“I’m sorry, Ollie! I needed it to be over. I couldn’t take one more day of it!”
“Then you take me with you. You never go off on your own like that! This is just like you, always crossing the street without holding our hands! Allie and I are here for a reason. You have to stop running headfirst into traffic! You have to stop throwing yourself away!”
I let my pride fall by the wayside and clung to my brother, sobbing incoherently into his unwashed polo. He held onto me with trembling arms, and I began to regret each minute I spent wallowing and hiding in my dark escape. “I’m sorry, Ollie.”
“I’m freaking out!” he admitted. Then remembering we weren’t alone, he barked at the men in the room. “Get out of here! Can’t you see we’re having a moment?” Ollie was never great at breaking down. He usually got surly to cope with his vulnerability, hence his many forays into Anger Management support groups.
Mason kissed my forehead, then Ezra followed suit before they exited. Levi bowed his head respectfully and brushed his knuckles to mine before he ducked out of the room, but Von didn’t budge. In fact, he pulled up the chair Ollie had occupied and crossed his arms over his chest. “Carry on. I’ll not stop you yelling at her. But she’s also not allowed out of my sight. Ezra’s orders are that either Mason or I are watching her at all times. You know the rules.”
Ollie grumbled and went back to hugging me. “You brought back that guy, that dad guy. Levi? What’s his deal?” I could tell Ollie was trying to move on from his tears, but a few still leaked out.
“I saw him, Ollie. I watched him transform from Sandy into that dude. Sandy’s been with us our whole lives. He tried to kill Sama to save me.” Ollie released me and sat on the side of the bed, leaning his elbows on his knees. He was patient with me while I laid out the entire story as I remembered it, from the moment I decided I was fed up waiting for Sama to mind-warp me, to waking up in the hospital bed.
I stared at my knees as I muscled my way through the admission of everything that had happened with Finn, not sugarcoating it for the two viewers, who both hissed through clenched teeth at all the right parts. I expected Von to get up and leave, but he didn’t. He sat with his hands folded over his stomach, taking in the story that punched him in his sore spots with nary a word.
I couldn’t believe how much we’d both grown. I wasn’t running from the truth and hiding it, and he wasn’t running from me. We sat in the room after I’d finished the retelling, too shaken for eye contact.
“Is that everything, then?” Von’s voice was cool, which meant he was furious.
I swallowed hard, and I sorely wished I’d just let Bruce Campbell chop me to bits with his chainsaw. “What else could there possibly be?” I couldn’t look away from my hands that were too clean now. They deserved to be filthy, still coated in Finn’s blood, but the spotlessness mocked me. I was the filthy one.
Ollie leaned over and kissed the top of my head. “I love you, kid.” When he stood, I panicked that I’d finally pushed Ollie too far, and somehow I’d managed to max out his infinite patience.
“No, Ollie! I’m sorry. I’m so sorry! Please don’t walk out. Please don’t leave me!”
Ollie paused, tapping his hand to his heart like I’d shot an arrow through him. Then he patted my arm gently to reassure me that he was my brother, and he wasn’t going anywhere. “I’m just going into the hallway to tell Ezra and the guys everything. This way you don’t have to relive it all. I’ll give you two a minute.” He slapped Von on the shoulder twice before shutting us in the room with no witnesses other than Allie, who wasn’t exactly a solid buffer.
I wasn’t going to be the one to speak first, since there was nothing else for me to say. I’d broken us, and I knew there was nothing I could do to fix it. I deserved to lose the man I loved – both of them.
Von broke our stalemate with a level, yet tense, tone. “I was thinking of going off to find Danny. See if I can’t sort him out and get him to give up Mariang.”
I kept my eyes lowered. “Okay. Makes sense.” Makes sense that he would leave. I deserved it, and had seen it coming. At least he had the decency to tell me to my face this time. It was growth that came when it was too late to make much of a difference.
Then Von said something that shocked the crap outta me. “I think you should come with me. Just the two of us. Give us some time to sort this mess out.”
I was sure I’d heard him wrong. My chin lifted slowly to look at him, tilting my head to the side to assess whether or not I’d hallucinated. “Sort this out? You mean us?”
“Who else would I mean?”
“I didn’t think you’d want to sort anything out. I thought you’d be gone. I’m kind of surprised you’re still in that chair. Thought there’d be a Von-shaped hole in the door by now.”
“I’m going to be a married man. Ezra had a good sit-down with me while you were off falling in love with Finn.” His words cut us both so badly that we winced in unison. Von licked his lips before continuing. “He said that marriage was in sickness and in health, for better or worse and all that. I can’t imagine things getting much worse, but I figure if you can forgive me for running out on you and September before I knew she was mine, then I can eventually forgive you for Finn.” He sighed, shaking his head. “I can’t even be truly angry at you both, though I want to be. Finn was more committed to you than I was in the beginning. I’m almost glad for him that he got the girl in the end. Went out a victor.”
My face soured. “You don’t mean that.”
“No, I don’t. But I want to be the kind of man who does. I know you resisted him as long as you could. I know you sent him away and stayed faithful until this all blew up in your face.” He chewed on his cinnamon stick. “I also know that you went to him with this whole Sama business, and didn’t come to me.”
I scoffed. “You really think I’d let you near Philip? After what he did to you, turning you against me when he stole pieces of your hair? You think I’d let him within a thousand miles of you? You’re the one person I would never, ever take with me. You protect what you love, and I love you, Von. I’m just really, really bad at it.”
Von was quiet for a minute, his hands still folded over his stomach. “Occasionally you are quite terrible at loving me, yes. But then other times you’re exactly what I need. So here we are.”
“Here we are. No one would blame you if you left.”
“Do you want me to leave you?”
I looked deep into his crazy gold and blue eyes, knowing that no matter how my heart got twisted, it would always come back to Von. “No. I want you to stay, even when I push you away. I want you to love me, even when you hate me.”
The corner of Von’s sculpted lips turned upward. “Darling, don’t you know? That’s our specialty.” He leaned forward and scooped up my hand, pressing his lips to the tips of my fingers. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the engagement ring I’d left in Ezra’s shirt pocket. “Do you still want to be my wife?”
I nodded so vigorously, my eyeballs felt like they rattled around in my head. “I do. Von, so much. Do you really still want to marry me?”
“Always and only you.” With a steady breath, Von slid the giant diamond I didn’t deserve onto my finger. “I think we’re going to have a lot to talk about on our trip.”
Thirty-Six.
Worst Road Trip of my Life
I tapped my thumb against Terence the Taurus’ window, not willing to be the first one to speak. I was the one in the doghouse, so I didn’t want to make things worse by saying the wrong thing.
“I know what you’re doing,” Von informed me, narrowing his eyes as he merged onto the second highway on the map. We were half an hour into our trip to bring Danny home, and so far, we’d not said a word. “You’re trying to hold all the power by not speaking first. You forget I’ve seen you do this with that wanker Judge.”
I turned to look at him, surprised this was what he’d been stewing on for who knows how many miles. “I
don’t need to play games with you. I already know you hold the power in this. I’m the one who screwed things up. I’m just being quiet because I don’t want to piss you off. Kinda surprised you haven’t dumped me on the side of the road yet. I’m just trying not to rock the boat.”
Von deflated. “You really weren’t pulling a power play?”
“You can’t compete for power if you don’t have any to start with. You really think I’d try to manipulate you like that?” I tapped the car door. “And you forget I lost to Judge. He’s got a tracker on this very car, access to my phone calls. No, I’ve given up on power games.”
“I don’t know what to think anymore. The more I think about you sneaking off to meet up with Finn, of all people, the angrier I get.” He held up his hand in case I was going to plead my case, but I assure you, I wasn’t. He’d heard my side of things. He didn’t have to take them at face value, and I wasn’t about to beg him to understand my craziness. I barely understood it myself. “Before you get all defensive, I know you did it to keep Mason and me safe. But it hurt me, Peach. You going off like that hurt me. You trusted Finn to keep you safe, but not me. What more do I have to do? Save your life again? How many times until you realize that I’m in this with you?”
This time he waited for a response, but I still didn’t give him one. He had every right to be angry at me. I wasn’t about to defend myself if I knew I belonged with my nose in the corner.
Von kept on his rant, though it was nothing I hadn’t heard before, and nothing he wasn’t absolutely right on. True enough, I hadn’t trusted him. When he’d left me after I’d gotten pregnant, it was all I could do to let him out of my sight without the nagging feeling coming over me that he might not come back. I didn’t bring that up. I knew blame-shifting wouldn’t get us anywhere.
It was another hour of that before he even got to the whole me falling in love with Finn part. “You knew he was in love with you. We all knew it, and you went to him anyway. If you know someone’s going to try to break us up, you get away from that person. Why do you think I don’t hang around Katrina anymore? Because I know she’d try to break us up. If you love something, you protect it.” He shook his head. “You may love me, but you didn’t protect our relationship from Finn. You didn’t do all you could to make it clear to him that you weren’t an option.”
Again, I didn’t respond. He was right, and the sucky part about it was that I didn’t know for sure how I would do things differently if I was given a redo. Part of me had loved Finn. It had just taken me too long to realize it, and in the end, it changed nothing. My love hadn’t saved Finn.
“Aren’t you going to say anything?” he asked, throwing out his hand in frustration. “It’s not going to work if you hide yourself from me yet again. Not sorting this out with me? It’s another form of hiding.”
I kept my eyes ahead on the license plate of the car in front of us, wishing I hadn’t agreed to a road trip to find Danny without a referee to monitor our fight. There was nowhere to run from our many issues. We were trapped in the car, and there was no way out but forward, through the mess. I began to understand Von’s brilliance in planning it to be exactly this way. Neither of us could run now.
I cleared my throat. “I’m not saying much because I won’t defend myself. You’re right on all of it. I should’ve been more careful. I want to marry you, and I was leaving part of myself open to Finn. If I hadn’t gone to him, he’d still be alive. You think I don’t regret going to him every single minute of every day? I got to live and he didn’t. I mean, where’s the logic in that? Why do I get to live and he doesn’t? It was my stupid idea that he tried to talk me out of. He wanted to go to the council. He wanted to take me back to Ezra. He followed me to the end because we loved each other.” Admitting our love to Von was nearly impossible, but I managed the feat, owning up to the awful things I’d done to all three of us. “A great warrior died because he was stupid enough to fall in love with me. So, you know, I’d invest in life insurance now if I was you.”
Von deflated, and then choked the steering wheel to redirect his rage so he could be kind. I don’t know where he found the strength to be good to me, but it was never clearer that I didn’t deserve him than when he replied with a simple, “You didn’t kill Finn. Sama did. Even if you had closed yourself off to him and made things painfully clear, Finn still would’ve followed you there. If somehow you’d gone to the council, me and Mason first, he would’ve come with you all the same. He loved you enough not to let you murder the man who’d tortured your mind so much. Even if you never gave him a second look, he would’ve kept trying to keep you safe and win your heart till the end. Even if there was no hope of a victory.”
“You can’t know that.”
“Of course I can. I recognize it in him because that same madness is in me. I’ll fight with you and for you till the end, even if you’re gazing at another man while I’m bleeding and dying for you.”
I turned my head to look out the window so Von didn’t see my eyes mist over. “I’m so sorry I did this to us. I’m sorry I got Finn killed. I’m sorry for Bishop, for Garrick, for Mariang and Bev. For September. I’m sorry for all of it.”
“I know, love. It’s survivor’s guilt, and it’ll pass.” His nose scrunched. “What could you have possibly done to feel guilt over Mariang’s death? You actually gave our sister a peaceful passing. That’s more than any of us could do for her.”
“Mariang might not have wanted to get pregnant so soon if she hadn’t had to help me with my pregnancy so much. I was the one who suggested it to her in the first place while I was taking that stupid pregnancy test. It was right after the healing waters made her all better. I’m the one who pointed out that she should get a little crawler of her own. If I hadn’t told her that, then she might not’ve...”
Von surprised me by laughing. “I hope you’re joking. Mariang wanted buckets of children with Danny from the very beginning. She only told him no and wouldn’t marry him for so long because she was so ill. Either way, she would’ve died. It’s horrible, but it’s not your fault. None of it was your fault. You cheated on me and fell in love with another man. That’s your fault. Only that.”
I was quiet for a few moments. “Even if that was true, it’s enough to sink me. I should’ve stayed away from Finn.”
“Yes, you should’ve.” Von turned off the freeway and pulled into a hotel. He cut the engine and reached over to hold my hand. “Let’s be done with it now.”
Thirty-Seven.
Kabayo in a Blond Wig
I awoke to Von wrapped around me, using my hip like a body pillow he’d decided sometime in the night to sling his leg over. Though I was caged in and twisted in his unconscious grip, I didn’t dare move. I didn’t trust that he wouldn’t run the second he woke up. So I stayed hemmed in by Von’s arm and leg, his breath on my neck and his lips resting open against my skin.
When half an hour went by and I couldn’t hold my bladder anymore, I carefully extricated myself from him and got ready for the day. I quietly headed down to the continental breakfast I’d seen advertised in the lobby.
I loaded up on all the staples, though I was eating more for fuel than desire. I assembled a tray and brought it up to the room for us to enjoy together, hoping I’d selected enough of whatever Von happened to wake up craving.
I expected him to be asleep still; I hadn’t been gone that long. When I opened the door, Von was sitting on the edge of the bed, holding his phone with a hopeless expression. His shoulders relaxed when I came in, and set the tray on the desk that was too shallow to do any actual work on. “You alright?”
Von shook his head, not bothering to hide his confusion. “Is this what I did to you? When I left after I found out you were pregnant, did it feel like this?”
I blinked at him, a little bowled over at the plunge into the serious first thing in the morning. “I don’t know. How do you feel?”
“Anxious when I wake up and you’re not there. Rolling over ex
pecting you to be in bed with me, but being completely alone. Wondering why you left, what I did to push you away, and not sure if you’re ever coming back.”
“Jeez, Von. I was just getting you breakfast.”
“Last time I went to sleep with you in my arms and woke up alone, you were in an entire other world, snogging another man while I searched for you like a bloody fool.” He rubbed his chest to soothe the ache there. “I guess it’s going to take me some time.”
The waffles I’d heated for us didn’t look quite so appetizing anymore. “Is this what it’s like to be in love?” My melancholy was palpable as I leaned my hip to the side of the desk.
“No. This is what it’s like to love poorly. I shouldn’t have left you, November.”
I folded my arms over my chest. “Back atcha. I know this is too little too late, but I won’t leave you out of my plans anymore. We’re going to be married. I think there’s some kind of rule about that.”
Von tilted his head up at me and smiled. I don’t know how he mustered up a smile for me, but there it was, gorgeous as the morning sunshine I desperately needed so I could feel goodness in my bones again. “We are going to be married. Maybe we should set a date for it, yeah? Make it all official. Mum informed me that a woman doesn’t feel settled in the engagement until there’s a date set.”
“Please always start off conversations about our future together with ‘my mum said’. It’s dead sexy.”
Von chuckled, standing up to stretch. He tossed his phone on the bed and made his way over to me, looking far too good in such simple clothing. Boxer briefs and a t-shirt, and I was ogling like a star-struck teenager. “When do you want to be married, love?”
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