Amber to Ashes

by Gail McHugh

  “Brock told me to stay away from you,” he admits through a shame-filled whisper, regret surfacing over his face as he stares at me, defeated.

  I stare back, equally defeated, my emotions one huge, tangled ball of hurt and confusion as his confession sinks its lethal fangs into my heart, obliterating what’s left of it. Silence wraps itself around us, a moment of calm before Ryder loses it, punching the steering wheel. He hisses in pain, blood seeping from his knuckles as he guns the engine and pulls out of the parking lot. “And I fucking listened to the dick, agreed to hurt you in whatever way necessary as long as it meant never seeing you again, never . . . feeling you again.”

  Dazed, I pull in a shocked breath, his words shredding me wide open as the truth behind them morphs Brock into a deceitful liar in the back of my mind. Still, how dare I feel this way about the only man I’ve ever loved up until this point, the man who unselfishly allowed me to touch, taste, and live out a fantasy most girls could only dream about, let alone experience in the flesh?

  I can’t, every supercilious ounce of me screaming that it’s wrong.

  Yet, that doesn’t change the tangled emotions spurring through my head. Brock tricked me into believing he was cool with all of us doing it again, his lie a punch to my gut as Ryder maneuvers through the winter wonderland of downtown Annapolis and onto an exit ramp. Body aching with the confusion Brock’s caused it, my heart hurts, the organ smothered with regret. Not so much because he lied to me, but more so because the man I’ve loved for what feels like an eternity is caught up in his own pain, my insisting on being with Ryder again bruising him to the point that he couldn’t even tell me about it.

  I’ve broken him, my hands filthier than his in this sinking boat’s demise.

  Anxiety grows, a steady mounting of unease greasing the pit of my stomach as my greatest fear blooms to life . . . I’m never going to be able to share these two men ever again. That beautiful night was a onetime thing, its powerful emotions never to be revisited. Both of my boys are hurt, their hostility toward each other a clear indication that I’m going to have to choose one of them.

  But how do you pick your right arm over your left, your ability to walk versus sight? How do you choose night versus day, water versus food?

  You can’t. Your natural instinct is to hold on to everything that helps you live.

  “You belong with me, not him, peach,” Ryder says, his voice soft, a balm, but for a fleeting second, to my nerves. “Have since the day you landed, whether my fault or not, in my lap.”

  I hear him. Hear every word he’s saying, but when I think about Brock finding out about my feelings for Ryder I freeze up, my muscles encased in a tomb of icicles as my head spits out the what-ifs.

  What if I lose Brock?

  What if I lose Ryder?

  What if I never paid either of them any mind the day we all met?

  None of us would be here, stuck in the unforgiving purgatory that is love.

  “I came here to tell you I love you, Ryder,” I start, panic re-inundating my nerves to new heights as my voice cracks, fearing the outcome. “Because I honestly do. I love you so much, I don’t know who I am, if I ever did, without you. Can’t picture my life with you erased from it.”

  He drags his eyes from the road and rests them on mine, a glitter of hope cascading over them as he reaches for my hand. “Then you’ll tell Brock? Let him know you wanna be with me instead of him?”

  “That’s the point,” I whisper, chills prickling my skin despite the heat warming it. “I—I don’t know if I can pick just one of you. I need you both for different reasons. The truth is harsh, hurtful, but I can’t picture going on without either of you by my side.”

  I know it’s selfish, know it’s most likely not an option. But I still need to try, my soul unable to choose between one part of my heart versus the other. Both men make up what’s vital to my well-being, each a necessity to my sanity, my survival.

  Ryder veers off onto a shoulder, nearly losing control of the vehicle as he brings the car to a slippery stop. Hands gripping the steering wheel, he focuses straight ahead. “So you don’t need me the way you claim to?” he asks, his voice shaking with heartbreak, betrayal, as he yanks his hand away, choosing to crush it into the dashboard instead of the steering wheel this time. “I refuse to share you again with him, and if you think I ever will, you’re crazier than I thought!” Chest heaving, he drops his hands to the side, his head hung in regret as his tone simmers down. “Christ, peach, I need you to myself. Can’t you see that? Feel that? I loved you from the instant I set eyes on you, from the second you walked into that goddamn cafeteria–slash–dining hall, and nothing will ever change that. I need you. All of you. Your hurt, your wiseass mouth, your magic, your nightmares, your dreams, your happiness, your . . . future. I can live without the sun, but I can’t exist without you. That’s my point. My harsh fucking truth.” He brings his weary gaze to mine, fury resurfacing on his face as he stabs a finger against his temple. “Whether I was prepared for it or not, regardless if I wanted it, you’re here, stuck in my mind. Brock shared something so precious, so goddamn sweet and sacred, with someone else, auctioned it off for cheap because he figured that’s what he needed, what you needed! You didn’t need that. All you needed was me, and the asshole knew that, took advantage of it! If you were mine, someone’d have to fucking kill me before I ever shared you with anyone else! Jesus! You can’t have the both of us! Don’t you get that?”

  “I know I can’t!” I blurt, recapturing his hand, tears falling from my eyes as his vicious words concerning Brock nearly crack my skull wide open. “And it’s not that at all! I need you more than anything!” I take a calming breath, hoping I can make him understand what I can’t even begin to. “I didn’t think my heart was capable of loving one man, let alone two, Ryder. There was never any room for love because it was beaten into my brain early on that it was something you fought to keep out, battled to ward off your heart from to keep it unharmed by the pain it inevitably causes in the end. God, I feared love. Feared what it would do to me. Feared I’d . . . turn it into the same thing my parents did.” I drop my head in shame, my attention honed in on our interlocked fingers.

  Without a word, he unropes his hand from mine and gently touches my jaw, his expression a jigsaw puzzle of hurt, desperation, and confusion as I lift my watery eyes to his.

  My heart splits, my tears falling faster as I try to grab a breath.

  I want to take his pain away, demolish his confusion, and cure his desperation. But I can’t even help myself, the disease I am, the incurable cancer I’ll forever remain, simply created to kill off the hopes of all around me, wipe out the dreams of anyone who gets too close.

  “I just need a little time, that’s all.” I sniffle, the look of despair coloring his face a noose around my neck as I pray that he’ll wait for me. “Time to make a clear decision. One I know is the right one for me, for all of us. I know choosing who I need and love the most should come simple, an automatic click in my brain. But it’s not for me. Before Brock, I’d never been in love, never felt what it was to need someone so badly you can’t think straight.” I lean over the console and seal my lips to his cheek, the sound of our heartbeats echoing through the car as I pull back, ashamed of what I’m asking of him. “Not only am I scared to death, but I’m confused, Ryder. I know I shouldn’t be, know that putting both of you in this position isn’t right, but I don’t know what else to do. So please, if you can, just give me a couple of days to get my head straight.”

  He nods tightly, his face wounded beyond the scars I created, beyond anything I ever want to see again.

  So selfish, toxic.

  As he puts the car in drive, slowly easing onto the highway, I can’t help but wonder if I’ve already killed off his hopes, wiped out his dreams.

  Unsure if I have, there’s one undeniable truth I can’t run from, one petrifying fact
that’s about to change all of our lives: the hourglass is on the table, two beautiful hearts awaiting my decision . . .

  CHAPTER 22

  Brock

  WALLS CLOSING IN around me, I feel like I’m gonna hurl, my entire universe crashing to pieces as I belt down 695 toward Ryder’s place, doing at least thirty over the speed limit.

  Fuck the cops. Fuck Ryder. Fuck my parents. Fuck Brandon being gone.

  Fuck . . . everything.

  Hands curled tight around the steering wheel, Amber’s voice haunts my head, nausea roiling through me as our conversation from earlier sparks to life.

  “We need to talk.” The panicked wariness in Amber’s tone causes my heart to jump as I claim a seat on my couch, already knowing what she’s about to say, able to feel it with every hesitant move she makes across my living room. She snatches a spot next to me, fear dilating her pupils as she takes my hand in hers. “It’s . . . important.”

  “What’s important is me not knowing where the hell you’ve been all night,” I bite out, my anger seeping through my serpentine skin more than my relief that she’s okay, her beautiful face unharmed by Derick’s threats. “Why you decided to sneak past the guy I have watching after your safety. That’s what’s important to me right now.”

  “You know you sound like a wannabe Don Corleone, right?” Amber ridicules through an exhausted sigh, her eyes puffed out like deep red bags of cotton candy as she hits me with one of her soft, caring smiles, gently guiding my head down onto her lap in her magical process.

  She wins. I do sound like an overprotective douchebag, but that’s not the case in point. Amber chose to disobey my strict orders of not going anywhere without me or her lookout, without someone making sure Derick can’t get near her.

  But, God, why do I feel so safe here, staring up into my angel’s eyes from below her? That’s because when I’m with Amber, I’m fucking Superman, sitting on top of the world, the ultimate untouchable force.

  Still, for making me worry for several hours while I sat here calling and texting her, Amber not only deserves a punishing yet unforgettable fuck from yours truly, but the dick who was supposed to keep his eyes latched on hers is more than deserving of a severe ass-kicking, also courtesy of yours truly.

  Whoever said I was a complete asshole was wrong. Less driving myself crazy over what Amber’s about to admit to, I’m feeling more than generous tonight.

  Before I can crack a grin at her somewhat entertaining joke, Amber’s smile fades, transforming into something no boyfriend ever wants to witness . . .

  . . . One huge I’m about to ream you a new ass frown, thick with a heavy dose of heart-damaging crying. Fuck me . . .

  “Why’d you tell Ryder to stay away from me?” she questions over a hiccupped gulp of grief, tears pouncing from her eyes as she pets my hair. Considering she looks like she’s about to eat my balls for breakfast, the notion’s confusing. “I know everything, because Ryder admitted to everything. Admitted to loving me. Needing me. Wanting to be with me.” Crying surpassing the hysterically dangerous point, she lifts my head from her lap and inches away from me, her back hitting the corner of the couch, her arms hugging her knees as she stares at me, almost appearing . . . scared to death? Christ, what have I done to this girl? “You made him purposely . . . hurt me by telling him to ignore my calls and texts. Why? Why, baby? I don’t understand. You said you were okay with the three of us being together again. Why lie to me while telling him to back off?”

  She said a lot, but the only words my brain pick up on is the part about Ryder admitting to . . . loving her. My heart explodes right there on the spot, regret for ever opening this can of worms crawling all over me.

  I spark up a joint, praying a little green will help calm me down as I pull into Ryder’s neighborhood, seeking the asshole’s blood. The high does fuck all to chill me out, my best friend’s deception hitting bone-deep as I slide into a parking spot in front of his and Lee’s apartment. Boundaries. I never set them, leaving Ryder to step over what should’ve kept him and his feelings for Amber in check.

  I pop open my glove compartment, reach for my pistol, and load it, ready to set all kinds of fucking boundaries as I kill the engine. Another rip from the joint and my head starts spinning with Amber’s confession, her final blow to my heart sending me over a cliff as she continued.

  “But before you answer anything,” she chokes out, wiping her nose with the back of her hand, “you need to know that I . . . Brock . . . God, Brock, I . . . love Ryder just as much as he does me, if not . . . more. But I don’t love him any more or less than I do you. I don’t . . . think, at least.”

  “What the fuck do you mean you don’t think you love him any more or less than you do me, Ber?” I shoot to standing, rage, hurt, and confusion attacking me from the inside out despite having known this was coming. Her barely answering my calls the last couple of weeks, not wanting to fuck around when we did see each other, skipping class, work, and her therapy sessions told me all I needed to know, warned me of what the future was about to upchuck in my face . . . her finally admitting to loving Ryder.

  I knew it.

  Knew she loved him the day I asked her if she did.

  The day she lied about how she really felt about him.

  I yank a glass-framed picture of her and me on the weekend that ruined my life, knowing she’s not to blame for the mess that’s become of us as I bullet it across my living room. It explodes against my fireplace, its jagged edges some kind of you deserve this, asshole sick, twisted representation of the universe’s way of slicing my heart open. Loud and destructive to everything evil, self-centered, and fucked up I’ve become since Brandon’s kidnapping, since the angel before me stepped into my life, its insidious whisper keeps asking, “Are you happy now?” It’s laughing, screaming to me, “Don’t forget. You were the architect of this structure, the almighty creator of the smoky ash it’s now burned into.”

  Even so, I buck against it, my world splintering on its axis as I make a duplicate glass-framed picture of us—the first time I met her foster parents—the fireplace’s next victim. The memory crystallizes into thin air, all it meant melting into what remains of a dream—a dead dream I let slip through my fingers. “How do you not know who you love and need more?” I snarl, seething to punch something. I refrain, the fear in Amber’s eyes halting me on a needle as she stands to her feet, slowly backing away from me like a scared animal would a hunter.

  Christ.

  No. Never. Fucking never. I’m not that guy, that sorry fuck of an excuse of a man who takes pride in petrifying the woman who makes up the glue that holds his universe together, the essential piece to his life force.

  Feeling like the ultimate dick, I step toward her, my hands tentatively coming up to cup her cheeks. She allows me to touch her dampened skin—thank God—the fear trickling over her face drying some as the anger on mine calms. “I don’t understand, baby girl.” I shake my head, unshed tears born from not grieving Brandon like I should’ve been allowed to, unseen tears created by turning my girl into something she’s not, coming as close as they ever came from dripping from my eyes as I move my hands into the silk of her hair, bringing her lips to mine. “How can you not know it’s me you love more?” I ask, my voice shaking like a certified pussy, fear that I’ve lost this gem forever cracking my words. “You’re my world, Ber, not his. I know I messed up by sharing you with him. And, fuck, baby. If I could take it back I would. But you can’t leave me like this. You just can’t. You gotta give me another chance to make things right, the way they should’ve been from the second we met.”

  “I love you with all my heart, Brock. I always have, and I’m pretty sure I always will. But I’m lost, confused, broken, nearing . . . hopeless,” she says through a self-deprecating whisper, her gaze begging for forgiveness before her lips land gently on my jaw. Her expression a smorgasbord of pain, she says one final t
hing. One final thing that has me painfully aware that the time I’ve spent with the girl who’s served as a painkiller to my past, a ray of light to my future, is almost up, my love for her lost upon my best friend’s love for her as she pulls back. “So I know a decision needs to be made. One that’ll kill off a piece of each of us,” she continues, numbly, an emotionless flower on autopilot as she turns toward my bedroom. “One I hope to make by the end of the week.”

  My bedroom door clicks shut, my heart, sanity, and fear caving into my soul, speeding my breathing, swallowing whole everything I’d had planned for us in one, slick your life’s over, dick gulp.

  I yank my Hummer keys off the entryway table, and it dawns on me that I’m cool, as good as any other heartbroken motherfucker. Temporary insanity will be the key player in my defense concerning the murder of my best friend . . .

  As I slip behind the wheel, I’m pretty sure I’ve got a solid game plan . . .

  CHAPTER 23

  Ryder

  I HAVE JUST ENOUGH time to shower and slide on a pair of sweatpants when I hear a loud crack-crack-crack on my door, the sound breaking me from the temporary bliss of Amber’s confession.

  The girl loves me . . .

  Christ. When she told me that, I knew she was mine, knew I’d won her heart. The undeniable want in her kiss, the unhidden truth swirling in her eyes, and the unmistakable need for me in her every touch couldn’t tell me otherwise.

  It’s me whom she’ll pick, me whom she’ll spend the rest of her life with.

  Still, I shouldn’t get ahead of myself. Though she loves me, there’s still a good chance she’ll pick Brock, leaving me to rot away without her because of her confusion as the fucker sucks the life out of her, using her weaknesses in his favor.