by T. K. Leigh
When Creed returns to the car, he hands me a tray with two coffees, one for me and one for Nora, as well as a box filled with what I assume are pastries. I still don’t speak, so he starts the car and navigates the few blocks back to the hotel, parking beside the Wrangler and turning off the ignition.
A silence stretches between us as I stare straight ahead, my jaw clenching, wanting to scream.
“This is what you found out about her, isn’t it?” I say finally. “That she’s…” I trail off, struggling to finish my thought.
“Nora Tremblay was in a car accident on Long Island six years ago. Her fiancé, Hunter Copeland, didn’t survive. Nora was pulled from the vehicle by a mysterious Good Samaritan—”
“I’m fucking aware of that, Creed,” I bite out.
“And rushed to the hospital,” he continues, despite my outburst, “where she was listed in stable condition with a mild concussion. Unfortunately, the baby she was carrying didn’t survive.”
I’m not sure what I wanted him to tell me. A small part of me held out hope it was just a coincidence. That there was another car wreck that same night with another man named Hunter. But now I know.
“You slept with her, didn’t you?” Creed asks when I don’t immediately say anything.
I slowly lift my gaze to his, neither confirming nor denying. I don’t have to. We’ve been friends for years. He knows when I’m happy. When I’m depressed. When I’ve gotten laid.
He shakes his head, the vein in his neck pulsing as he tightens his grip on the steering wheel. “I knew she looked familiar. Knew her name sounded familiar. It’s why I insisted on the background check. Why I tried to tell you days ago. I feared this might happen, but—”
“Feared what might happen?” I ask, my hackles rising.
“That you might put the pieces together. It’s why I tried to dissuade you from continuing on this journey. Worried of what memories it might—”
“What? That it would remind me of Kendall?”
“No.” He jerks his head toward me. “I was worried she might remember. And she cannot know about your involvement.”
“Why? Don’t you think she deserves that? If it were me and I’d been pulled from a car seconds before it burst into flames, I’d want to know who saved my life.”
He pinches the bridge of his nose, conflicted. Then he heaves a long sigh as he looks through the sunroof before bringing his gaze back to mine.
“Because you didn’t just save her life, Anders. You caused that car wreck.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Anderson
Creed’s words are like a punch to the gut. A chill sweeps over me as I process this shock. How is that possible? I would have remembered something like that. Sure, I’d been upset that night, but if I’d caused a wreck, the SUV I’d been driving would have suffered some damage. But it hadn’t. All I knew was one minute I was driving, ignoring Creed as I fought through a blinding headache, my body seemingly frozen. The next, a crash stole my attention.
Shit… The headache.
I’d closed my eyes for what I thought was a millisecond to ease the pain. Had it been longer? I mentally rewind to the night I’ve tried to leave in my past for years now, but it’s like a fog has settled, the memories unclear and hazy.
“Explain,” I grind out through a clenched jaw. “Now!”
“You rounded a curve and swerved into the other lane,” he answers in an even tone, as if giving a report to his superior. In a way, I suppose he is. “I thought you’d correct yourself. Remember you were in the States, not back home. But you never did. I tried to get your attention, but you ignored me. When I saw a car coming straight for us, I shouted. Needing to act quickly, I yanked the steering wheel to pull you back to the correct lane.” He heaves a sigh. “But it was too late. The other car lost control and skidded down the embankment.”
“I don’t remember any of this. I—”
I swallow hard and shake my head. As if it weren’t a shock to my system to learn that Nora was the woman I pulled from that wreck, now I have to face the fact that I caused that accident. That I killed her fiancé. That I’m the reason she lost her baby. And that my father probably covered it up so as to not paint the Royal Family in a negative light. It’s too much, my emotions yanked in every direction.
“Why the fuck didn’t you tell me?” I roar. “Why is this the first I’m hearing about it?” My ears pound, nostrils flare, adrenaline rushing through my body.
“You were in a really dark place after Kendall’s death, Anders,” Creed responds calmly, trying to pacify me. But nothing can pacify me now. Not after this. “After learning that the lone survivor…” He clears his throat. “That Nora had been asleep until the crash, it was decided not to mention what I’d witnessed regarding your somewhat erratic driving.”
“It was decided?” I repeat, my voice rising in pitch. “By whom?”
He opens his mouth, but hesitates.
“By…whom?” I say again, getting in his face.
“Your father, upon the advice of your psychiatrist. He was of the opinion that telling you would only add to the mental duress you were under. You already blamed yourself for Kendall’s death. They worried if you learned the truth, you wouldn’t be able to carry that weight and would break. So, for your safety, I was ordered to keep the truth from you.”
I stare at him, struggling to swallow through the excruciating new world I find myself in. I wish I could rewind the clock, return to bed with Nora, ignorant of who she is. But I can’t. And now I’m faced with the cruel reality that I’ve fallen for the woman whose life I destroyed. There is no happy ending here. Only tragedy.
“But you’re my friend, Creed,” I whisper.
His Adam’s apple bobs up and down in a hard swallow, a flicker of emotion passing over his face before he schools his expression, returning into the trained officer he is.
“When I agreed to be your CPO, I told you there may be times I have to put the job above our friendship. This was one of those times.”
“I should have known,” I spit out. “You had no problem putting the job ahead of my sister. You’d surely have no qualms doing it with me, either.”
“I didn’t have a choice. This is my job,” he reminds me.
“Yeah? Well, consider yourself fired, at least from this post.”
Heat flaming my face, I throw open the door, grabbing the coffee and pastries before slamming it.
My behavior is juvenile, but my world’s been turned upside down in the past few minutes. I need someone to feel the same agony and heartache threatening to rip me apart. It’s not the first time Creed and I have gotten into a heated argument. But he’s never kept something of this magnitude from me before. He’s always been one of the few people in this world I can trust. Now I question everything.
“You’re firing me?” Creed scrambles from the SUV and runs in front of me, forcing me to stop. “Why? So you can get a piece of ass from Nora, then toss her aside, just like you’ve done with every other woman since Kendall?”
His words hit me hard and I lean into him. “She is nothing like those women, and you know it. She’s so much more than a piece of ass, so don’t you dare speak about her that way.” I move around him, but he calls out before I can make it more than a few steps.
“What do you expect me to tell your father?”
I pause, slowly facing him.
“If I go home without you, he’ll ask why. He’ll want to know what happened. Everything that’s happened.”
“What do I care? You’re going to tell him what you want anyway. What the job requires. So go. Leave. And so help me, if I notice you trailing me, I’ll make sure the only post you’ll ever get again is checking bags of tourists visiting the palace.”
I spin from him, heading across the parking lot and toward my motel room. I do my best to make as little noise as possible as I slip inside and close the door, blocking the outside world from infiltrating our bubble. But it’s already too lat
e for that.
My vision blurs as I pause to admire Nora’s sleeping form in the same position she was in when I left here less than a half-hour ago. I wish I could return to that time. Wish I’d stayed in bed. Wish she didn’t have to learn the horrific truth that she gave her body, her heart, to a devil.
As if sensing my gaze on her, her eyelids flutter open, a smile building on her mouth when she sees me standing at the edge of the bed.
“Morning,” she murmurs in a husky voice.
I peer into the same eyes that begged me to save her fiancé all those years ago. Pressure builds in my chest, making everything uncomfortable. Every breath. Every heartbeat. Every motion. My conscience is torn in a thousand directions, splintering me.
I want to wrap my arms around her, then kneel before her to beg forgiveness.
I want to surround myself with her affection, then lay prostrate before her so she can punish me like I deserve.
I want to bury myself inside her, then sacrifice myself for her own peace of mind.
Noticing something’s off, she props herself up, not doing anything to cover her exposed breast.
“Anderson, what is it?”
I part my lips, struggling to come up with the words I need. All the education I’d received in my formative years about what syllables formed which words and how to string words into a sentence has vanished, rendering me mute.
Leaving the tray of coffee and pastries on the desk, I walk to the bed and crawl on top of her. Overwhelmed with misery and desperation, I capture her mouth in a deep, burning kiss.
Last night, every kiss was lust-filled and wanton, our need to succumb to our desires driving everything we did. This kiss, however, is nothing like those. It’s riddled with anguish and vulnerability. With heartache and guilt. With torment and hopelessness.
“I need you,” I breathe.
This will only make things more complicated, but I’m desperate to extinguish the torturous flames threatening to engulf me. I need Nora. Her compassion. Her kindness. Her mercy. Please, God, let her show me some mercy.
“Have me,” she murmurs, just like she did last night.
I don’t move from her as I clumsily push down my shorts and kick them to the floor. Ripping my t-shirt over my head, I settle between her legs and thrust into her, no barrier between us, breaking the rule that was ingrained into me the second I became interested in girls. I no longer care about the goddamn rules. No longer care about following protocol. All I care about is feeling something other than the crushing weight threatening to destroy me. Nora’s the only one who makes me forget. And I need to forget.
I bury my face in the crook of her neck, inhaling her scent. I pull my bottom lip between my teeth, now knowing why her perfume seemed so familiar. Why she seemed so familiar. Because she was.
She wraps her legs around me, her fingers threading through my hair. Unlike last night, there are no statements of desire, no loud moans, no carnal biting. It’s just two broken souls desperately trying to find solace in a world that’s devoured us and spit us out.
I frame her face in my hands, moving my mouth to hers, giving her everything I have as I continue thrusting inside her. Even when I break away to catch my breath, I keep my lips poised on hers, our eyes locked, remaining in this place until we both cross that point of no return.
And that’s what I’ve done by sleeping with her knowing the truth. Crossed the point of no return. There’s no going back now. There’s no trying to make things right.
There’s only serving the sentence karma has bestowed on me for my sins.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Nora
“What’s this place?” I ask when Anderson pulls into a dirt parking lot late in the afternoon. The desert sun shines high in the sky, heading toward the west, casting a pinkish glow over the terrain. Or perhaps it’s all the clay buildings that seem to tint everything red.
“San Miguel Mission.” He puts the Wrangler into park. “Oldest church in the United States.”
“We’re at a…church?” I peer at the traditional pueblo-style building that seems to dominate the architecture of this area. But this place looks much older, lacking any flair one would expect in modern construction.
“It’s a historic landmark. Built in the early 1600s, it was damaged during the Pueblo Revolt of 1680, then rebuilt in the early 1700s.”
“Did you read all this in my guidebook?” I joke.
He smiles, but it doesn’t light up his expression as it normally would.
All day, something about him has seemed off. I can’t quite put my finger on what. He’s been affectionate. Even pulled the Wrangler off the side of the road and made me straddle him after I’d teased the bulge in his pants to the point of desperation. Despite the physical connection, there was something missing. Since this morning, sex has been…different. Almost like he’s using it to make him forget whatever’s ailing him. I should know. I once did the same thing. But I don’t want to use Anderson to forget. And I don’t want him to use me to forget, either.
“No.” He briefly shifts his attention to the steeple, appreciating the craftsmanship, before looking back at me. “I just really like history. But you already know this about me.” He grabs my hand and leads me toward the building. “Let’s go look around.”
“Are you sure we’re allowed to just…go in? Don’t churches have rules or something?”
“What are you so scared of?”
“Organized religion,” I mutter under my breath, which makes him chuckle.
“Not big on attending church, I take it.”
“I never grew up around it. Why?” I tilt my head. “Are you religious?”
He pauses outside the entrance, pulling his lips between his teeth as he contemplates. “I don’t know if you could call me religious, so to speak.” He chuckles to himself. “I’m certainly no stranger to sin.”
“Nothing wrong with a little sin,” I murmur in a husky voice as I rub my body against his, the subtle contact awakening his erection. Despite his reaction, a vacancy still looms in his eyes, turmoil swirling like a hurricane. “Sinning makes life interesting. Wouldn’t you agree?”
“You’re bad, you know that?” He pulls me along with him, discreetly adjusting his shorts.
“I didn’t hear you complaining last night.”
“Certainly not,” he whispers once we cross the threshold, serenity engulfing us. And there’s something else in the air, too. Something more potent than history.
Grace.
Forgiveness.
Absolution.
As one would expect from a church constructed centuries ago, the building is small and smells of dust and decades of stories. The stark, white stucco walls contrast with the ornate wood beams crossing the ceiling, perhaps a dozen rows of pews beneath it. The décor has a Mexican influence, a few splashes of turquoise and blue making it stand out from any other church I’ve been to, which isn’t many.
Anderson and I walk toward the altar, both of us silently taking in the solemnity of the space. Out of the corner of my eye, I notice an elderly woman clutching a rosary, her hand pressed against a clay carving on the wall. Glancing around, I see there are over a dozen more carvings.
“The stations of the cross,” Anderson whispers, answering the question clearly evident in my expression. “It’s big in the Catholic religion. Tells the story leading up to Jesus’ death and subsequent resurrection.”
I try to follow along, although the words he speaks may as well be a foreign language for all I’m concerned.
“Here. Look at this.” He points to a panel of glass by the wooden stairs leading up to the altar. I join him, squinting at several adobe bricks contained within. “The original steps.”
“Wow.”
I’ve never been infatuated with history, at least not like Anderson is. Nevertheless, there’s something humbling about standing in a building that’s been around for centuries. About seeing pieces that have survived war and the passing of hundre
ds of years. It puts things into perspective. No matter what life throws at you, it’s important to carry on. To find the strength to rebuild. To repair.
“Incredible, isn’t it?”
I meet his enthusiastic grin. “It is.”
We walk around for a while longer, soaking in the history contained within these hallowed walls, admiring the architecture and stunning craftsmanship. A few other tourists snap pictures to memorialize their visit, but other than the occasional clicking of a shutter, it’s quiet. Subdued. Reflective.
As we approach a table to the left of the altar holding dozens of small votives filled with red candles, Anderson grabs a long match. When he strikes it, a flame erupts, and he brings it toward a candle, lighting it.
My curiosity getting the better of me, I sidle up next to him. “What’s that for?” I ask in a hushed tone.
“It’s a tradition in the Catholic religion to light a candle for a loved one who has passed.”
I admire the three tiers of candles set on the antique wooden table, a cross hanging above. A few candles are already lit, but the majority aren’t. I don’t press him to talk about it. Loss is one of those things you can’t pressure someone to discuss, regardless of whether it’s recent or in the distant past. We never truly get over the loss. We simply learn to adapt to life without that person.
Like I’ve finally done with Hunter…with Anderson’s help.
“Her name was Kendall.”
“I know.”
Now that I’m aware of who Anderson is, my knowledge of him has increased. I haven’t looked at tabloid articles, but everyone knew about his relationship with Kendall Davies. Everyone expected to see an engagement announcement any day. Unfortunately, she passed away from a heart attack before that happened, shocking the world.
“She’s the reason I got the tattoo.” He brings his hand to his heart, covering it briefly. “She said my alter-ego was fitting. That I was her compass, her true north.” He pauses for a beat before turning his impassioned eyes on me. “So I understand what it’s like to lose someone so unexpectedly. Understand how much it can mess with you, keep you tethered to the past. Make you feel like you’re doing a disservice to their memory by moving on.”
