Wait (Bleeding Stars #4)

by A. L. Jackson

  A self-conscious smile wobbled on my mouth, my words lost in the strands of her hair. “What do you want me to sing?”

  “Something soft and sweet.”

  Just like her.

  I pressed a kiss to her temple, her heart going thud, thud, thud where it was flush against my chest. “I don’t know anything sweet.”

  Chaotic, heavy beats were what I knew. Sunder’s sound and vibe were so much a part of my soul, the songs running through my veins like they were essential to sustaining this half-life.

  In the shadows, she peeked up at me, trust shining back. “I think you are all things sweet, Austin Stone.”

  This time it was affection running through my veins. Something foreign and right. A missing link.

  Pushing out a sigh, I wrapped my arm around her head, pulling her closer, this girl who somehow managed to make me feel whole when I was so goddamned broken.

  I cleared my throat. Began to sing Broken by Lifehouse. Softly. My voice was a mere scrape from the back of my throat. The lyrics hit me hard as I held this girl in my arms. Wishing she could truly belong there.

  As quiet as they were, the words seemed to impale the air. The meaning of them was dense. Intense and absolute.

  I’m falling apart, I’m barely breathing

  With a broken heart that’s still beating

  The words were so true for both of us.

  And it struck me as I sang the song to bring her comfort while her touch brought the same to me.

  The two of us were barely hanging on.

  And in her name…in her name…I’d found meaning.

  I trailed off as the song came to an end, my throat nearly closing up with the emotion suddenly locked there.

  Edie clung to me, her face buried in the material of my tee, before she inched back and gazed at me as if she were the one who was looking at the light. Moisture swam in her eyes. “You have the most beautiful voice.”

  Everything went tight, those stupid hopes igniting in her belief. “No.”

  Wasn’t close to being as talented as my brother. As the rest of the guys.

  Wasn’t even worthy to be in their space.

  I fuck it all up. Ruin it all.

  Slightly, she shook her head, disagreement and exasperation and adoration so damned clear. “Don’t you see it, Austin? How amazing you are? How talented? Do you have any idea what your voice does to me?”

  Somehow I managed to get her closer. God, it made me feel insane that I both wanted to tug my damned hoodie over my head so I could curl up and hide and lie back so this girl could completely strip me bare.

  “When you’re here it doesn’t hurt so bad,” she whispered. Soft, soft fingers fluttered up the column of my neck and brushed across my lips.

  I suppressed a groan, my voice going rough as the two of us dug deeper into the other than we’d ever gone. As if every single layer separating us was slowly being exposed. “What doesn’t hurt so bad?”

  Would she finally tell me? Trust me enough to fully let me in?

  Reservation and fear held her tongue. I could feel it right there, lodged at the base of her throat, begging to be expelled.

  “Everything,” she whispered into the hush of the room. “I…I don’t feel so alone. And the dreams, they don’t come, knowing you’ll be coming soon.”

  I cleared my throat, the rasp of words raw. “Mine either.”

  Maybe that was the scariest part. The fact she filled up all those vacant, hollow places within me. Soothing them with her touch. When she was near, the nagging need to fill up my veins, to distort the pain, to cover the loss, to clot out his voice—it was muted.

  Subdued.

  Like she was doing all the covering herself.

  “What do you dream of?” Her question was almost guarded with the plea.

  Those empty places throbbed. “Him. About his laugh.” I blinked toward the ceiling, visions so clear. “Mostly his eyes. Every night, it’s like he’s looking back at me.”

  Her smile was soft. Filled with understanding when she propped herself up on an elbow, her gaze intent. She touched my face. “Maybe he is…looking back at you. Would that be such a bad thing?”

  Sadness tugged at my mouth, the hatred I felt locked up tight, condemned to the well of my toiling spirit. Because she didn’t know. Had no clue it was my fault. “Feels like it is…when I wake up and realize it’s not real. That he’s really gone.”

  Sympathy pinched her brow. “Were you there?”

  A phantom of a memory slithered through me, the feel of his body twitching in my hands. “Yeah. I was there.”

  She buried her face in my neck. “I’m so sorry.”

  After a few moments, she pulled back to look at me, aqua eyes sincere and so damned sweet.

  Diamonds.

  Light. Light. Light.

  This girl who somehow managed to pull me from the overwhelming waves that held me under.

  The urge struck me with the force of a two-ton truck.

  Crashing as it careened.

  I wanted her.

  I wanted to kiss her and touch her.

  Bury myself inside her.

  Lose myself in her body and her heart and her mind.

  Hold her.

  Love her.

  That crazy energy blistered, the one that stirred through every time this girl stepped in the room.

  But tonight it’d twisted into something different.

  Something more.

  Fuck. I wanted more.

  My mouth watered and my hand was on her face. Her lips parted, and I was inching forward.

  Those eyes widened in fear.

  She turned her face.

  Breaking the connection.

  Rejection slammed me. Too hard. So hard it nearly blew me back two years. Back when I’d been spiraling.

  Down to darkest depths.

  Veins full of poison.

  I clenched my jaw, needing to escape. But she was grabbing my hand that’d been on her face, pushing it back to her heated skin, holding it tight. She whispered, “Don’t leave me, don’t leave me,” again and again.

  Moisture glistened in her eyes, shimmery pools of sea, her expression so fucking raw. Real and honest. “I just…can’t do this, Austin. Not again. It hurts too much. But if I could, it’d be you. I promise, it’d be you.”

  I hiked the sweet little girl up onto the short wall that divided the beach and the road, giving her a soft smile as I helped tame her wild mane of dark brown hair. Gathering it at one side, I twisted the three big sections I’d made into a fat braid.

  A breeze rushed around us, ushered in by the waves, the sun breaching the cool air to kiss our skin.

  I tapped her nose. “There you go, sunshine. All finished.”

  She lifted her face up at me and offered me a grin so wide it touched me somewhere deep. In that achy place I tried so desperately to pretend didn’t exist. Two of her adult teeth were already working their way in and two baby ones were missing from the bottom. “Do I look so pretty? My daddy told me I’m the prettiest girl in the whole wide world.”

  A roll of affectionate laughter rippled from me, and I picked her up from under her arms, steadied her on the ground. “You certainly are.”

  “Billy doesn’t say so. He said I’m gross.”

  “Who’s Billy?” I asked.

  “From school. Daddy says Billy’s a bully. Bully Billy. That’s what I call him. He’s so, so mean all the time. Always cheating and pullin’ hair.”

  With a frown, I took her hand and began to wander down the lane toward the crosswalk. “Well, that doesn’t sound very nice.”

  She skipped along at my side. “Nope. Not nice. But Ms. Montez says we hav’ta be nice, so I’m always nice even when he’s not.”

  “That’s good. You just let me know if he bothers you too much, okay?”

  I knew well enough there was a fine line between teasing and abuse.

  “Yep…but I hav’ta tell my daddy first. He promised he’d pay a li
ttle visit to my class if Billy keeps buggin’ me. And I really like when my daddy visits my class!”

  I stifled a chuckle.

  I bet he would.

  Heidi belonged to Kane, the head surf instructor down at the shop. Her mom had disappeared with nothing more than a note scrawled on a piece of scrap paper left under a heart magnet on the fridge, saying she couldn’t handle being a mom for a second more. It had been two weeks before Heidi had turned two.

  It’d left Kane a single dad with a huge chip on his shoulder and an intense love of a little girl the guy didn’t always know how to handle.

  Old grief spun through my spirit.

  It was something I just couldn’t understand.

  Couldn’t fathom or comprehend.

  The thought of willingly leaving this precious girl behind.

  Maybe that’s what bonded Heidi and me so tightly.

  From the moment I started working at the shop, anytime she was there, she’d constantly follow me around, chatting nonstop as she scurried around at my heels and tugged at my shirt, desperate for a woman’s attention.

  There was something about her guileless smile that filled the boundless void inside me. At the same time, it expanded and throbbed within the confines of the hollow cavern carved out at the center of me. The child was six, going on seven, full of life and excitement and innocent hope.

  It hadn’t taken Kane all that much to convince me to keep her Saturday afternoons. He had several classes to teach, and Blaire worked the store on Saturdays so I could have a day off.

  Funny, since they were typically spent like this.

  “So what do you want to do today?” I asked as we waited for the crosswalk light to change.

  Heidi danced on her toes. “I want to go to the park and to the restaurant that has those funny fries with the faces and I want to get ice cream. Oh, and I wanna go to the store because my daddy gave me ten dollars. Let’s go there first!”

  Um, wow.

  She was a tiny whirlwind.

  But of course I grinned, because I loved every second of it.

  After the chaos that had ripped into my safe haven, leveling all the walls, I needed a day like this.

  A distraction.

  A purpose.

  “All right, then. We’ll see what we can fit in before your daddy gets off work.”

  Hand in hand, we strolled down the street lined with palm trees interspersed with bushy shade trees, the tourist shops and quaint restaurants painted a rainbow of colors, big plate-glass windows framed in white.

  That same calming breeze rode in on the tide, chasing us close behind.

  “How’s this?” I paused in front of a small specialty toy store.

  Heidi released my hand and moved forward, pressed her palms and forehead to the glass, peering inside.

  Leaving her little girl mark.

  A few fingerprints never hurt anyone.

  She looked up at me with that grin, excitement blazing in her gaze. “Oh yes, oh yes! They have dolls, Edie! They have dolls!”

  I smiled down at her, touched her chin. “Well, then, we’d better get inside.”

  I opened the door, and Heidi raced in ahead of me, bee-lining straight to the dolls spotlighted on an end cap.

  I cringed. With just a glance, I knew there was no chance she could afford one.

  “Edie…look! Look! This one looks just like me.” Heidi jumped around at my side and yanked at my hand, pointing at a ridiculously expensive doll with her same hair and eye color that I would lay down bets any six-year-old girl would salivate over.

  “Um…I’m sorry, sweetie, but you definitely don’t have enough money for that.”

  And I would totally buy it for her.

  Of course, if her dad wouldn’t kill me because I did.

  She pouted, but even that had something sweet about it. “Oh man. What do I have ’nough money for?”

  Soft affection played through my heart. A feeling that was always shaded with sadness. I squeezed her hand. “Well, how about you save it and next time you’ll have more money to spend?”

  You know…nothing wrong with throwing in a few life lessons whenever you got the chance.

  “But my daddy said it was for me to get a treat.”

  Okay then.

  “Well…maybe you could get a pretty dress for the doll you already have?”

  There we go.

  A diversion.

  Compromise.

  She bounced on her cute little pink painted toes. “Then can we go get ice cream?”

  “After lunch.” I gave a small tug to the end of her braid. “Sound like a good plan?”

  “Yes!”

  That was easy enough.

  We rounded the aisle in search of the doll accessories. The whole way I sent up a silent prayer they weren’t as pricey as the dolls exhibited out front, because her dad would just have to get over me spoiling her a little bit, because I didn’t have the heart to tell her no twice.

  And I froze.

  The world dropped out from underneath me.

  I stumbled to a stop. It was instant. The way I was captivated by the beautiful boy who stood at the far end of the aisle. That ominous, threatening man who rocked my quickly crumbling foundation. As if his stance carried a shock wave of power that rippled along the floor, creating gaping, fissuring cracks.

  It slammed into me.

  Stealing my breath and my mind and my sanity.

  My fingers twitched, itching to weave through that mess of brown hair that was all mussed on top of his head, his face in profile, the angle of his jaw so strong, shadowed by the beard he obviously hadn’t the time to shave this morning. His tight gray tee exposed the vast canvas of ink that swirled and twisted down his arms. Ink I wanted nothing more than to explore.

  A piece of this boy I didn’t recognize.

  A mystery.

  A riddle.

  I was staggered.

  So torn.

  I’ll wait for you forever.

  He was the only one I’d wished it was the truth.

  Heidi tugged at my hand, her voice full of impatience. “Come on, Edie. We have to hurry or my daddy is going to get home and be all, all alone and then we won’t have time to go to the park.”

  With her tinkling, sweet voice, Austin looked our way.

  His own shock vivid, that grey gaze wild and unsettled when it locked on me.

  I could feel it, the way his entire body tilted my direction.

  Drawn.

  He blinked, those earthy eyes so dark and deep.

  Heidi hauled me forward. The little girl was completely oblivious to the way my axis had shifted. All direction altered and centered on one man.

  The two of us magnets. Spinning. Churning. Attracting and repelling.

  Austin moved, each step calculated. His own surprise that had been evident on his face faded away and those delicious lips tipped into an even more delicious smile.

  Satisfaction and desire.

  A shiver slicked down my spine.

  Cold as ice and sharp as a dagger.

  God, I had to get it together. Maintain control.

  He raked a casual hand through his hair as he approached, head cocked to the side with a gleam in his eye.

  I would accuse him of following me. Except tucked beneath one arm was a huge golden-brown teddy bear, and a little girl’s fashion design set was wedged beside it.

  Confusion swirled.

  What in the world was he doing?

  “Edie,” he breathed. Warm eyes traced me as if seeing me was relief, head to toe and right back up again.

  I fidgeted, my fingertips fluttering up to fiddle with the strand of hair that had freed itself from my own loose braid.

  “Hi,” I whispered.

  After what had transpired two nights ago, I wasn’t sure how to handle his presence. My weakness for him so clear.

  Trust.

  It was no secret I didn’t often grant it.

  But right then, who I didn�
�t trust was myself.

  He glanced down to the little girl grinning up from at my side. A curious frown pulled at his brow and a small smile worked itself onto his mouth.

  “Who’s this?” He slanted his attention to her.

  She swayed at my side, tucking her head to the side as if she was suddenly struck with a rush of self-consciousness, clearly not immune to the charm that was this boy.

  Poor girl.

  I could hardly blame her.

  “I’m Heidi.”

  He glanced at me for clarification.

  “Heidi’s dad…Kane…he works down at the surf shop. I help him out with her on Saturdays since school is out and the summer program is closed weekends.”

  The smile he gave was slow and cautious. Searching. As if this boy knew and he was silently asking me if this was okay.

  If I was okay.

  I wished with all of me that the place I harbored for him, the place I’d kept like a safe haven, didn’t pulse with old affection.

  I wished I didn’t want to edge forward and bury my nose in his skin, breathe him in the way I used to and confess to him that sometimes it still hurt so bad I wanted to fall to my knees.

  I wished most I didn’t know he would chase some of it away when he pulled me into the harbor of his arms.

  Instead, I forced a brittle smile and squeezed Heidi’s hand.

  Not exactly sure who I was trying to reassure.

  He directed the full power of his presence on her and dropped to a knee. “Hey there, beautiful. It’s nice to meet you. I’m Austin.”

  My insides quaked. The easygoing, confident side of this gorgeous, mysterious boy was completely unrecognizable. Here was a man who’d shed his shy, wary skin.

  Heidi giggled and swayed some more, all coy and cute. “Nice to meet you, too,” she said, peeking up at me as if seeking approval.

  When I didn’t pull her away, Heidi reached out and ran her little fingers through the stuffed bear’s fur. “Who’s that for?” she asked. “It’s really big. Is it for someone’s birthday? I like birthdays.”

  A soft smile danced on his full lips. Though something about it felt sad, hinting at sorrow. “This right here?”

  Her nod was emphatic.

  “This bear is for my niece. Her name’s Kallie. You actually remind me of her a little bit, back when she was your age. I haven’t gotten to see her in a real long time, so I wanted to send her something to let her know I’m thinking about her.”