by Serena Grey
I nod.
“About this morning...”
There’s something about the sound of his voice. The tenderness is pulling at my heart, and suddenly I can’t bear it anymore.
“Don’t tell me.” I say, stopping him, “Please David. This morning I...” I swallow as my voice catches in my throat. “Nothing has changed David. I’m always going to be the girl who loves you even though she shouldn’t, and you’re always going to be that man to whom love means nothing.”
“Sophie…”
“No wait.” I continue. “I spoke to your mother this morning.”
His body stiffens and a shuttered expression comes over his face. “What?”
“I bumped into her when I was leaving this morning,” I tell him, “and she asked me to join her for breakfast so we could talk.”
“And what did she have to say?” He asks coolly, his tone betraying that whatever his mother has to say means little to him.
“She explained that she may have hurt you by putting your stepfather’s needs ahead of yours.” I say. “I think she was trying to say that she hurt you then, and that you’re still hurting because of that.”
He snorts bitterly. “Is that what she said?” He laughs harshly. “Well beneath those pretty words Sophie, the truth is this. I never got along with my stepfather. He hated me from the first, and I grew to hate him too. He mocked me, belittled me, and verbally abused me any chance he got. But my mother never saw that, all she wanted was to be his wife, to travel the world with him and attend parties, play the socialite.
David pauses and takes a deep breath. “He used to hit her.” He says with a deep frown. “She’d have a bruise and tell everyone that she fell or something, I didn’t even know until I saw him hit her when I was fourteen.”
I close my eyes, feeling his pain. “What did you do?” I ask gently.
“I didn’t know what to do.” He says, looking into my face, his eyes searching mine, as if looking for some confirmation that there was nothing he could have done. “When I begged her to leave Henry, she laughed and said I was imagining things because I hated him so much.” He laughs mirthlessly. “It went on like that till I was about seventeen, then one day he lost his temper and hit her, right in front of me. He kept hitting her, and when I tried to pull him off, he started to hit me too. Well I fought back, and I beat him up really badly. I didn’t know what my mother would think. But I didn’t expect her to stand beside Henry when he had me arrested, and say nothing in my defense.”
“She didn’t explain why you hit him?”
David shakes his head. “Henry told the police that I was prone to violent fits, and she agreed with him, she agreed with everything he said. I spent a week in a facility for troubled teens, and he hired a psychiatrist who agreed with what they said. I was going to be transferred to a home because he had everybody convinced that I was crazy.
“I’m so sorry David.”
He turns away, pacing away from my desk before coming right back, a frown marring his brow. “Do you know why my mother agreed with him, Sophie?” he asks, “because she signed a pre-nup before they got married. In the event of a divorce, she’d have gotten nothing. That’s why she threw me over for him again and again, because losing the money and status meant more than her son’s life.”
I sigh, “She said she was in love with him, that she just wanted to make him happy.”
“I’m sure she did.” David scoffs, “She’s very good at telling herself what she wants to believe.”
“What happened after?” I ask, “How did you get out?”
“I don’t know.” He shrugs. “One day, I was released, all the charges were dropped, and my record wiped clean. Steve picked me up and took me to the house. When we got there both Henry and my mother had gone on another one of their trips. I left, and never went back, and I never heard from my mother until after Henry died.”
I shake my head. “I didn’t know.” I say, my heart breaking for him.
“Well, you couldn’t have.” He frowns. “The next time she tries to make you feel some sympathy for her and tells you that she ‘hurt’ me when I was a child, at least you’ll know what she did.”
I nod. At least now I know why he never lets anyone in, why he couldn’t let me in. He’s been hurt by someone he loved, at the time when it could make the most impression, and now he’ll never expose himself to that kind of pain again.
I’ll never hurt him, but what does it matter? He doesn’t trust anyone enough to let them in, not even me.
“David,” I get up and go around my desk to where he’s standing. “I’d like to show you something.”
He looks wary. “What is it?”
“You’ll have to come with me.” I tell him with a gentle smile. He waits while I interrupt the tournament going on in the back office to tell Jan and Larry that I have to step out for a while. They wave me off, more concerned about finishing their game than about me.
“About this morning…” David starts again, his voice strangely hesitant. I look at his face, confused by the uncertain expression I find there. What is he going to say?
“Wait.” I tell him, leading him outside. “You can tell me later.”
Surprisingly, he obeys, and follows me down the street to the museum, as he holds one of the swing doors open for me to step inside, there’s a quizzical look on his face, but he doesn’t ask any questions.
Trey smiles and waves at me, but when he sees David, he doesn’t come over to talk.
I lead David to the painting, faltering as we approach it. I’ve been so certain about it for so long, but now I wonder if maybe I’m wrong. What if David doesn’t believe me? What if he can’t see what I see when I look at it.
It’s hanging in its usual place, everything about it the same as when I first saw it.
David stares at the painting for a while, and then reads the name at the bottom. “Jonathan Cutler,” he says at last. “I’ve never heard of him.” He looks at me, his eyes searching. “Does it mean something to you?”
“Yes.” I sigh, “When I first started working at the store I used to come here just to look at this.” I pause. “It just drew me, somehow.”
David nods, his eyes encouraging me to continue.
“Then I learned that the painter was a professor at one of the local colleges, and that he had an affair with one of his students. When his wife found out, she drove her car over a bridge with him in it.”
David gives the painting another searching look. “And this was the student?”
I nod. “He loved her.” I say. “That’s what I see when I look at this painting. That even though it was wrong, and even tough ultimately, it destroyed all their lives, he loved her.”
“All their lives?” he frowns at me, I can almost see his mind working, “She... The student…You don’t think...?”
I nod silently, answering his question. He remembers, I think in wonder, he remembers our first real conversation when I told him about my mother. It seems like ages ago, but he didn’t forget, surely that means something.
“Are you sure?” He looks from me to the painting and back again.
“Yes,” I smile sadly. “She was pregnant, and he was dead. That’s why she left school, came home, and had me.”
“And then she died.” He looks sad. “I’m sorry Sophie.”
“It doesn’t matter now.” I say. I look up into his face, searching his eyes, “David, I know that love can be destructive. I know it can hurt, and God knows I’ve been a victim, I grew up a victim of what love can cause when it’s wrong, but I’m not ready to never be in love again, to never be loved again. Because without love, life doesn’t mean as much as it should.” I pause. “You think that because you’ve been hurt by someone you loved, you shouldn’t love anyone ever again.”
“Sophie,” David interrupts, “You’re wrong, if you think I can’t…won’t love you because of my childhood, because of my mother and stepfather,” he breathes, “Well you’re wrong.”
My breath hitches in my throat. Then why is it? I wonder, am I just unworthy then, unlovable in some way that I don’t know. Am I good only for sex?
“You’re wrong, Sophie,” he continues emphatically, his eyes intense, “Because I love you.”
I feel my breath leave my chest.
His eyes are searching mine, and when he speaks, there’s a desperate edge to his voice. “I think may have loved you from the first time I saw you.”
There is a lump in my throat. This is not the same as his outburst in Bellevue, only a few days ago. He is in control of himself, and he’s telling me that he loves me.
“I love you, Sophie.” He says again.
I close my eyes as his words wash over me, wanting so much to believe him. “Do you mean that?” I ask, “Or are you only saying it because you think it’s what I want to hear?”
“No, I mean every word.” He frowns, shaking his head. “I’ve spent my life avoiding close relationships. I think Steve may have been the closest person to me, before you. But everything I thought I was changed when I met you.” He moves forward and takes my hands in his, “That day you left, I would have lain at your feet and begged you to stay, even then I knew I didn’t want to … I knew I couldn’t live without you.” He sighs, his eyes imploring me to believe him. “But I was afraid, jealous, confused…” he shakes his head. “It’s been hell since you left Sophie. Nothing is the same.”
I want to cry. “But this morning…”
“About that…” he turns to look at the painting, and when he looks back at me he has a strange smile on his face. “This morning I went to get you something.”
I search his face. “What?”
I watch, stupefied, as he gets down on one knee. “I love you, Sophie Bennett – Preston,” He says, producing a ring from his pocket, “and if you give me another chance, I promise to do it right this time, to spend the rest of my life proving just how much I love you.”
I want to scream, to let out the incredible rush of joy in my heart. I can’t breathe. I’m crying, and I’m just so happy.
“Oh, David!” I say, wrapping my arms around him as tears start to fall down my face. “I love you so much.”
He gets up, lifting me with him. “So you’ll come home?” he asks, his face relaxing into a relieved smile.
I laugh happily and proceed to cover his face with kisses. “Nothing can keep me away.”
Epilogue
I’M SCARED.
There’s a storm, and it sounds really bad. I pull my blankie closer and try not to hear the scary noise outside. Mommy says it’s just the wind whistling, but I know it’s ghosts screaming, bad ghosts who haven’t gone to heaven like my Dad.
I miss my Dad.
I want to cry, but I try my best not to, Henry, my new step-father, says only weak little boys cry. The night I woke up and ran around the big house looking for my Dad, he called me a sissy.
And mommy didn’t say anything.
It’s so dark in my room. I miss my old room in our old house, where me and mommy and my dad lived together. Henry’s house is big and scary, even during the day. I hate it here, but mommy says I shouldn’t say that.
Suddenly the room is very bright, and then it goes dark again. I cover my ears because I know there’ll be thunder soon. My dad said that was only because light travels faster than sound even though they both happen at the same time. That doesn’t stop it from being scary.
I don’t hear anything, so I remove my hands from my ears. Then the thunder comes, and it’s so scary because it’s loud and I can hear it inside my head. I close my eyes, and the noise doesn’t stop. The room is shaking like an earthquake.
I scream and run outside, down the long dark hallway to the big room where mommy and Henry sleep together now. I open the door and run inside.
Mommy is alone on the bed, so I climb up on her side.
“Mommy?”
“Sweetheart.” Her voice is sleepy. It sounds like back in our real house, when I used to climb into the bed with her and my dad. She doesn’t call me sweetheart anymore now, not when Henry is around.
“I’m scared.”
She sits up and hugs me. “It’s just a storm baby, an itty bitty storm.”
I hug her back tightly. “I want it to stop.”
“It will, soon.”
I don’t feel so scared anymore. I close my eyes and imagine that we’re back at home, and my Dad is still alive. She’ll sing something funny, and I’ll laugh with my dad and then fall asleep on their bed.
“Sing something Mommy.”
She looks towards the bathroom, and then she closes her eyes. She almost starts to sing, but then the door to the bathroom opens, and Henry comes into the room wearing a robe.
He stops when he sees me. Immediately I start to feel scared again.
“What’s he doing here?” He asks my mom.
“There’s a storm. Henry.”
He doesn’t say anything, but he’s looking at my mom and he looks a little mad. She sighs and gets up from the bed. “Come on David.” She says, walking ahead of me, out of the room.
I follow her, turning to look at Henry before I leave the room. Another flash of lightning comes from the window behind him, and it makes him look scary, like a monster. I scream and run out of the door, bumping into my mommy’s legs.
She doesn’t look at me until we reach my room. She puts me back to bed, her face looking sad. She didn’t used to look sad when my dad was alive.
“Don’t go back mommy.” I tell her.
“Go to sleep.’ She whispers.
There’s another flash of lightning and before long the thunder comes again.
“Don’t go mummy.” I beg.
“David.” She sighs and gets up. “It’s only a storm.”
But it’s scary. I want to cry, even though I’m trying my best not to. “Don’t go.” I say, but she continues to walk towards the door.
“Don’t leave me.”
“David.”
“Don’t leave me.”
Arms tighten around me, my nose fills with the sweet scent that’s all her. I pull her closer, filling my senses with her.
“I won’t leave you.”
I sigh, relief flooding me even in my sleep. Opening my eyes, I see Sophie looking at me, her beautiful green eyes right in front of my face.
“I love you.” I tell her, and I mean every word. My heart is full to the point of bursting from having her so close to me. “I love you.”
She giggles. “We love you too.” She says softly.
My hand drifts down to the smooth roundness of her stomach, where our child is growing. It’s the most wondrous thing I’ve ever felt. “I love you.” I say again. No matter how many times I say it, it wouldn’t be enough. I have to tell her as often as possible, and not just with words, because she is my life, the end of my nightmares. My love.
Forever.
The End
About the Author
Serena Grey discovered her first love when she was a child, and that love, reading, has been her constant companion since then.
She still loves to read, but now she also writes, because the stories in her head won’t leave her in peace otherwise. Even though she loves all kinds of fiction, she has a soft spot for love and romance, and that flush of pleasure that can only be found at the end of a beautiful love story.
When she’s not reading and writing, she enjoys cocktails, coffee, the Vampire Diaries, Smash, and constantly drools over Gabriel Macht as Harvey Spector in Suits.
From the Author
Thank you all so much for sticking with me to the end of this series. Even though I’m soooo happy to have completed my first series. I feel a little sad, knowing that my time with David and Sophie is over. Hopefully, I’ll be able to create new characters before too long, that will also capture your hearts and keep you entertained.
If you enjoyed this book, please consider leaving a review. I would love to know what you think.
If you would like to receive an email alert whenever I have a new release, then subscribe at www.serenagrey.com/alerts.
Thank you for reading Surrender.
Love,
Serena Grey
