going to give you a choice,” I tell him, fucking with him, because no matter what he says, he’s dying. “I know your daughter is here and staying at The Pearl’s Edge.”
“No, please don’t—”
“Choose. You die or she dies. You have five seconds.”
I pull the slide back and chamber a round when he pleads urgently, “Kill me. Don’t hurt my—”
BANG.
BANG.
I fire two shots into his head, and he falls lifelessly to the ground, maroon blood oozing out of him. Quickly holstering my gun, I look around, but there’s still not a car in sight. I grab him under his arms and drag his body out into the woods. The adrenaline pumping through my veins helps me move at a velocious rate. Tossing this fucker behind a pile of brush, I run back to my car and high-tail it out of there with the thrill of vengeance roiling through me.
It’s finished.
RAIN FALLS AGAINST the window, its particles alone and bleak, waiting to be joined by other raindrops. And once mended, they fall, trickling their way down the glass. I lie in bed on my side and watch this endless pattern repeat itself again and again. I’ve been up for a while—I don’t know how long, but long enough to notice the storm intensifying every few minutes or so.
The somber clouds hang like a veil—cloaked in the darkness of dysphoria. I know the sun is out there somewhere far, far away. She refuses to shine her light on me, but that’s okay. I don’t want it anyway. I’d rather drown in my misery than be ridiculed by resplendent radiance.
The weight of Declan’s arm as he drapes it over my hip alerts me to his rousing. A part of me is angry that he knew and didn’t tell me that yesterday would be the last time I saw my dad. But at the same time, I need him close and for there to be no animosity between us. He continues to prove to be the one man I can count on. He’s all I have left—again.
I roll onto my back, snug up against him, and watch him watching me.
“I’m sorry,” I rasp against the strain of my throat, an attestation of how much I probably screamed and cried last night.
“You slap hard.” His lips tick in a subtle grin, and then he shifts, saying more seriously, “Don’t you ever be sorry for how you feel. It’s okay.”
I don’t say anything else, exchanging words for reticence. I close my eyes and seek solitude in the warmth of Declan’s body. We remain in bed for most of the morning, drifting in and out of sleep, because sleep is much more appealing than having to face the truth. Reality can go fuck itself for all I care; I’d rather frolic among the fantasy of dreams.
Eventually, Declan decides it’s time to wake. I remain under the sheets as he calls up for coffee and tea. He then goes into my toiletry bag and finds my prescription bottle. I take the pill he hands me, and again, cheek it. Once he’s in the bathroom and I hear the faucet running, I drop the pill behind the headboard.
“He’ll be furious if he ever finds out.”
“He won’t.”
Pike stands and leans against the fog-covered window, looking out at the storm.
“Everything they told me about my dad was a lie, you know?” I whisper, keeping my voice low so Declan won’t hear.
Pike walks over to me, kneels beside the bed, and holds my hand. “I know.”
“He was everything I thought he would be after all these years.”
“Are you hungry at all?” Declan asks when he walks back into the room, and suddenly Pike is gone.
I shake my head when I look at him from over my shoulder and then turn back to the window. Declan encourages me to get out of bed and freshen up, and like a machine, I do it—all the while numb.
Did last night really happen or was it a mirage?
When I slip back into bed and sit against the headboard, Declan hands me the teacup. I cradle it in my hands as the steam ribbons into the air, eventually evaporating in a metaphoric display.
Declan sits next to me with his coffee in hand. He takes a sip and then punctures the silence. “Talk to me.”
I keep my eyes on my tea. “What’s there to say?”
“Tell me how you’re feeling?”
“I don’t know how to feel right now,” I respond despondently.
“Do you want to know how I feel?”
When I look at him, his face is marred in suffering.
“I feel like I failed you.” His words weigh heavy in the air between us. “I promised you I’d never let you fall. And when your father pulled me aside and told me it was his last day with you, I knew the best thing for you would result in you falling in the worst way possible.” He sets his coffee mug on the bedside table and then turns to me. “I was powerless to save you, and it kills me to know I couldn’t protect you from this pain. I wa
s put in the worst position last night, and I am so sorry.”
Declan isn’t a man who ever apologizes, so to hear the sincerity in it is a blatant reflection of his grief. I want to say something, tell him I understand, tell him it’s okay, but it hurts too much to speak.
He leans over and opens the drawer to the bedside table, pulls out an envelope, and hands it to me. “Your dad gave this to me yesterday.”
I hold it in my hands for a moment before breaking the seal and opening it. His written words cover the paper entirely, and agony conquers numbness and takes over.
“I don’t know if I can do this, Declan.”
“It might help,” he suggests.
Taking a deep breath, I release it slowly before lowering my eyes to his words. Declan wraps his arms around my shoulders and holds me against him when I start reading the letter to myself.
My beautiful girl,
I know you must be hurting, because I’m dying inside. I wish I could be there to comfort you and wipe your tears, but I also know that you’re in good hands with Declan. I don’t want you to be upset with him. I told him not to tell you I’d be leaving. If I told you, I knew I’d never be able to leave you. I couldn’t have our last day together with you in tears. I hope you can understand that.
The thing is, the government found out that you and I had made contact. They stepped in, and as much as I hate it, I have to agree with them. Your association with me puts you at an unbelievable risk, and if anything happened to you, I’d never be able to live with myself. You are too precious for me to put you in harm’s way. Selfishly, I want you, but because of the mistakes I made in my past, this is how it has to be.
I don’t know where I’m relocating or what my new identity will be, but I need you to let me go. Please don’t try to find me. I don’t say this because I don’t love you. I’m saying it to save you. After you read this letter, I need you to destroy it because no one can ever know that I’m alive.
These past few days were a gift. It was never supposed to happen, but it did, and I will forever be thankful that I have a daughter that fought her way to find me. You are strong and beautiful and smart, and you are destined to do great things. Promise me, you won’t let my mistakes stand in your way.
