by E. L. Todd
His eyes softened slightly.
“I promise it won’t happen again. I’ll get help. I’ll see a specialist. I’ll do anything she wants to make this work.”
“There’s nothing I can do, Arsen. She made her choice, and I stand by her decision—completely.”
My heart fell into my stomach. I couldn’t breathe. Everything hurt. I was distraught over losing Silke but losing Ryan…was somehow worse. He was my dad, the only parent I ever really had. He turned his back on me and now I was alone all over again. And the fact I knew I deserved it just made it worse. “Please…” I wasn’t above begging.
His anger diminished for just a moment because he gripped me by both shoulders. “Arsen, listen to me.”
All the fight left my body. I was broken and beyond repair.
“Arsen.” He cupped my neck and forced me to look at him. “You’re still my son and I love you. But you hurt my little girl and I have to be there for her now. I don’t care how much you mean to me. You hurt someone I love and I will come after you. I know you’ve made a lot of mistakes and redeemed yourself for them, but in this case I’ve never been so disappointed. I stuck out my neck for you and told Silke she should give you a chance. Now you’re making me look like a fool.”
“It won’t happen again.”
“It shouldn’t have happened at all.”
“I love her.” I was rambling through my panic. “I made a mistake. Shit, give me a chance. I’m sorry. I promise it won’t happen again. Please help me, Ryan. Please…I’m begging you.”
His eyes moistened but he blinked them away. “I can’t.”
“Ryan.”
“I’m sorry. You need to leave now.”
“Just let me talk to her.”
“No.” He stood his ground and blocked the door.
I tried to move past him anyway.
He grabbed me by the neck and shoved me back. “I said no. Try it again and I’ll give you a black eye.”
I stumbled back and felt the pain from his rejection. “You know I love her. You know I’m a good person. Please stay on my side. Come on, you’re all I’ve got.”
He was conflicted, and the emotions were written all over his face. This wasn’t easy for him and he wished things were different. “I will always be here for you, Arsen. No matter what happens with you and Silke, I’m here. But you hurt her and I’m not going to let that slide. You need to give her space. More importantly, you need space to clear your head.”
“I don’t need to clear my head…I need her.”
“It’s not going to happen, Arsen. Now go.”
“When can I talk to her?”
“Whenever she feels like it—if she ever feels like it.”
This was my worse nightmare.
“Arsen, I wouldn’t waste your time. I know my daughter. She’s never going to change her mind about this.”
No…I couldn’t handle that.
“I’ll return Abby next week. Until then…take some time for yourself.” He slowly shut the door before he locked it.
I continued to stand there, feeling the ground move from under my feet. My whole world had fallen apart. I didn’t know who I was anymore. I didn’t know who I was without Silke. How did I let this happen? How did I fuck this up so badly?
How did I lose her?
Chapter Fourteen
Conrad
My apartment was lonely without Carrie. Now it was just Apollo and I all over again. I missed Carrie’s laugh. I missed her smell on my sheets. I wanted her back but I knew she wouldn’t take me. She said I needed to give Lexie another chance.
But that would never happen.
Even if I wanted to take her back I couldn’t. Too much time had passed. Too much agony was ingrained deep in my bones. I would never trust her again or look at her the same way.
Then why was she all I ever thought about?
Why did I keep replaying our last conversation in my mind? Why did I still inhale her scent anytime I was around her? Why did the sight of her crying make me want to cry?
Man, I was really fucked up.
Lexie ruined me in an irrevocable way, and that terrified me. Because I had a feeling she was the only one who could put me back together. I tried everything else, booze, sex, and expensive shit I didn’t need.
Nothing worked.
When I hit rock bottom I knew there was no way to remove my depression. Now it was a part of me that I had to live with. It was like having a friend I took everywhere.
And I knew I would feel this way forever.
A knock on my door shattered my thoughts of Lexie and my pathetic life. I wondered if it was her but I found that unlikely. After our last conversation I doubted she would make another appearance. There was nothing left to say that hadn’t been said already.
When I looked through the peephole, I saw my dad on the other side. I wasn’t sure what he wanted since there wasn’t a game on tonight. Maybe he wanted to get dinner.
I opened the door. “Hey, Dad. What’s up?”
He stepped inside with his hands in his pockets. “Nothing much. You?”
“I was going to take Apollo on a walk.”
Apollo sat in the middle of the living room, watching my dad with curiosity.
“Sounds like fun,” Dad said. “You’re really taking a liking to this dog.”
“Yeah, he’s pretty cool.” I headed to the fridge. “You want a beer?”
“Sure.” He sat on the couch and kept watching Apollo.
I returned with two beers then sat beside him. “You want to watch soccer? I think that’s the only thing on right now.”
“No, it’s okay.” He held his beer but didn’t take a drink. “I actually wanted to talk.”
That was never a good thing. “Got a topic in mind?”
“I talked to Trinity today…”
That cunt. I couldn’t believe she opened her big mouth and blabbed to Dad. I never snitched on her for anything. She’d get an earful from me next time I saw her. I took a long drink of my beer to cool my jets.
“She told me she saw Lexie outside your apartment the other night.” Dad didn’t ask me a question but it was implied.
“Yeah, she did.”
Dad patiently waited for me to share with him.
“She came to the office before that. Basically, she apologized and said she wants me back.”
Dad didn’t react at all.
“She told me she left me because she was afraid to get married…since her parents got a divorce. A bunch of bullshit.”
Dad took a drink.
“I told her it was never going to happen and she needed to leave me the hell alone.”
“But she came to your apartment after that?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I answered. “She said the same bullshit just with different words.”
“Why did she come back?”
I didn’t see the harm in telling him. “She thinks I still love her.”
“Do you?” he asked quietly.
It was getting harder to lie to myself. I was beginning to realize I would love her for as long as I lived, no matter what she did to me. When I saw her I still thought she was beautiful. I remembered the way our bodies felt tangled together when we made love. I remembered…how beautiful it was. “No.”
“Then why does she think that?”
“I don’t know…she just does.”
“Does Carrie know all of this?”
“Yeah…but she left me.”
Dad finally reacted. “Because of Lexie?”
I never told Dad the truth about my relationship with Carrie. “She and I weren’t in a traditional relationship. She’s a widow and I’m heartbroken. We decided to be together because it was all we could handle. We agreed to get married and have children…with a loveless marriage.”
Dad gave me a sad look.
“Carrie says I should give Lexie another chance…because she knows I still love her. She left me because she doesn’t want to take away the
greatest love affair of my life. She already had hers and now he’s dead. But Lexie is still alive…”
“That was noble of her.”
“Yeah, I guess…but I’m not taking Lexie back.”
Dad usually shared his opinion with me and he even tried to manipulate me into doing what he thought was best. But he didn’t do that this time. Now he just listened without passing judgment. “Are you okay?”
“Not really,” I said honestly. “I wish she would leave me alone.”
“She came to the office today.”
I turned my look on him.
“I asked her to leave. Trinity told me she was bothering you.”
The fact she made another attempt told me she wasn’t going to quit until she got what she wanted. “What do you think I should do?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know, Conrad. It’s entirely up to you.”
I raised an eyebrow. “But you always tell me what to do.”
He shook his head. “I’m a concerned parent and I want to be there for you. But that’s my only role in your life. I won’t pressure you one way or another. Your decisions are entirely your own.”
I smiled. “Wow…someone grew up.”
Dad chuckled. “Took me long enough, huh?”
“You really don’t have an opinion?”
“I do. But I’m not going to share it with you.”
It was ironic. I usually didn’t want to know what his thoughts were, but now that he wouldn’t tell me I actually wanted to know.
“No one understands how you feel better than you,” Dad said. “Only you can make this decision. If you really love her and want to be with her despite what she did, that’s entirely your choice. If she’s made you suffer so much you can never forgive her, that’s your decision as well.”
“I can’t forgive her…”
Dad stared at his beer.
“I just can’t…she put me through so much. She acts like her actions are vindicated just because she was scared. We’re all scared sometimes. That’s no excuse. And it’s been four months. That’s a long time.”
“It is a long time…and you have been through a lot.”
“She can’t just do that and pretend it didn’t happen.”
Dad shook his head.
“But…” The depression hit me hard. “I know I’ll never love anyone the way I loved her. It’s just not possible. She took my heart, Dad. And she’ll always carry it in her pocket.”
Dad made a painful sigh before he placed his arm around my shoulders. “I know, Son.”
“I’ll never forget the first time I fell in love with her. We were dancing in my living room and laughing…and I’ll never forget the way her hair would always clog the sink. When she brushed her teeth she would always get water all over the mirror. And she always used to make me pie when I had a bad day…” My eyes watered and I felt pathetic for feeling that emotion after all this time. I took a deep breath and stilled the tears.
“Let it out, Conrad,” Dad whispered. “It’s okay. It’s me.”
“I remember the first time I introduced her to you guys…and you guys loved her so much. And she loved you.” I felt the tears bubble on the surface of my eyes. “Whenever we would sleep together she would always rub my back until I fell asleep because she knew I was sore. And when I gave her that necklace she never took it off. Her eyes always shined in a special way when she looked at me. I just…I miss everything even after all this time. And I think I’ll always miss everything.” I sniffed then wiped my eyes with the back of my forearm.
“I remember, Conrad. You two really did love each other.”
“And when she left me…I didn’t know what to do. My brain shut off and everything just stopped. I couldn’t handle the pain. It was too much for me to bare. And I just…did whatever I could to protect myself. I slept with anything that moved and pissed off people as much as possible just to forget the real pain in my heart. She drove me mad, Dad. She really broke me.”
He rubbed my back gently and listened to every word I said.
“How can I still feel this way after all this time?” I whispered. “How can my heart still ache every time I look at her? How can I feel pain whenever I see her cry?”
“Because you love her, Conrad. You still love her.”
I closed my eyes and felt even worse than I did before. The fact I still cared about her, still loved her, told me I was doomed for the rest of my life. She would always have me by the throat and there wasn’t a single thing I could do to escape. “Didn’t you and Mom break up for a while?”
“Yeah…but it was nothing like this.”
“Didn’t you want a family but she didn’t?”
“Yeah…but I never proposed. And we were only broken up for a few months. It hurt when she left but she didn’t hurt me the way Lexie hurt you. The situations aren’t comparable.”
“Why did you take her back?”
“I loved her. I still loved her.”
I nodded.
“And she was pregnant with Trinity so I couldn’t turn her away. But honestly, that was just an excuse so I could take her back without feeling guilty about it.”
“And the rest is history?”
“Yeah,” he answered.
That didn’t give me comfort like I hoped it would.
“Conrad?”
“Hmm?”
“If you love her, why don’t you give her another chance?”
“You think I should?” I whispered.
“That’s not what I said,” he said quickly. “I’m just wondering.”
A part of me wanted to, and I hated that part. “I don’t trust her. And I’m too hurt to go back to what we were. It’s just not possible. My heart still beats for her but every time I look at her I want to destroy her. Rage like I can’t describe rises up inside me.”
Dad kept his arm around me. “Then why don’t you try to work things out with Carrie?”
“She won’t take me back.”
“Is that the only reason?”
No, I knew what the real reason was. “Yes.”
***
I walked out of PIXEL with my gym bag over my shoulder. Now that I was officially off the clock I was going to head to the gym and do some weight lifting. I tried to mix up my exercise regiment so I wasn’t doing the same thing every day.
When I stepped out I came face-to-face with the blonde that held my heart. We stared at each other, saying more with just our eyes than our mouths. Her look was apologetic and desperate. And I had no idea what mine was.
“Now you’re just flat-out stalking me?” I asked sarcastically.
“Your dad told me not to come to the office anymore.”
“So standing outside the building like a hobo is a better choice?”
“I’m desperate,” she said quietly. “And I’m not going to pretend that I’m not.”
I kept my hold on my bag while my eyes were glued to hers.
“Can we talk?” she asked. “Get some coffee or something?”
“What’s there to talk about?” I asked. “You’ve had your say. If you’re just going to repeat yourself I have better things to do.” I walked around her and continued on my way.
“Conrad.”
I stopped even though I shouldn’t.
“Please.”
I turned around. “Please what?”
She pressed her lips tightly together.
“Please what?” I repeated. “Take you back? That’s not going to happen.”
“Can we just get dinner together or something?”
Why wouldn’t she give up? “Lexie, why are you bugging the shit out of me? Look, I said no. I’ve moved on. Did you think I was going to mourn you forever?”
“But you haven’t moved on.”
“Uh…Carrie? You remember her, right?” She and I weren’t together but that didn’t matter.
“You look at me the same.”
“Then maybe I hated you then as much as I do now.”
; “No, I can tell how you feel about me. It’s still there. There’s still hope.” She came closer to me, just an inch away. Her blonde hair surrounded her shoulders, and her green eyes looked like gems. I remember the way they used to burn when we made love. It was hard being so close to her without feeling the desperate need at the same time. Then she did something I didn’t expect. She pressed her forehead against my chest and wrapped her arms around my waist. She took a deep breath like she was inhaling my scent. Then she clung to me for dear life.
I let the touch go on even though I shouldn’t. I didn’t reciprocate but I let it linger.
“I’m so sorry….”
My arms wanted to hook around her waist and I wanted to hold her and never let go. I wanted to bring her to my pent house and lock her away so she could never run away from me again. I wanted to spend the night with her, holding her in my arms and keeping her safe. My lips wanted to feel hers, to listen to the musical sighs she made when I made her feel good. Like a natural instinct, I wanted all of that.
But I couldn’t have it.
I stepped away and felt her arms slide past my shirt. “We can never go back to what we were, Lexie. I’m sorry.”
“Maybe we can start over…start something new.”
I shook my head.
“Conrad, you’re the only man I want. I’ve tried moving on but I can’t. And I know I’m the only woman you want.”
I averted my gaze because I knew she would see the truth the second she looked at me.
“Please…let me fix this.”
“There’s nothing you can do. The damage is done.”
“Just…” She started to fidget again. “Baby steps.”
“No.”
“Conrad—”
“My entire family hates you, Lexie. Each and every one of them. They mean the world to me and I can never be with someone who they utterly despise. Even if I wanted to give this another chance, I couldn’t. Lexie, you really fucked up everything when you left. But you’re the one who made that decision. Accept the consequences and move on.”
She took a breath and her eyes watered. “I know I’m in the wrong. I know I really messed this up. I don’t deserve you, not after what I did. I should let you go…”
“Then why don’t you?”