Where Lightning Strikes (Bleeding Stars #3)

by A. L. Jackson

  Didn’t blame him a bit.

  If I were him, I’d want to kick my ass too.

  Didn’t matter anyway. Because this kid…this kid was all I could see. The way his mouth twisted up in welcome, eyes so dark they were almost black, sparking with mischief I knew all too well. It was like looking at all those pictures my mom kept plastered on her walls.

  This boy was mine.

  They stopped just a couple feet away from where I stood under a shade tree near the bench. He kept peering up at me with this unending smile that twisted through me like chains and ropes and indestructible ties.

  An unbreakable bond.

  Curiosity played in his dark, dark eyes, and his mom dropped to her knees in front of him, something shaky and frantic about her as she brushed the too-long bangs from his forehead. “Baby, I want you to meet someone really important, okay?”

  “Okay,” he agreed, grinning toward me.

  “This is Lyrik.” She said it like a secret, and I was dropping to my knees, too, completely laid bare when he turned the full force of his attention on me.

  His grin showcased a straight row of baby teeth. One missing on the bottom.

  And I wanted to weep when I looked at him.

  When I looked at all the years gone, and the wonder in his gaze and at what came spilling out of his arms when he suddenly dumped his stash of toys to the ground. He rummaged through his pile, snatching it upside down by a leg.

  That fucking bear that was supposed to be good luck.

  Binding a family together.

  The thing was a complete disaster and probably should have been tossed years ago, tattered and torn and frayed.

  He held it up like a prize. “You made this!”

  For a second, every part of me seized.

  My eyes pinched at the sides, dents cutting into my forehead as I fought against the unbearable pain. I shifted my gaze to Kenzie for help because I didn’t quite know how to make sense of this.

  Tears just kept sliding down her face. She remained silent. Like she trusted me to handle this right. For me to get the situation was fragile and I could either foster it or shatter it into a million unrecognizable pieces.

  “Yeah, buddy, I did.”

  He turned back to his pile and dug out a blue car. “Hey, do you like cars? This one’s my favorite.”

  A low chuckle rumbled in my chest. “I like them a lot.”

  His grin grew. “Me, too. My dad says this kind goes so fast.”

  Did my damned best not to flinch, but I couldn’t help it, that slam of jealousy I knew I’d feel. But I’d accepted that was probably something I was gonna feel when I’d made another choice. When I’d switched paths and headed a different direction.

  When I came here.

  I forced some lightness into the gravel grinding up the words. “Your dad’s totally right. It is super-fast. Any faster and it’d be a race car.”

  His eyes went wide. “Whoa, that’s way fast. Do you know what green means?”

  A little bewildered, I lifted my shoulders. “Go?”

  “Yep!”

  He made a revving noise and pushed the car along the ground, totally unaware he was completely crumbling my world.

  “Go!” he shouted, then asked, “How about yellow?”

  “Um…slow down?”

  He glanced at me with a smile. “Right again, ’cuz that’s what my teacher tells me when I have to flip my card from green to yellow. Slow down,” he acted out with a grin, those eyes glinting with mischief again. “Because when you get on red? That means stop and you don’t get to play at recess. No way is that gonna happen!”

  Kenzie choked out a laugh below her breath.

  Yeah.

  I was right.

  He was a total badass.

  So fucking cute.

  I was betting he was a little handful and unruly and a whole lot perfect.

  He started driving that car up my arm and over his song. A song I’d never sang for anyone. It was one reserved for the loneliest hours of the night. One I’d played what felt like a thousand times. One I played like some kind of fucked-up tribute. When I’d pray more of those prayers I didn’t have the right to pray.

  Begging for his joy.

  “Hey, that’s my name,” he suddenly said, running the wheels back and forth over his name forever etched on my arm.

  Affection gripped my throat.

  “Yeah, it is, little man, it is.”

  He grinned again, and it took about all I had not to scoop him up and steal him away.

  Instead I sat there while he talked, showing me all his favorite toys that he obviously took with him everywhere, his chatter nonstop, animated, and unbridled. He talked to me like he’d known me forever.

  Like I was his best friend.

  My gaze drifted to Kenzie who had taken a seat on the small bench, elbows on her knees as she watched us. Her expression was soft and sad and knowing.

  Silently I told her what an amazing job she’d done with this kid. Just like I’d known she would.

  And I couldn’t stop myself from wondering what it would have been like if I’d been there, if I’d gotten to witness it all, if I’d somehow been a partner to it.

  The hardships and joys and accomplishments.

  The little things.

  Everything I’d given away for one night of revelry.

  I watched as Brendon got lost in his own play, pushing his car through the blades of grass, then plopped it in his pocket as he stood and raced for the slide.

  Silence swirled around me and Kenzie as she gave me time. But honestly, no amount of time was ever gonna be enough.

  “Thank you,” I finally said. Because I’d had no clue how her reception was going to be. Not when she didn’t owe me anything at all. Especially when I’d given her no warning at all of my intrusion into her life. Wrapping my arms around my knees, I rocked, working my way through the discomfort, gauging what to say.

  “So…he does know…about me?”

  A slow breath leaked from between her pursed lips. “I was being honest when I said I knew one day you’d come. And yes, it was definitely a shock turning around and finding you there, but once the shock wore off, I can’t say I was really surprised.”

  She tipped her head toward her husband who still stood guard across the street. I wondered just how damned difficult this had to be for him, because it sure as shit was hell for me.

  “We’ve been preparing him for this day, Lyrik. For the day when you’d come back into our lives. And even if you never did, we still knew one day he’d figure out Brad isn’t his biological father. We weren’t going to lie to him about that.”

  I rubbed the tension from the back of my neck, trying to brace myself for the impression Brendon might have already made about me. “What does he know, Kenz?”

  She looked down at me through bleary eyes. “Lyrik…he knows that he has your eyes and your hair and that you made him that bear.” She choked over the admission. “He knows you put him in my tummy. He just hasn’t figured out what that means yet.”

  Everything throbbed and ached.

  And I wasn’t sure I could breathe.

  Not through the remorse and sorrow and gratitude.

  A wistful smile tugged at her mouth as she looked at Brendon. “Even after I fell out of love with you, that didn’t mean I didn’t still love you, Lyrik. That I didn’t have faith in you. That after all the horrible mistakes you made, that one day you wouldn’t make the right one. So I told him stories about you…the good ones…about the guy I knew before I didn’t know you at all.”

  That smile tipped down, and more tears fell down her face. “But I guess I did know you, after all, didn’t I?”

  Unsure, I turned my full attention on her.

  “I know you didn’t cash that check. My dad finally admitted it to me…the night before I married Brad. He wanted to be sure I was sure. That I was marrying for my heart rather than marrying because I thought some guy would be good for me and
my son.”

  Her voice lowered to a whisper. “He wanted to give me the chance to go back to you.”

  “And you chose him,” I supplied through a nod with a subtle gesture in Brad’s direction.

  For two weeks I’d wondered how I’d feel when I got here. About Kenzie. About this girl I’d thought would forever hold my heart.

  Guess that was my answer.

  The fact her choosing the other guy when she knew I’d been lying when I left her and Brendon didn’t hurt. Instead it filled me with this strange sense of comfort.

  A simple joy found in the fact she was happy.

  That’s all I wanted for her.

  I guess just like her, even though there would always be a part of me that loved her…cared for her…I wasn’t in love with her anymore.

  Guess that’s what my stupid heart had been telling me for the last two months. Why those words had come spilling free.

  Blue.

  You sing my soul.

  A warm ache filled my chest.

  No longer was there a question of who owned me anymore.

  That girl.

  My brave, beautiful Blue.

  Self-conscious laughter trickled from her, and she blushed. “I think what we had was real, Lyrik. But I think it was just preparing me for what I was going to feel when I met the man I was supposed to live my life with.”

  Tenderly, she looked at the man across the street.

  I chuckled. “Why does that sound like something my mother would say?”

  She laughed. “Because your mom is amazing.”

  And God, it was weird. Sitting comfortably with Kenzie this way.

  She sobered, eyes roaming my face. “Are you happy, Lyrik?”

  Exhaling, I pushed back the hair blowing in my face. “No, Kenz. I’m not happy. I haven’t let myself be since the night I walked out on you and Brendon.”

  The words locked somewhere deep, before they came rushing out in a quiet confession. “But I’m…almost there.”

  Yeah.

  That was weird, too.

  Realizing that.

  “I watched you,” she admitted, “watched you as Sunder made it. I saw the tabloids…the success and the parties and the women. You should have been happier than anyone. But I knew, Lyrik. I knew. I saw it on your face.”

  She met her husband’s gaze. “I want you to know it’s okay. It’s okay to let it go. The guilt I saw in every picture.” She looked at me. Expression wistful. “I let you go a long time ago.”

  My world spun on fast forward. In slow motion. Everything becoming clear.

  So fucking clear.

  You sing my soul.

  “You’d better go,” she finally said with a tender smile. “Brad’s the best guy you’ll ever meet, but even he has his limits.”

  Nodding through the daze, I stood and brushed off the grass and leaves from my pants.

  Brendon came hurtling back over. His arms were lifted over his head and there was nothing I could do but swoop him up.

  I squeezed him and breathed him in like I’d done that night, and he giggled as he edged back and pulled at a strand of my hair, like he was remembering what his mom had told him, this strange connection filling up our air.

  Energy and light and life.

  This tugging pull. Tying me to him. Leading me to her.

  “I’ll miss you, little man,” I murmured in his ear.

  “I’ll see you soon,” he said as if he held a clue. As if he were telling me not to worry. That maybe that gaping distance between us had just become narrow.

  Close enough to cross.

  “Yeah…I sure hope so.”

  Carefully, I set him down, shoved my hands in my pockets. Brendon went running to his dad who was already crossing the street, going straight for Brendon with love and protection in his eyes.

  Whole and absolute.

  Slowly, I began to back away, taking in the last couple seconds of my son I could get.

  Kenzie’s and my eyes met. “He’s going to ask questions after you’re gone. And I’m going to tell him, Lyrik. I really hope you do the right thing with it.”

  The words were subdued and filled with the promise as I continued to walk backward. “Whenever he’s ready to find me, whenever he knows what all that means, please don’t stop him. I’ll be waiting.”

  She nodded, and I gave her the gentlest of smiles. I spun around and started climbing the small hill.

  “Hey, Lyrik,” Kenzie called. She was grinning wide when I slanted my attention to her over my shoulder. “Whoever she is…she’s a lucky girl.”

  I returned her grin, shaking my head.

  I increased my pace, breaking out in a sprint as I ran for my truck.

  Because Blue wasn’t the lucky one.

  But if I managed to win her back? I’d be one lucky guy.

  MY MOTHER SQUEEZED MY hand. It was a silent show of encouragement as she stood at my side. The world rushed around us, people traversing the busy downtown streets, while I stood stock still right in the middle of the sidewalk in front of the short stack of steps leading to the court building.

  Sweat slicked my hands and beaded at the back of my neck.

  Run. Run. Run.

  It was that small, terrified voice that whispered the tortured plea within the confines of my muddled head.

  Begging me to go.

  To spare myself the torture waiting behind those doors.

  Brave.

  But it was the memory of that deep, haunting voice that convinced me to stay. The lingering warmth of his presence.

  Funny how Lyrik had been the one to reveal my inner courage, to embrace it, to show me I no longer had to live behind walls when he’d just kept building his own.

  Brick after brutal brick.

  Deflecting and avoiding and protecting a mashed-up heart I’d learned kept so much hidden good. I knew it was there. Lurking in his ominous shadows.

  That didn’t mean his savage heart didn’t hold the power to decimate.

  I was still reeling from the fact he’d chosen to decimate me.

  I’d thought we’d been so close…so close to finding who we were supposed to be. Together. But I guessed that was the problem.

  Lyrik had gotten too close and it was too much.

  This boy who didn’t have his heart to give.

  But he held mine, anyway.

  My mother squeezed my hand again. “We need to go inside.”

  “I know,” I whispered, still unmoving.

  She turned to me, her expression pure and understanding as she tenderly brushed back the long locks of my hair that whipped around my head, stirred by the wind.

  Hair now so dark brown it was nearly black.

  Red gone.

  I should have known when Lyrik forced his way into my life she could never stay.

  I’d dyed it back to my natural color. The color it’d been before I’d run. Before I’d masked and cloaked and camouflaged.

  The same way it’d be when I climbed the stand and stood against Cameron Lucan.

  No.

  I’d realized since I’d come home I wasn’t ashamed of the tattoos that covered my scars or the way I’d dyed my hair.

  But when he saw me sitting there, it wouldn’t be under veil or disguise.

  It would be me.

  Tamar Gibson.

  The girl he’d so nearly destroyed.

  In all those years of running, I’d never realized by hiding, I was allowing him to keep her that way.

  Broken.

  Hidden.

  Submissive.

  And as scared as I was to face him, he would no longer hold me down or hold me back.

  “You can do this, Tamar,” my mother said. Emphatic. “I know you can, and I know it has to be one of the most terrifying feelings you’ve ever had to contend with. But you’re already more than halfway there. You’re here. You came.”

  Tears welled, and I trembled a smile. In the two weeks since I’d knocked on their door at dawn, my
mother had been my constant support. There for me when I’d needed someone to talk to and there for me in the silence when she’d known I’d needed to be left alone.

  She pulled her bottom lip between her teeth and wiped away the single tear that slid down my cheek. “I’m so proud of you. Have I told you that?”

  I laughed a soggy laugh. “Only about a thousand times.”

  She smiled. “Then I’ll gladly tell you a thousand more.”

  “Thank you,” I whispered, more grateful to her than she could ever know.

  “Oh, sweet girl. I’m your mother. No matter how far you go, I will always be right here. Waiting for you. You are a gift, not a burden. Don’t ever think otherwise.”

  Her saying that just made me want to grab onto her, hug her and thank her again and again. Instead, I nodded. “Okay. Let’s do this.”

  We headed into the building and through security. I’d declined sitting through other testimonies and questioning. Declined putting myself through the presentation of evidence. I was here to tell my story. And I was here to stand in the place of Madeline since Cameron had robbed her of telling her own.

  That didn’t mean my stride didn’t slow as we approached the courtroom. That I couldn’t feel my heart pounding in my chest, so hard I was sure it was visible beneath my white blouse, each step inciting a panic that quickened through my veins.

  It only amplified when I was led through the double wooden doors.

  Tingles flashed across my skin.

  Evil and vile.

  Oh God.

  I gulped down the bile that threatened to rise in my throat, the fear that threatened to bring me to my knees.

  Run.

  But I’d done it for so long and I was so tired of hiding. So tired of pretending.

  Just like I’d known I would, I’d reached a crossroads.

  Decision made.

  I’d turned in the direction of my past.

  An anxious energy trembled in the room, voices muted and subdued as they awaited my arrival. Paneled wood lined the walls, even darker where it gleamed from the judge’s and jurors’ boxes, the same wood making up the benches where people were squeezed shoulder to shoulder.

  It made everything appear dark.

  Sinister.

  Cold.

  A shiver skidded down my spine, and I forced up my chin, searched for the strength and courage that had set me on this path in the first place.