Unbearable (the TORQUED trilogy Book 2)

by Shey Stahl

  A smile tugs at her lips. “You’re right. That wasn’t me. Jesus, what kind of asshole does something like that?”

  “A big one.” My laugh shakes through me, causing me to wince while a gnawing pain spreads through my head at the onset.

  “What now, then?” she asks finally, clicking the button for the nurse when she notices I’m in pain. Turning to look me directly in the eyes, her expression of heartache and remorse mirror my own. We don’t speak, just stare at each other.

  “We take it slow like you want and I’ll try to be patient.”

  Tears stream down her reddened cheeks and I quickly wipe her tears away and pull her into my arms, the best I can at least which is a sideways hug.

  “Raven,” I say, waiting for her eyes to meet mine when I draw back from her embrace. “This may not be the time or the place to tell you this…” my heart thuds louder and then steadies out into a rapid rhythm, “but I love you, and I’m not going anywhere. I’m sorry for the things I said to you. I had no right to accuse you of anything and treat you that way. I’ll wait for however long you need me to. I don’t know what I can offer you, but I’ll give you what I can.”

  “We—” She starts to say something but stops.

  I panic at what her reaction to my words will be and add, “This. Whatever we have is worth waiting for,” I say, reaching for her hands. “I love you.” I blink, nerves taking over.

  She nods, slowly, as if she’s letting the words sink in. And then she surprises me by saying, “I love you, too, Tyler.”

  My face spreads into the warm smile. Here I am, lying in a hospital bed in front of the girl I love, and for some reason I might never understand, she actually loves me back.

  I still remember the girl who sat in my truck one snowy night, big brown eyes watching me with curiosity as I asked her age, wishing somehow she would have been older. Maybe I knew all along there was something between Raven and me that could only be ignored for so long before it changed.

  All my uncertainty of her not wanting a life with me seems silly now. She showed up for me, waited for me, and now I will wait for her.

  Looking at her now, why did I ever have fear?

  Tyler’s released from the hospital on a Saturday, a week and two days after the accident. For having a hole drilled in his head, I think a week is pretty fucking good. As did his doctor. It just goes to show you when Tyler’s determined, he’s unstoppable.

  I drive home for the weekend to help him get settled in at his apartment. Mostly because he said the idea of having his mother help him use the bathroom wasn’t happening but he’d gladly let me assist his wang. Muff kindly agreed.

  The doctor advises him to take a few months off work but he can’t afford it so he settles with a few weeks and I know even that’s pushing it for Tyler. He’s never missed a day of work until now.

  I move around his apartment, washing sheets, cleaning dishes and putting away his premade and labeled meals my mom made him. I wouldn’t say I’ve convinced myself to be with him in the terms he wants, but I’m here, helping him out and organizing his apartment because it’s a goddamn mess and I can’t stand it.

  Some would wonder why my hesitation, right? He loves me, and I love him. Should be simple. Not exactly.

  I’m in the kitchen labeling the pot roast I made when he comes out of the bathroom laughing after taking a shower.

  “You didn’t tell me I looked like a drunken prank.” He stops in front of the counter and smiles at me.

  I try not to laugh as I look at his half-shaved head. “Well, I figured you could only handle so much bad news at once.”

  “True.” He runs his hand over the left side of his head that’s shaved from the accident and gives a nod to the bathroom. “Can you help me out?”

  I’ll admit, I miss the longer hair he had. “Yeah, sure.” I follow him in the bathroom taking a seat on the counter in front of him. He reaches his hands behind his head, grabbing the neck of his shirt, and pulling it over his head, tossing it to the floor.

  My stare is immediately on his chest and then to his stomach. He’s lost some weight in the week he was in the hospital but he still looks amazing. Every defined muscle is on torturous display for me. It’s really hard not to act on these impulses I have seeing how we’re in a bathroom and these rooms are a weakness for us.

  His lips twist into a smirk, knowing what’s going through my head. I have half a mind to shove my panties in his mouth so he won’t smile at me like that. “Stop looking at me like that.”

  He holds up his hands, turning his smile up a notch. “My bad.”

  I watch carefully as he pulls out the clippers from under the sink. When his arm lifts, I catch sight of his tattoos. I’ve seen them hundreds of times but his ink is beautiful, full of red and black designs.

  “I’ve always loved your tattoos.” I run my fingers ghosting over the black markings, tracing over them with the lightest touch.

  “I’m glad you like them.” His voice is rough, as though me touching him is hard for him. Probably about as hard as it is for me being in here with him.

  His hands move to my thighs, trailing up them ever so lightly. I shiver, my legs wrapping around his and pulling him to me.

  I pick up the clippers. “Ready?”

  He nods, giving me a smile. “I guess so.”

  I’m careful because the last thing I want to do is get the clippers anywhere near the bandage on his head. Relaxing, his eyes drift closed as I pass over his head, thick black beautiful hair I used to thread my fingers through falls onto the floor at his feet.

  “I’m going to miss your hair.”

  The corners of his mouth twitch into a half smile. “It’ll grow back.”

  I know it will but in a strange sense, this, me shaving his head is like a fresh beginning in a bigger sense.

  When I’m finished, his eyes open and my heart pounds in my chest, so nervous, but also from the way he’s watching me. He’s in love with me and I don’t think I’ve ever noticed the look, until now. My heart lurches and it’s easy to get lost in the moment when he looks at me like this.

  I think he knows what he’s doing to me and clears his throat, his hands still on my thighs. “Do you want to watch a movie with me?”

  “Sure.” At least on the couch I’ll probably be less likely to want to have sex with him.

  Wrong.

  It’s clear Tyler’s thoughts are not on the movie. Once the opening credits are displayed and his head is in my lap, his left hand is dangerously close to my V and I know D is looking for a little action.

  When his hand moves further up, I stop him and Tyler sits up, staring at me. He knows he crossed the line but he doesn’t say anything.

  I open my mouth to say something but forget what I’m even going to say when I meet his eyes. So instead, I lean in and kiss him because I’m an idiot and I miss kissing him.

  Curling his hand to cup my cheek, his lips give me what I need, even harder than what I imagine he will give me. I moan at the sensation, blend of warm and wet soft lips making contact with mine. My hand fists in the fabric of his T-shirt as his tighten around me. Without meaning to, I straddle his lap.

  Tyler moans deeply at the change in our position and greedily moves his hands lower over my ass. A spike of nervousness and excitement pricks my skin, settling in my belly. I’ve missed him so much.

  His fingers clench into tight fists around the hem of my shirt. That’s when his hard length presses into my center, his hips straining a little closer to capture the friction.

  “Raven.” He groans, his eyes squeezing shut as a shudder moves through him.

  Hearing my name on his lips makes my heart stumble.

  I don’t have a chance to recover before he growls softly, possessively, against my lips. “You have no idea how much I need you.”

  By the hardness pressing against me, I have a pretty good idea.

  And that’s when I stop. He does need me, but not this way. Not yet.


  He notices the hesitation and then I move to sit next to him, pulling away completely. Rubbing his hands over his face, he groans before he drops them to his sides. “What’s wrong?”

  I stand, intending to leave when he grabs my hand.

  When he speaks, it’s low and deep. With pleading eyes, he presses gentle hands on my cheeks. “Come on, please. Raven… don’t go. I’m sorry I did that. Please don’t leave without giving me hope that we’re okay.”

  “Tyler, we can’t keep falling into this trap. If I have sex with you tonight, it’s just like all the other times. I don’t want to be here for just sex. I want more than that.”

  It’s so hard for me to say because sex with Tyler is so fucking amazing. I want to wash my mouth out with soap for saying I can’t have sex with him.

  He exhales a huge breath and nods. “I want more than sex too. But I can’t have you leave without knowing how you feel. Regardless of not having sex, which sucks, but I need to know.” His words send my nerves into a rushed frenzy, my heart hammering as he clasps his hands together between his knees. “I don’t know what you want out of a relationship,” he admits. “Hell, I don’t know if I really know how to be in a relationship but what I do know is I want to figure it out with you. It’s up to you, Raven. You’re going to have to take the lead because when it comes to this, I’m flying blind.”

  I understand what he’s asking and by the fragile way he’s holding onto my eyes. I don’t think I can give it to him right now. We need time to figure out what a relationship between the two of us means.

  I take his hands in mine, our eyes making contact. “We stumbled into our physical relationship, and I fell hard. We have to take this slow.” His face falls with my words and I lose his eyes. “And I’m not saying no, but I feel like if we’re truly meant to be, you’ll be willing to wait while we build a stronger foundation and in order to do that we have to take it slower this time.” Blinking slowly, his stare returns but there’s not the same hope there once was. “I thought having a relationship with you would give me the security I needed, but the truth is, the definition I wanted before of boyfriend and girlfriend doesn’t mean anything. It’s just that. A definition. I think I’ve learned that when it comes to us, actions speak louder than words and while we can tell each other everything we want to hear, we aren’t truly going to be successful in the long term without taking the time to really learn about each other and what the other needs out of this.” Sighing, I release a deep breath. “I just can’t jump back into what we were. The worst part of this was I wasn’t looking out for myself. I went head on into this hoping to snag my childhood crush. If you’re asking me if I love you, the answer is yes. But a true relationship needs to be built into more in order to survive. We had sex, Tyler. That’s all we had and as great as it is, that’s not a relationship that will last.”

  He nods, knowing there’s truth to my words.

  Dipping my head forward, I wait for him to look at me. “In order for this to work, you have to come to terms with who you are too. You can’t use me as an escape from your life. You need to deal with not being able to have children and what that means for our future. I’m ready to make that sacrifice for you, but you have to be ready to make it too. And you need to forgive your parents.”

  He stares at me, his fingers dancing over my palm as he smiles softly. Raising his hand, he touches my cheek with just his fingertips like he’s brushing away an eyelash. “Beauty and brains… how’d I get so lucky?”

  I laugh. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”

  His hand moves down my neck and then falls away and he nods, once more. “As much as I want to call you mine, I understand we might not be ready for that just yet. I’m willing to do it your way if it means we’re getting a chance.”

  Sitting next to him on the couch again, his lips meet mine and when I don’t push him away, his mouth comes back a second and third time, and on the forth, they don’t leave mine.

  “I love you,” he whispers against my mouth. His tongue sweeps gently against mine. “I love you so much, Raven, and I’ll wait forever for us.”

  My arms wrap around his neck. “I love you, too.”

  He closes his eyes. His fingertips press into the curve of my jaw as he holds my head in his hands. “Don’t get me wrong, my D will miss your V, but he’ll learn to deal with it,” he teases, his humor returning.

  I throw my head back, laughing. We’re so inappropriate. “Muff loves her Wang.”

  His shoulders shake as a laugh rolls through him. “We need to talk about something else now. All this muff and wang talk isn’t good for me.”

  I snuggle against his side and then stick a pillow between us. “Let’s watch this movie.”

  Just being with him, like this, with everything out in the open is by far the most relaxing night I’ve experienced in a long time.

  I DON’T HEAD straight back to Eugene Sunday night. Instead, I sneak home to grab a few things from mom’s house. She’s outside watering her newly planted flowers in the backyard so I go back there to check on her. She’s been a huge help with Tyler too, and I know she’ll be around the shop and upstairs during the day to check on him for me.

  Watching Mom in her own world is what I love most. When no one else is looking and she’s talking to my dad in the backyard. You know just by seeing her now she’s completely at ease. She says she feels him out there, mostly because she loved our backyard and he did too. They spent many nights on the patio together talking, so naturally she’d find strength where they spent time together.

  “Oh, hey, honey,” she says when she notices me. Setting down the hose, she takes a seat next to me on the patio.

  “How’s Tyler doing?”

  “Seems good. He’ll probably need a lot of help tomorrow. I feel bad going back to school.”

  She waves her hand at me. “Don’t, honey. He’ll be fine and I’ll take good care of him until you get back.”

  I kind of laugh because I’ve never really come out and told my mom what’s been going on with Tyler and me, but she knows. A mother always secretly knows.

  Her eyes move from mine to the table when a lady bug lands on her gardening gloves and stays there. She smiles softly, like it’s an inside joke. “Your dad used to hate lady bugs and grasshoppers. Any flying insect with wings made him scream like a little girl.”

  I laugh too, because I remember that about him. My father was my hero in so many ways but if a bug landed on him, you’d think he was going to die.

  “Since he passed, lady bugs always land on me. It’s like he’s telling me he’s always with me.”

  “How do you manage so well without him here? I mean… I’m… I just can’t imagine spending your whole life with someone, raising a family with them and then having them taken from you so suddenly.”

  She thinks about my question for a moment, tears flooding her eyes and I think maybe I shouldn’t have asked.

  I fretted over my mom for months after my dad passed away last May. Nervously waiting for the breakdown and the moment I’d have to be there for her to pick up the pieces like she did for Red when Nevaeh died. But Mom has only ever showed strength.

  “Things like this.” She points to the lady bug who hasn’t moved. “He’s all around me, in my thoughts, here in this house, the shop. He’s all around us and I just”—her hand moves to her chest, over her heart—“he’s here. Inside my heart. Your father possessed such a confidence about him you couldn’t ignore. Even before I really knew him, he had my attention just off that confidence. He could walk into a room and captivate it just by being there. When he passed, that feeling never went away for me. I can walk outside and it’s here, all around me. I can step foot in the shop and know he’s there, beside Red, giving him the strength he needs to go on.”

  I smile, knowing it’s true. The lady bug that’s on her gardening gloves moves, flies around and then lands on my right hand.

  “He’s with you too, Raven. He’s with all you kids.
”

  “Well then, why can’t he knock some sense into Rawley? Maybe turn himself into a spider and bite him,” I tease, trying to keep from crying.

  Mom laughs, her cheeks warming with the gesture. “Rawley will come around when he’s ready. You just have to give him time.”

  “I can’t believe you’re saying that after what he did at the shop.”

  She frowns. “I’m not happy with his behavior, but with Rawley, forcing him to change his ways isn’t going to make him do it. He’s stubborn and he needs to do this on his own.”

  She’s right, again.

  “How are you and Tyler?”

  I knew this was coming. Naturally she’d want to know since we hadn’t talked about him.

  “I gave him a maybe.”

  “A maybe?”

  “Yeah. I didn’t want to fall into the trap of just having sex with him.” Normally I wouldn’t tell my mother this but we were opening up so I just kept going. “For so long I wanted to be with him. I mean, you know how much of a crush I had on him. My face would literally turn beat red when he’d come into the room when I was younger.”

  She laughs, probably remembering me trying to come up with every excuse I could to go to the shop when Tyler first started working there. I wasn’t shy about it either. I’d hang out in the shop like I belonged there just to be around him. So yeah, Mom knew I had a huge crush on him.

  “So what was the hold up on his part?”

  “Well, he kept telling me he wasn’t in a position to fall in love. But then every time I came home for the weekend or a holiday, he wanted to get together. Then I wouldn’t hear from him. It got to the point where I felt like I was being used. I knew it and he knew it. I was his escape from all the shit in his life he was trying to avoid. So when it finally got to the point where I told him I was done, suddenly he wants to be with me. It wasn’t until after the accident that he told me he can’t have kids and that’s the reason he kept pushing me away.”