“What’s that?” I asked, even though I was scared to hear his answer.
“She scours the news sites, reading about every assault, every attack.”
He stopped and stared me dead in the eye. He looked like he wanted to kill me.
“That woman spends her days looking for your death notice.”
My death notice...
I flinched. I’d fucked her up big time.
“Please just let me see her. I can fix this.”
“I’m not sure you can.” He looked down at his feet and kicked at something with the toe of his boot. “I want to believe you can... but I don’t know. I’ve known her a long time, and I’ve never, ever seen her like this.”
“Please,” I begged him. “Just let me through that door.”
He was torn. They never expected me to come back – I could see that now. It pained me to realize that all this time, while I’d been working to better myself, so I could be worthy of her, she thought I was never coming back.
He stepped aside, and I released a heavy breath.
I closed my eyes momentarily. “Thank you,” I breathed as I stepped around him.
His hand landed heavily on my shoulder. “I’m sure you’ve already had this from Lawson...” He glanced at my puffy eye. “Maybe El too... but if you fuck this up, it’ll kill her.”
I nodded in acknowledgement.
“And then...” His grip tightened. “Whoever gets there first, will kill you too.”
I’d been within an inch of my life before, but I’d never felt a threat like this.
I swallowed. “Thank you.” I held my hand out to him.
He frowned. “I threaten to kill you, and you thank me?”
“I can see how much you care about her, so thank you for keeping her alive.”
He nodded once and shook my hand – hard.
I reached for the door handle and turning it, pushed the door open. I looked back over my shoulder.
“I was always coming back for her, you know? I expected it to be a conversation from a jail cell... but I just needed to make an honest man of myself first.”
He shook his head at me. “I’m not the one you need to convince.”
“Sometimes two people need to fall apart to realize how much they need to fall back together.”
- Colleen Hoover
49. Quinn
He’s here. He came back.
Ellerslie was right. I didn’t know what it meant, or what he would say... but he was here.
He’s here.
For the first time, in a long time, I felt hopeful.
***
I wanted to hide from him so he couldn’t see me. But I couldn’t, he’d done this to me and he needed to see the damage.
I knew Logan would let him inside. He knew how I felt about Harrison, and even though he’d deserted and damaged me, he knew that I needed to see him. He wouldn’t send him away.
My breath caught in my throat the moment he entered my line of sight. I very nearly whimpered.
He was slimmer too – not in the way that I was, but in an ‘I run everyday now’ type of way. His waist was slightly narrower than I remembered, and his muscles looked leaner.
He lifted his head and his step faltered when he saw me. His eyes swept over my body and I resisted the urge to wrap my arms around myself.
“Jesus,” he hissed quietly.
I looked down and pulled at the hem of my now-baggy tank top. I didn’t want to look at him – it made me feel like I was going to cry.
He approached me slowly, like somebody would a wild cat, cautiously, like it might bolt at any second.
“Quinn?” He whispered it like a question, as though he wasn’t sure it was really me. It was lucky he hadn’t come over two weeks ago; thanks to Logan and El force feeding me, this was at least an improvement on that.
I nodded, one short jerky bob of my head. The first tear falling from my face.
“Oh, Quinn.” His voice was distraught, broken. The sight of me was causing him physical pain.
He reached an arm out towards me, silently asking if he could touch me.
He stepped forward and I fell into his arms. I clutched at his shirt, my tears instantly soaking the front.
I didn’t care in this moment that he’d destroyed my heart, that I’d barely eaten in months... he was here, alive and well. I’d been convinced that the next time I’d see him; it’d be in a body bag. I knew that I shouldn’t find so much comfort in the man that had caused me so much pain, but I couldn’t stop the feeling of safety and contentment that washed over me the minute I was in his arms.
“Skippy. God, I’m so sorry.”
He grabbed me under my knees and scooped me up into his arms. He walked me over to the couch; and sat with me in his lap, cradled against his body, my face buried into the side of his neck.
He stroked my hair and rocked me back and forth, like a child.
“I’m sorry. I’m so, so, sorry,” he murmured over and over again.
I was exhausted. Seeing him, feeling his body, being in his arms had taken everything out of me.
My eyes closed, and I drifted to sleep.
***
I was dreaming. It was the best dream I’d had in months. Instead of Harrison being chased down a dark alleyway and stabbed to death or beaten, he was here, holding me, placing soft, wet kisses to my hair, my forehead, my nose.
I sighed and smiled.
This is a really good dream.
“Come back to me, baby,” he murmured.
I smiled again at the familiar sound of his voice. I inhaled deeply and breathed in his scent.
The smell slapped me back into the present with a flying backhand.
He’s here.
My eyes snapped open.
I’m in his arms.
“Harrison?” I asked cautiously. My voice was croaky and hoarse from crying and sleeping.
“Oh, thank god.” He breathed a sigh of relief. “You’ve been out for three hours. I was worried.”
Three hours?
“Can you put me down?” I asked him quietly.
He lifted me effortlessly, using only his arms, and set me down next to him on the couch.
I took a minute, not looking at him, to get my bearings. I was disorientated and shaky. I knew I needed food, but I wasn’t hungry enough to stomach it.
When I finally looked over at him, he was rising to his feet.
“Wh... where are you going?” I stuttered.
“I can’t look at you like this, Quinn,” he answered as he stood and walked out of the room.
My head hung forward and if I hadn’t already cried myself dry, I had no doubt the tears would have begun falling again.
He’s gone again.
I internally lectured myself for letting him hold me like that. It was only going to hurt me so much more now that he was gone again.
“Quinn?”
His voice startled me.
“Eat this. Please,” he begged, holding out a plate with a sandwich and a large glass of milk.
He didn’t leave...
I don’t know what it was, but I suddenly felt hungry enough that I wanted to eat it, and confident that I wouldn’t throw it straight back up.
I nodded and took the plate and glass from him.
He snagged a blanket from the back of the couch and draped it around my shoulders while I pulled small pieces of the bread apart and popped them in my mouth.
He watched me like a hawk, his head moving between the plate and my mouth as I fed myself the food.
“I’m so fucking sorry, Quinn.” He ran his hand through his hair. “I should have come sooner.”
You should have never let me leave.
“Actually, I should have never let you leave.”
I gasped.
Did I say that out loud?
“Can I talk? I’ll just talk, and you can listen?”
I nodded and sipped on the milk.
He shook his head. “Jesus
. They warned me you weren’t okay, Quinn. But I never expected to find you like this. I’m so sorry.”
They?
I felt my cheeks heat and I dropped my eyes from him.
I knew I looked terrible, my bones were sticking out everywhere and I’d lost nearly all my muscle tone. My face was gaunt, and my hair hung dull and lifeless. I was literally fading away before my own eyes.
“When you left that day, Quinn, I thought I was doing the right thing. I was a liar, a criminal and a bastard. I wasn’t good enough for you and I knew you deserved better. I convinced myself that letting you leave was the best thing for you, but I know now that it was bullshit.”
My eyes flickered back up to his.
“I can see now that I wasn’t doing it for you. I was doing it for me. I was wrong back then... I’m what’s best for you Quinn... me. But I wasn’t good enough for you then, so instead of acknowledging it, putting in the work and changing who I was, I took the easy option and let you leave.”
He was right. He was all I’d wanted these past few months.
“I spent one whole month thinking that you were better off without me. I knew you were strong and I imagined you moving on, meeting someone else and being happy with someone who deserved you.”
I shook my head quickly. “I was worse, Harrison. So much worse off without you.” I stared at the food on my plate so that I wouldn’t have to look at him.
“I see that now... Jesus, I see it as plain as day. I underestimated your feelings for me, Quinn. But I was right about one thing, I didn’t deserve you, not the way I was.”
He reached for my hand. “So, I decided to change.”
My eyes found his face again. “You did?”
“I didn’t get there on my own though. Colt came to see me.”
Colt?
He nodded. “He bowled right up to me, shoved me against a wall and asked me what the fuck I was thinking.”
I gasped. “He knows what you’ve done?”
“No.” He shook his head quickly. “He just knew that you were hurting. He told me he’d seen you and it was like the life had been sucked out of you.”
“Dramatic,” I mumbled.
He ignored my comment.
“He basically told me that if I put him through all of that bullshit, just to let the woman I loved walk away from me when I’d fucked it up, then he’d never speak to me again.”
I never thought I’d see the day that Colt was the driving force for his brother coming back to me.
“I can’t believe he did that,” I thought aloud.
“I couldn’t either. When he calmed down, he told me that he didn’t know what had happened, but he knew it would be my fault. And that if I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you, I needed to remove the problems from my life and be what you deserved.”
His eyes shone with pride as he talked about his brother. I was impressed too. It sounded like Colt had done some growing up of his own.
Maybe Harrison has too.
“I stopped, Quinn.”
My heart raced.
Is he saying what I think he’s saying?
“I don’t hunt them anymore.”
I pointed at his swollen eye. “Since when? Last night?”
He pressed his fingers to his eye and smiled. “Your sister has one hell of a right hook.”
El?
“Oh. My. God.” A laugh escaped my lips and it made me gasp. It felt foreign to me after all this time.
What the hell has happened to me?
“I warned Lawson against laying a finger on you,” I informed him.
“So I heard,” he replied dryly. “Next time could you extend the warning to Ellerslie?”
He had the beginnings of a cheeky grin on his lips, and just like that we were back to bantering back and forth.
“Next time? You planning on needing another punch in the face sometime soon?”
His expression morphed into a guilty grimace. “Never again, Quinn... never,” he promised.
“Sometimes the two people who are truly best for each other will have to face greater obstacles in order to be with each other.”
- Author unknown
50. Harrison
It was going to take time – so much time for her to get better. If this was going to work, I was going to have to earn my place in her life again. I’d been handed it freely the first time, but now, after this, I was going to work harder than I ever had to deserve her. I had to rebuild trust and make her my top priority.
I broke her.
This amazing, strong, woman was a complete mess because of me.
“Will you ever be able to forgive me, Quinn?” I asked her quietly.
I wasn’t one hundred percent sure she was even awake. She was so exhausted; she’d been drifting in and out of sleep.
“I do forgive you; I know your intentions were good,” she murmured.
“Not that... for breaking you,” I clarified. “Do you think you’ll ever forgive me for that?”
She was quiet for so long I thought she must have drifted off again.
“I don’t know,” she finally whispered. “You lied to me, and you left me.”
I tried to swallow the lump in my throat.
“Can I tell you something?” I asked.
She snuggled into me again. “You can tell me anything... everything. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.”
My chest constricted with guilt and I vowed right then and there that I’d never lie to her again.
“You remember that officer that came to my house? Anthony Rodgers?”
She nodded against my chest.
“I went to him and confessed. Everything.”
She tilted her head back to look at me. “Harrison...” Her voice broke. “He’ll lock you up.” A tear slipped from her eye. “You can’t... we have to get you out of here.” Her face was a mask of pure horror as she struggled to get out of my arms.
“Shhh.” I pulled her back in. “I’m fine. I’m not going to jail,” I reassured her.
“But... but... you...” she stammered, more tears falling.
“Shhh, Skippy.” I ran my hand up and down her back. “I’m fine. He already knew everything. He was even there the night I got really hurt. He and his partner saved my life. It’s a long story...”
Her eyes bulged.
“I’ll tell you everything,” I promised. “But the most important part is that I came clean, I told him everything because I don’t want to be that man anymore. I wanted to be better. For you... and for me.”
“How, Harrison?” she asked. “How can he just let you walk free?”
“I made a deal.”
“What kind of deal?” Her lip quivered.
“They want Max Barceló. They still have eyes on him... and they want me to go in there, with a wire, and get him to confess to his master plan.”
She gasped.
“I need to do this. I was just a pawn to him, Quinn.” I shook my head in disbelief. “He executed it all perfectly. Anthony promised me he’d keep me safe, the deal is, I get what they need to take him down... and I walk free.”
“When?”
“Tomorrow,” I replied quietly. “I don’t know if it’ll work, but I’m gonna give it my best shot. My future... hopefully our future, is riding on this, Quinn, I won’t stuff it up.”
The two words she replied filled me with hope.
“Our future,” she confirmed in a whisper so low I nearly missed it.
God, I hope she means that.
“I’ve never been very good at leaving things behind. I tried, but I have always left fragments of myself there too, like seeds awaiting their chance to grow.”
- Joanne Harris
51. Quinn
“Can I have some time to think?” I asked him.
He frowned at me and opened his mouth to argue.
“Just a couple of nights,” I promised him before he could reply. “I just need to try and get some strength back... some sleep.” I
shook my head. “I just need to get my thoughts together... please.”
I tugged on the front of his shirt and he moved closer. “And you’ve got to keep focused on what you need to do. I don’t want you distracted... I need you to come back in one piece this time.”
“Of course.” He ran a nervous hand through his messy hair that I’d missed so damn much.
I leaned my body against his and breathed in his familiar scent.
“I love you, Quinn, please don’t give up on me yet,” he begged.
I love you too.
He kissed my head, pulled away slowly and headed in the direction of the front door.
I lifted my head. “Harrison?” I called weakly after him.
He stopped in his tracks and turned back to face me.
“Yeah, babe?” he asked curiously.
I asked him the question that had been driving me crazy for a long time.
“What was it you couldn’t give up? Those people you were protecting? Or do you just like to throw your fists?”
He thought about it for a moment.
“I’m not going to lie to you... hitting those bastards did feel good. But I know it’s not right.” He looked at his feet with embarrassment. “It’s the victims I feel for.”
Me too.
“Quinn?” he called quietly across the entrance.
I brought my eyes up to meet his.
“I never got to tell you.” He rubbed his hands together nervously. “I had a client a few years back. Her name was Sam.”
I nodded for him to continue.
“I couldn’t get the man harassing her behind bars... he killed her, Quinn. I couldn’t help her.”
I gasped.
“I know it’s no excuse.” He shrugged helplessly. “Maybe I can think of another way to help them.”
“Harrison,” I breathed.
It all makes sense...
“I’ll talk to you soon,” he promised as he stepped out the door.
I nodded at him, my newly invigorated mind already thinking through the possibilities.
***
Ellerslie came over as soon as Harrison left.
“Are you going to take him back?” she asked as she mixed the sauce for the macaroni cheese she was making me.
Love like Yours Series Box Set: Books 1 - 4 Page 65