by Aycart, Elle
She was too close. He lunged for her, but she knew what to do and blocked him. “Con, snap out of it. It’s me, Audrey.”
Her voice didn’t seem to reach him. He wasn’t in their bedroom; he was still in the grip of his nightmare. And he was in fight mode.
He attacked her again and she barely managed to block him, getting hit on the nose in the process. Ouch. Desperate, she looked around. She didn’t want to fight him, but she had to bring him back to reality. As he came at her once more, she grabbed a metal tray from the nightstand and placed it in front of her face. With a loud bang, the punch that had been meant for her ended up bending the tray.
The unexpected sound—or maybe the reflection from the metal—made Con pause. She peered around the tray. He was blinking and glancing around, looking disoriented.
“It’s me, Audrey,” she ventured. “You were having a nightmare.”
She could pinpoint with astonishing accuracy the second he realized what was going on, because his face contorted in pain and his eyes were horrified. “Oh, God.” He jumped out of bed, almost tripping on his own two feet, and backed away from her until he hit the wall, his gaze never leaving her. Then his legs buckled, and he slumped to the floor.
“Con, it’s all good,” she reassured him, getting off the bed.
“You’re bleeding,” he said, still breathing hard.
She realized something warm was running over her lip. Blood. “Don’t worry. It’s a nosebleed. It’s nothing. I was too clumsy and got hit while blocking you.” She tilted her head back and reached for the box of tissues on the nightstand. Then she plugged her nose. “See? It’s all good.”
He didn’t seem reassured in the least. “Stay away!” he yelled as she took a step toward him. “Don’t come any closer.”
He looked so freaked out, she stopped. She was less than six feet from him. “Don’t worry, love. I’m okay. See?” She opened her arms and turned around. “Not a scratch. I’m perfectly fine. We’re cool.”
“No, we fucking aren’t.” He spat the words out, running his hand through his hair. “You’re dripping blood all over. I could have—”
“You did nothing,” she interrupted, taking another step forward and going down on the floor. Then she noticed the spattering of blood on her shirt. Okay, the visual was frightening—but it was from her nose. People got nosebleeds all the time. “You barely touched me. You’re not sporting a black eye because I felt sorry for you. Otherwise you’d have an incredible shiner. You trained me well, Master Yoda.”
Her attempt at breaking the tension with humor didn’t work. He cursed. “Why didn’t you run? Are you fucking crazy?”
“Because we need to get past this, Con. You have to realize you aren’t a danger to the people around you. You don’t have to be afraid. We can handle this. I can handle you.”
He cursed again, this time louder. “What if you had been asleep, helpless?” he demanded.
She shrugged. “Maybe it would have been a better option. I think you would have snapped out of it right away. I didn’t mean to, but I might have made things worse. I was almost looming over you when you woke up. You saw my face right after opening your eyes. Of course you freaked out.”
“Maybes aren’t good enough!” he roared, his eyes shiny as if he was about to cry.
“It doesn’t matter, because you didn’t hurt me.”
“This time,” he muttered.
“I’m perfectly capable of keeping you in line.”
She tried to come closer, but he stopped her. “Don’t. Stay the fuck away from me from now on. That’s going to be best for everyone.”
Before she could argue, he charged to his feet and stormed out.
By the time she managed to stand up and run after him, he was gone. Shit. It had been a mistake to stay in the room. She’d wanted him to be able to sleep with her without worrying, but damn if it hadn’t backfired big time.
* * *
Con sat in the back yard, cracked the bottle of whiskey open, and took a whiff. He hated the stuff, hated how it burned on the way down, but he needed to space out, so he took a sip and, grimacing, swallowed. He wondered how much he had to down before his body would be numb enough not to notice the burn, and his mind foggy enough not to remember the last twenty-four hours. Would one bottle be enough?
He poured some of the amber liquid in his glass and began to test that hypothesis.
He wasn’t even one-quarter through when he heard someone clearing her throat behind him. “Connor?”
Greta.
“Please, Grandma. Whatever it is, I really don’t want to hear it.”
“You have a visitor.”
Then it reached him—a sweet vanilla smell. Audrey.
“I don’t—”
“You tell her that yourself,” Greta said tartly and left.
He didn’t dare turn around, but he soon realized he didn’t have to. Audrey came to stand in front of him.
“So here is where you’ve been hiding,” she said. “I didn’t come earlier because I wanted to give you some space and time to calm down. How are you doing? Are you okay now? Ready to come back home with me?”
He snorted. “I almost killed you yesterday, and you’re already back for more? No instinct for self-preservation whatsoever.” He averted his gaze. He was dying to take her in his arms and kiss her, reassure himself she was fine. If he laid eyes on her, he wasn’t going to be able to keep his hands off her.
She sighed loudly. “Jeez, you’re a drama queen. I don’t have a single scratch. Not a fucking one. Yes, my nose was bleeding. Big fucking deal. I’ve gotten much worse bruises while sparring with you at the gym. Are you going to run away from me every time you freak out?”
“Call it by its name, Audrey. I didn’t just freak out. I attacked you.”
What a moron he’d been. Happy about having a baby with the love of his life, playing house with her as if he were a normal person and not a ticking bomb. Man, what the fuck had he been thinking?
“You were having an episode. Con, my love,” she said, squatting in front of him, trying to force him to look her in the eye. “We expected this. You trained me for it, remember? You trained me to kick your ass. We knew there was a big chance you’d lose it at some point. Why are you so shocked now?”
Why? Because he’d attacked the woman he loved and their unborn baby. Because he was a fucking menace. Because he should be put down. That was why.
But he couldn’t tell her that.
“Please talk to me,” she begged. “Come back to the inn. Let’s discuss this in peace.”
Con wanted so badly to go back to her. He stared at her intensely, willing her to tell him what he wanted to hear. “Give me a reason why I should go back.”
“Because it was an accident and it wasn’t your damn fault, for example?”
He cursed viciously. “Stop trying to exonerate me. Of course it was my fucking fault.”
She remained silent for a long while. “Do you want a reason?” Con held his breath until she finally spoke. “Because I love you. And you love me too.”
He did. He loved her so much. But there were other things at stake here. “Is that it? That’s the only reason why I should go back to you?”
“Should there be more?
She wasn’t going to tell him about the baby. She’d had several chances to come clean about the pregnancy and she hadn’t used them.
Then it dawned on him. He’d assumed she wanted the baby, but maybe he’d assumed wrong. Maybe she didn’t want to tell him about it because she didn’t want the baby at all. And no wonder. Who would want a kid with a nutcase like him?
She probably shouldn’t. She and the baby would be better off far away from him, where Connor couldn’t harm either of them. That realization, though, squeezed his chest so hard that, for a moment, he felt like he couldn’t breathe.
“Do I even have to give you a reason?” She stood up and, taking a step back, crossed her arms. Her voice was pissed now. “If y
ou can’t find a reason within yourself, maybe you shouldn’t come back to me.”
“Finally you’re catching on.”
She sighed again. “Okay, maybe you were right and I was too hasty. Maybe I should have left the room when I realized you were having a nightmare, or respected your wishes about sleeping elsewhere.”
He chuckled. “Of course. Why would you keep someone like me around after the sex?”
“Don’t be a dick.”
“But I am a dick,” he said, standing up and looking at her. God, how it fucking hurt. “Too bad the dick that gets you so hot and bothered ain’t nothing more than fucking material. Good enough to fuck, yet not good enough to keep around outside the bedroom.” Deep down, he knew he was being unfair. She wasn’t to blame for him being a fucked-up whack job who couldn’t be trusted around people, but he couldn’t stop himself.
She seemed taken aback. “Who said you’re nothing but fucking material? What the hell are you talking about?”
He didn’t bother answer. “Then again, at least I’m good for something. And you like my special brand of fucking. You like it rough.”
“You’re being an asshole and I’m out of here.”
She walked away. He couldn’t bear to watch, so he lowered his gaze and remained still, until he heard a loud curse and the sound of her steps grew louder instead of dimmer. He looked up in time to see her charging at him. She got in his face and pushed him with both hands on his chest. “Coward!”
He was caught off-guard and had to take a step back not to lose his balance. Before he could say anything, she went on tiptoe and yelled in his face. “Drop the bullshit and be honest with me! You’re pushing me away to protect yourself, not me.”
His chuckle dripped with acid. “I don’t think you should be talking to me about honesty, little girl.” She was the one keeping the biggest secret. A baby. His baby.
He saw the wince on her face before she could cover it up. He was hurting her. Welcome to the club.
“Yes,” she said, “I’m conning a whole town—but not you. I’m not lying to you.”
Yeah, he guessed that in her dictionary, omitting information didn’t amount to lying. “Whatever you need to float your boat.”
If she didn’t trust him enough to tell him she was pregnant, he wasn’t going to force it out of her. Besides, who could blame her for having reservations? He’d tried to kill her, after all. Not the most confidence-inspiring move from your man, the father of your offspring. No wonder she hadn’t wanted to come clean with him—which killed him, because he did love her. And the baby.
He knew he wasn’t the most appropriate or suitable candidate for a lifelong companion, not by a long shot, but realizing he was only good as fucking material hurt.
“Are you dumping me over this moronity? Are you that childish?”
“It’s not a moronity.”
“I can’t believe this,” Audrey said. “Did I mean anything to you?”
Her eyes were shiny and her voice was breaking. He closed his eyes. “What do you want me to say?”
“What the hell was I to you, just a lay?” she yelled.
He wanted to ask her the same, but he didn’t. Enough with the self-pity. Time to face facts. Time to drive her away. He wasn’t strong enough to keep rejecting her over and over. He needed for her to walk away. Definitely. For both their sakes.
“No, baby girl. You weren’t just a lay; you were a phenomenal lay. But as explosive as the sex was, and as hard as you got my dick, it wasn’t good enough to risk ending up in prison for killing you one night. Sorry. And you were right—professing undying love while your dick’s engaged is… a dick move. Right up my alley.”
She stilled, her expression filled with hurt and anger. “Fuck you. You don’t need to come back. I don’t want you to.”
Audrey turned around and left, and this time, she didn’t come back, not even to yell at him some more. He sat there as what he was: a worthless piece of shit trying to pass as a sorry excuse for a man. Shattered and empty.
He noticed his jaw was trembling and his shirt was getting wet. Wow, he could cry. What a surprise. He wiped the tears away, downed the whiskey in his glass, and poured himself some more. Back to his endeavor. He had still over three-quarters of the bottle to get through.
Greta must have seen Audrey storming out of there, but she was keeping away. Thank God for small favors. His nosy neighbor, though, wasn’t. Mike was crossing the lawn into Con’s back yard.
He sat by Con’s side. “I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, man, but you were kinda loud.”
“No shit.” He filled his glass and offered the bottle to Mike, who refused.
“Too early for me. And for you.”
Con ignored him and downed the whiskey. It didn’t burn that much anymore. Pity it was doing squat to numb his brain. He was going to need another bottle to erase the image of Audrey’s hurt face.
“You had an episode and went wacko on her?”
Con nodded, keeping quiet. An episode. Audrey had used that word too. Such a nice way of putting it.
“For what it’s worth,” Mike continued, “I’m with her on this one. She can defend herself. You taught her well.”
“It’s one thing to train your woman to kick your ass. It’s another to see her with blood running down her face, fending you off with a metal tray. A metal tray you bent with your fist while aiming at her face.”
Mike cursed under his breath. “Fuck, man. I underst—”
“She’s pregnant, Mike,” he interrupted. “I’m too dangerous for her in her state. I attacked my woman and my unborn baby. What a prize of a man, huh?”
Mike turned to him. “And your solution is to dump the mother of your baby? I get it. Realizing you tried to hit her must have felt like shit, and you’re going to have to grovel for months to make that up to her, but you can’t dump her. There’s got to be another solution.”
“I found out about the baby by accident. I’m not even supposed to know. She hasn’t told me. She might not want it. And who could blame her after what I did? Certainly not me.”
“Ask her.”
“Ask her what? Why is she hiding the pregnancy from me? She would have told me if it were good news. I gave her plenty of chances to come clean. I don’t want to put her in a situation where she’s forced to admit out loud that she doesn’t want a kid with me.” He’d rather live without hearing those words himself. It would kill him. He knew he was undeserving; he didn’t need to hear it. “I don’t have any right to ask her to have my kid.” He was too dangerous. Too broken. She deserved better. The baby deserved better.
“You need to talk to her,” Mike insisted.
Con snorted and filled his glass again. “Didn’t you hear her last words before she left? Because the ‘fuck you, I don’t want you back’ was pretty loud.”
“You weren’t particularly kind yourself. ‘Phenomenal lay’? What the fuck were you trying to achieve with that?”
Con sighed. “She doesn’t seem to realize how dangerous being around me is. I needed her to see what a piece of shit I am so that she could walk out on me with her conscience clean.” The last thing he needed was for her to stay with him out of pity, on top of everything else. He knew his words had hurt her, and he’d hated it. He’d wanted to stop, but he hadn’t been able to. Self-hatred, hurt, and anger had been warring inside him. The anger had overpowered everything else.
“Well done then. You nailed it,” Mike said. “I’m not one for giving advice. You of all people know how much I screwed up with Kyra before I got my shit together, but I don’t think driving Audrey away and drinking your ass off is the solution.”
“I don’t see any other.” He couldn’t stay around as her fuck boy. He loved her too much for that, and it would kill him to know she didn’t want his baby. And yet he was too unstable and fucked up in the head to have any right to try convincing her he could be a decent father and husband. When it came to Audrey, he had nothing left. Nowhere to stand
that was solid ground.
“I hope you know what you’re doing.” Mike took a deep breath and, shaking his head, stood up. “May God or the devil help you. You’re going to need it if you want the strength to keep away from her.” Then he grabbed the bottle of whiskey and left.
Con sagged on the chair and closed his eyes. Then he covered them with his forearms, trying to stop the tears from coming out. Right. Fat chance.
Chapter Fourteen
“What’s wrong?” Red asked, sitting by her side on the pool terrace, motioning at the pitcher filled with tomato juice.
Audrey lifted her full glass. “I’m trying to convince myself this is a Bloody Mary so that I can drink myself under the table. Placebo effect, it’s called.”
Forget morning sickness, stretch marks, and swollen feet. The worst thing about being pregnant had to be the fact that one couldn’t booze. She’d give anything to be able to get drunk.
“Does this have something to do with a certain fight that took place at Greta’s several days ago?”
Audrey looked at her chef, stunned. “You know about that?”
“Small town,” Red said with a shrug. “What happened?”
Audrey choked out a snort. “Strictly speaking, nothing happened. Something ‘almost’ happened.”
Red frowned, obviously not following her. “Didn’t he… like the news you had for him?”
Another half-laugh, half-snort burbled up. “I didn’t get that far. He dumped me before I got to tell him.” She took another sip from her Bloody Mary placebo.
She was pregnant, in love, and alone for the foreseeable future. Con had been painfully clear about where they stood. They were through.
She’d gone to Greta’s to coax him back to her. She would have loved to tell him about the baby, but if he’d been totally freaked about the attack, she didn’t want to think about what his reaction would have been to the news about the pregnancy. That would have sent him over the edge. Then he’d told her she was just a lay and not worth risking prison for, so no fucking way was she telling him shit now.