by Leddy Harper
Naked.
Sprawled out beneath me.
“W–what are you doing here?” Her breathy words pulled my attention from her hips to her face. The same face I’d sketched thousands of times since I left her all those years ago. Except, none of my depictions of her matched the beauty that stood before me now.
Time had been good to her, and I questioned myself as to why I’d refrained from looking for her. She’d put on at least fifteen pounds. I’d always thought she was perfect, gorgeous. Flawless. But seeing her now, it’d take nothing short of a riptide to keep me away from her.
I stepped over the threshold and grabbed the sides of her face, pressing my body flush with hers. I had so much to say, so much to tell her, but it was too early for that. I had nothing prepared other than what I knew I’d say when I eventually showed my face again. However, I couldn’t repeat any of it. I hadn’t anticipated how much it would stun me—silence me—to see her again.
“Is it really you?” Her words were filled with tears, the same ones streaking her face.
I leaned down and blew her name across her lips. “Rylee…”
It must’ve been just enough for her to reclaim her senses. She shoved at my chest, adding space between our bodies, and then twisted her head out from my hold. I matched her step for step—she took one back and I moved forward.
“No!” Her voice deepened, stern and unrelenting. “You can’t just waltz back in after five years. You can’t just show up at my house and expect me to fall into your arms like you never left. Not now. Not after all you’ve put me through.”
She skirted around me, held the door open, and pointed outside in a silent command to leave. Little did she know, that wouldn’t happen. I wasn’t about to walk away. I couldn’t over an hour ago when I saw her in the gym. I couldn’t fifteen minutes ago while I sat outside in my car. And I couldn’t now that I’d touched her, smelled her, heard her.
I grabbed her upper arm with one hand, pulled her away, and slammed the door closed. As soon as the latch clicked in place, I moved into her space until her back was against the door and my chest was flush with hers. I twisted a lock of her hair around my finger before setting my attention on the flaring golden flecks in her eyes.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
Her whole body shook against mine, and it forced me to back away an inch or two, just enough to assess her. I had no idea why she reacted this way to me. Like I’d scared her. She’d never done it before. The only times I’d ever seen her tremble were after I’d gotten her off. Never out of fear. But by the look in her eyes, I could tell this was different.
“I can’t do this with you,” she whispered.
My heart cracked open, releasing the emotions I’d locked away for so long. “Why not?”
“I already told you. Too much time has passed, too much has happened between us. You hurt me too much. There’s no going back.” Her face scrunched with a silent sob and her head hung forward slightly. “Maybe had you come back a year ago…two, three years ago. But you didn’t. It’s too late now.”
I lifted her chin and wiped away a tear with my thumb.
Her body stiffened. “You always said you wanted to steal the moon from the sky to freeze time so it was just me and you. You said you never wanted the next day to come. Well…congratulations, Killian. You stole the moon. You took it with you and left me with nothing but endless days without you. Time stood still, just like you wanted. Except instead of trapping us together, you left me alone.”
“I wanted to come back for you.”
“Then why didn’t you?” Desperation scratched her words.
“I couldn’t…”
She slapped my chest. Once, twice. Three times. “That’s not good enough!”
“That’s all I can give you right now.”
“Then leave! And don’t come back!”
I grabbed her wrists to keep her from hitting me again, and then forced her against the door once more. “That’s not going to happen, and you know it. I barely survived when I left you. I can’t do it again.”
Her gaze fell to my chest and she sneered. “Barely survived? You look like you haven’t suffered for a second. Is this what you did with your time away?” She twisted her arms out of my hold and waved her hands over my chest. “What’d you do? Spend every day working out? Bulking up? Fighting?”
Her words slapped my face, bringing me back to the present. “Why were you at the gym tonight? Why were you with him?”
She blinked rapidly at me while forcing air in and out of her lungs at a hurried pace.
“Why?” My plea sounded as if it were wrapped in air.
Instead of answering me, she shook her head and tried to look away. Her avoidance birthed my frustration until unrestrained heat licked up my skin, my face flaming with the temper I’d released from its cage five years ago.
“Why, Rylee? Tell me!” My patience had started to run out. I didn’t want to yell at her, scare her even more than I already had. But I needed the answers. I needed to hear her tell me. Because I couldn’t believe it without her confirmation.
Refused to believe it.
“That’s none of your business, Killian. You left me…in case you’ve forgotten.”
“I told you I was leaving. I asked you to come with me. Begged you. It was your decision to stay. Don’t act like I just disappeared without telling you anything.”
She scoffed and rolled her eyes, the fear in her seeming to dissipate some. “You’re such a jackass,” she whispered, almost to herself. Before I had the chance to ask her to repeat it, she shoved me again. “You left me standing in my back yard, all alone, with your come dripping down my leg. You left me there to deal with the fallout all on my own.” Her voice raised with each word she gritted out.
“You told me to go!” I slammed my hands against the door on either side of her head, leaning into her space. “You pushed me away and told me to go!”
“I was protecting you!” A rush of tears cascaded down her face and flooded me with unbearable pain. Regret. Her anger was nothing but a front for her grief. “Who was there to protect me, Killian? Huh? No one. I had to deal with it all by myself. My dad found me outside at eleven o’clock at night, my underwear on the ground, half naked. Where were you when they questioned me? When they looked at me with enough disappointment and disgust to suffocate me? Where were you the next day when my mom took me to take the morning-after pill because you came inside me? Or every day that followed when my heart broke more and more? Where were you?” She punctuated her last question with her fist against my chest.
“I’m sorry—”
“Don’t.” Rylee pointed a manicured finger in my face. “Don’t you dare apologize to me like one word could possibly make up for the years I had to face without you. I finally got to a point where I wasn’t dying, where I no longer felt like I was drowning in the pain of your absence. And here you are, bringing everything back. Bringing all the hurt to my front door. Well, no more, Killian. I won’t let you destroy me again.”
I wanted to tell her everything, just get it all out so she would know why I was gone. Why I couldn’t come back. Why I had to leave then instead of waiting a year. But nothing came out. Everything that came to mind would be excuses, things she’d never understand. Reasons she wouldn’t accept. So rather than waste my breath, I stepped back.
I gave her about ten feet of space.
But until she answered my question, that was all I’d give her.
“Why were you there tonight?” I gritted out through clenched teeth.
“I don’t know, Killian…why were you there?”
“Just answer my fucking question.” I’d spent five years without her softness. Five years without her ability to calm my soul, soothe my pain, deplete my anger. A lot of rage can be built up in that amount of time, and it all seemed to be pouring out of me right now.
“I’m not answering anything.” She pulled the door open again and stood to the side. “You ne
ed to leave. My neighbors will be in the hallway soon, and something tells me you wouldn’t appreciate the cops showing up.”
Her calm demeanor set me on edge. I took one step toward her but stopped. “Just answer me, please. And then I’ll leave you alone.”
Her gaze fell away for a second before finding mine again. Something flashed in her golden orbs, but it was so fast, so brief, I almost missed it. I couldn’t discern what it was. Whatever emotion I saw knotted my stomach and nearly knocked the wind out of me.
She cleared her throat and straightened her posture. “I was there for Josh.”
I took one more step. My foot was heavy, as heavy as my head and heart, but I pressed forward until I closed in more of the space between us. “Why?”
“He needed me after his fight.” She glanced at my hands, probably noticing the small cuts and traces of dried blood on my knuckles. “I guess it’s safe to assume you’re Happy?”
“Am I happy? No. Not at all, Rylee. In fact, I’m furious.”
“No. I mean the fighter. Happy.”
Another step and we were now less than a foot apart. I lowered my voice, fully aware the front door still stood wide open, and at any point, someone could’ve walked down the hall. Someone could’ve heard me. “Why were you there for him? Why did he need you?”
“Maybe because you beat the shit out of him.”
I closed my eyes and shook my head. She knew the meaning of my question, and the more I had to ask it, the angrier I got. “Stop playing games. Stop talking in circles and answer my fucking question. Why. Did. He. Need. You?”
The musical ring from a cell phone sounded from across the room, pulling her attention toward it. I grabbed her by the chin and forced her to look at me instead of the offending noise. Again, she didn’t speak. When the song ended, I expected her to give me an answer. Instead, the music started again, barely taking a break before the end and the beginning. She glanced to the side and then back at me. “That’s him. If I don’t answer, he’ll come over. I don’t think you want that to happen.”
“Then answer me.”
“You want to hear me say it? Fine. Because we’re together. He’s my boyfriend. We’re dating. Me and Josh.” Each sentence, each clarification, felt like another punch to my chest with a steel fist.
“You can’t be with him, Rylee.”
“Why not?”
I clenched my teeth with enough force it caused my jaw to ache. The answer sat on the tip of my tongue, but I had to swallow it back down. Instead, I chose a response she’d understand better. “Because you’re mine.”
Sixteen
Rylee
Mine. That’s all I heard. It replayed in my mind over and over again. He’d bared his teeth and gritted it out in such a deep, raspy voice it sounded like he gargled with shards of broken glass. His eyes had trapped mine.
And then he left.
Left me standing there in the open, empty doorway. A cold chill wrapped around me, but I didn’t know where it had come from—other than his absence. My phone continued to ring, and it finally broke the spell I’d been under ever since Killian proclaimed his possession over me and stormed out.
I slammed the door, crossed the room, and snatched up my phone, already knowing the caller. “Hello?” I tried to remove the emotion from my voice, though it still came out shaky and breathless.
“Where were you? I’ve called like four times.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I was getting changed and washing my face.”
Josh’s sigh drifted through the earpiece, and I wish I could’ve said it calmed me. It didn’t. “I was about to drive over there. I worried something might’ve happened to you. You left in such a hurry…”
He knew why I ran out of the gym so fast.
Thinking of how he’d treated me—with Dalton in the room—made my stomach turn inside out and push bile up my throat. He’d said he needed me, so I was there. I had no idea his way of needing me was forcing my hand into his pants to stroke his limp dick.
“Listen, Lee…I’m really sorry about earlier. I didn’t mean it. I was fucked up six ways to Sunday. I know that’s not an excuse, and I’m not meaning it to be. I just want you to understand that’s not who I am. It’s not what I do. I was just pissed and I lost my mind there for a minute.”
“It’s fine.” That was a lie, because it wasn’t fine. Nothing about it was okay. But ever since Killian showed up at my front door, filled my apartment with his presence, claimed me, and then walked away, I couldn’t give too much thought to what Josh had done back at the gym. “Just don’t do it again. Please. It made me really uncomfortable, especially with Dalton standing right there. I’m not that kinda girl.”
“I know you’re not. That’s why you’re special. And trust me, that won’t happen again. I won’t lose again. Whoever takes that ‘roid motherfucker better be prepared to lose a fighter and a lot of money because next time, I’ll leave him six feet under.”
“Dalton didn’t want him?” I held my breath until he answered, worried what would happen if he and Killian were on the same team. I also worried what would happen if they ended up in the ring together again.
“He’s not supposed to tell me anything, but he did say the price tag was too high for him. No one has ever bid that high on anyone before. Dalton turned the deal down because it was more than he was willing to pay.”
“If he’s a good fighter, why is it too much to pay?”
“It all comes down to how many wins you’ll have to get in order to pay it back. Dalton never bids higher than what he calls a five-win reimbursement. And with the big tournament coming up, he doesn’t want to take the chance on not having enough time to train him properly.”
“Oh. That makes sense.”
He sighed again, followed by a short, restrained growl. “I don’t want to talk about the ring any more tonight. I’ve missed you. I had to go four days without you, and then you come back to me being a fucking dick. Tell me something good. How did your visit with your parents go?”
I shrugged, even though I knew he couldn’t see me. “It was fine. They spent most of the time trying to get me to move back home.”
Laughter filled his voice when he said, “I hope you told them to fuck off.”
“No, Josh. I didn’t tell them that.”
“You’re not moving back are you?” It was a question, but the way he said it sounded more like a threat. Josh wasn’t abusive to me—he’d never hit me. But the way he sounded just now, coupled with his actions in the back room earlier, left me uneasy.
“I don’t know.”
Silence met me, followed by a loud thud on the other end, probably him hitting something. “You don’t know? You’re seriously contemplating leaving me?”
“Josh, can we please not do this now?”
“No. We’re doing this right now. I need to hear it from you.”
“I said I don’t know. Meaning, I don’t know if I’m staying or leaving. Truth be told, you’re the only reason I’m still here, and our relationship is still new. I want to see where things go, see how we work out before I make a decision.”
His labored breathing calmed some, which meant what I said offered him some semblance of peace. “What do I have to do to prove it to you? You’re it for me, Lee. I knew it the moment you crashed into me. The very first time I looked into your eyes, kissed your lips…I knew. So tell me, what do I have to do so you know it’s me?”
“You shouldn’t have to convince me, Josh. That’s not how this works.”
“It’s him, isn’t it? The boy who broke your heart?”
All the air in my apartment vanished and the walls began to close in. The lights dimmed—or maybe that was just my vision darkening. “W–what?”
“The reason you’re scared to move forward with me. It’s him, isn’t it? Listen, babe, I’m not going to run out on you. I’m not going to leave you without an explanation—no, I’m not going to leave you period. When will you trust me about that? What mo
re do I have to do to prove it to you?”
He was right. He’d been good to me, patient and attentive. “You don’t have to do anything, Josh. I just need a little more time before making such a drastic decision.”
“Drastic? You already live here.”
“The plan has always been to get my degree and then go back to Tennessee. So yes, staying here would be a drastic move for me.” I dug my thumb into my temple and closed my eyes. “Can we please not argue about this? I’ve had a long day and my head is starting to hurt.”
“Can I come over?” His tone had dropped a few octaves, sounding deeper than normal. “Or you can come over here. I don’t care. I just want to see you, hold you, touch you, kiss you. I’ve gone four days without you and fucking blew it earlier. I want to make up for that.”
“I’m really tired. Maybe tomorrow night. Honestly, Josh, I just want to climb into bed and go to sleep. I might even do it without the TV on tonight. That should tell you how tired I am,” I said with an airy laugh. He always teased me about falling asleep with the television on.
There was rustling on the other end of the line, taps and moving around like he was doing something on his phone. “Shit,” he hissed. “Cal picked up the fucker.”
“What?”
“Dalton just sent me a text letting me know that Happy motherfucker is on Cal’s team.”
“Okay…” I drew out the word, letting my confusion be known in two, elongated syllables. “I have absolutely no idea what that means. Is it bad? And who’s Cal?”
“Cal is the owner of the ring Dalton used to fight for before he walked away and started his own. There’s bad blood between them. Ever since Dalton left, Cal’s been trying to find anyone who can take down the guys in Dalton’s circle. No one’s been able to take me out, so I bet he’s salivating over this new motherfucker.”
