Passion Restored

by Carrie Ann Ryan

  This was just a fling.

  It wasn’t more.

  It couldn’t be more.

  He gripped her hips, steadying her when she was fully seated. “You okay, Lizzie?” he rasped.

  She nodded, lying to them both. “I need to move.” That part wasn’t a lie.

  One hand slid up to cup her breast, his fingers playing with her nipple. “Then move, darling. Make yourself come on my cock.”

  She smiled then. “Oh, and what are you going to do, lazy butt?”

  “Well, I would just lay here and think of England, but I have a feeling your breasts are going to be too tantalizing to ignore.”

  She rolled her eyes before rolling her hips. When they both let out a gasp, she knew they were close. She didn’t move off him; instead, she used his body to roll her hips over him, his length still fully inside her.

  Their eyes locked once again, and though she tried to break the connection, she couldn’t. His hands roamed over her, the caresses full of an emotion she couldn’t name. And though she wanted to close her eyes and forget about what was happening, she didn’t.

  And when she came, her inner muscles tightening, he followed, his harsh shouts a balm to her soul even though they shouldn’t be. Nothing was going as it should, damn it, and she was at a loss for what to do.

  She collapsed on top of him, trying to catch her breath, aware if she spoke, she’d do the unmentionable thing and cry. She couldn’t shed a tear, not for him, and surely not for herself.

  Strong arms wrapped around her as Owen kissed the top of her head. “What’s wrong, Lizzie. Talk to me.”

  Liz shook her head, curling more and more into herself even with him fully inside of her. She needed to get out of there, get out of the room, out of his arms, and into her clothes so she could once again find that steely control she’d worn like armor for as many years as she could remember.

  Owen Gallagher was breaking her, and she couldn’t let that happen.

  When he slid his hand up and down her back, soothing her without words, she knew it was too much. She pulled away from him, letting him slide out of her, and she scrambled off the bed. She reached for her jeans, searching in vain for her underwear. They’d stripped each other in a hurry after dinner, and she wasn’t sure she’d be able to find them in this panic of hers.

  “Shit,” Owen growled, reaching for the box of tissues on the nightstand. “Hold on a minute. What happened?” He cleaned himself off, disposing of the condom as he did so, and tried to reach for her.

  She evaded his touch, her body shaking. “I need to go.”

  “It’s your house, babe. Where do you need to go at ten at night?”

  She slid on her jeans sans underwear. “I just need to go. God. Just let me be, Owen. The sex was great. Just get out, okay? I need…I need you to just go.”

  She stood in her darkened bedroom with only a small lamp to illuminate them both, wearing jeans and nothing else, her eyes stinging, and her breath coming in harsh pants. She knew she looked like a woman on the edge, but she didn’t care. She just needed to breathe and not feel. If she felt…well, she knew what happened when she felt.

  Owen had his hands up as if waving off a crazed bull. “Lizzie. Just sit down and tell me what happened. Did I hurt you? Was the anal play too much for you? Just tell me so I can fix it.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “You didn’t hurt me.” Not really. “You can’t fix everything, Owen, even if that’s what you seem to love to do.”

  He leaned back at the venom in her voice but didn’t move away. “I don’t know what I did to deserve that, but, yeah, I like fixing things. It’s what I do.”

  “You can’t fix me.” To her horror, she felt a tear slide down her cheek, and she reached up to rub it away.

  “I didn’t say I wanted to,” Owen said slowly as if talking her down from the ledge. Maybe she was already there and hadn’t realized it. Either way, he needed to go so she could compose herself again. “Let’s get you the rest of your clothes. Okay?”

  “Why? Because you think I need a shield or something?” She did. “Just go. I can’t think with you here, and you just can’t be here right now. It was fun while it lasted, Owen. But I’m done. We both got off, so let’s call this was it is. Over.”

  She knew she was being a bitch, but she couldn’t help the words coming from her mouth. She hated herself more and more with each word she spoke, but she couldn’t stop them once she’d begun. If she hurt him, if she made him leave, then maybe she wouldn’t hurt him worse later. Maybe she wouldn’t lie in pain, a thousand small cuts over her body as she wished for something that would never come.

  Owen slid on his jeans and handed his shirt to her. “I can’t find yours right now.”

  She took it greedily, awash in his scent as she tugged it on. That only made the tears fall faster. “Go.”

  He shook his head, coming closer to her. She had nowhere to back up, not with the bed in the way, so she couldn’t stop him from gently putting his hands on her arms. “Honey. Liz. Talk to me. Why are you so scared? If I didn’t hurt you during sex, then I must have done something for you to push me away like this. Yeah, I know you haven’t wanted to open up with me at all since we started seeing each other, and I get that. We’re still new, but you’ve never outright told me to get out before. What happened, Liz? You can talk to me. I promise. No matter what happens between us in bed or in our relationship, I want us to be friends.”

  She raised her chin. “We don’t have a relationship.”

  The hurt in his eyes cut at her, and she wanted to crawl into a hole and hide. “Talk to me.”

  She huffed out a breath. “Fine. You want to know me? Want to know why I’m all fucked up and can’t do anything right? Fine. Just take a seat and listen to the lonely and sad little life of Liz McKinley.”

  “Liz.”

  “I said sit.” She closed her eyes tightly, willing back the tears. “Please.”

  The creak of the mattress made her open her eyes, and she let out a breath when she saw Owen sitting on the edge, his hand firmly clasped around hers. “Talk to me,” he repeated.

  “I don’t do relationships.”

  “I figured that,” Owen said slowly.

  She shook her head. “I need to just get all of this out at once so don’t interrupt.”

  He raised a brow but didn’t comment again on her rudeness. Hell, she was well and truly a bitch, and he hadn’t run yet. She didn’t deserve him.

  And she wouldn’t have him.

  “I don’t do relationships because they don’t work out. I watched my family fall apart, and it broke me. And when I finally thought I was happy and could have a relationship of my own once, everything got fucked up.”

  She tugged at his hand, and he let her go so she could pace. “My mom was—is—an alcoholic. She was a functional one, though, so no one really caught on that she was plastered most of the day rather than sober. She freaking drove me to school with a flask of vodka tucked in her purse, but no one cared. No one noticed that her smile was always a little too bright at PTA meetings and that she never actually fulfilled her promises about bake sales and crap like that because she was too drunk to do it.”

  She let out a breath, wrapping her arms around herself. Only the scent of Owen’s shirt kept her settled, and that worried her. But soon he’d be gone. Soon, he’d know what kind of person she was, what kind of people she came from, and then she wouldn’t have to worry about the way she wanted to be near him too much. She wouldn’t have to worry that she’d end up turning into the monster her mother was…wouldn’t have to worry she’d turn Owen into the shell her father had been.

  She met Owen’s gaze, but he kept to his word and didn’t say anything. But she saw the fury in his eyes. The anger. Yet she couldn’t see pity. She’d expected pity. She’d have been able to fight back pity. The fury? That she had no idea what to do with.

  “She always yelled at me when we were home. Or when she wasn’t yelling, it was that slurre
d calm voice that told me that bad things were coming. She hit me for the first time when I was six or seven. Slapped me right in the face because I needed a permission slip signed, and she hadn’t been in the mood. She never stopped hitting me until I moved out. Every time I tried to fight back, she made it worse. And no one did a fucking thing.”

  When he finally spoke, it surprised her. “Where was your dad?”

  She snorted; that same pain a hollow ache that never seemed to heal. She was a damn nurse, a healer, and yet she couldn’t heal herself. She didn’t want to. “Dear old Dad was there the whole time. He just didn’t care. He watched her beat the shit out of me after calling me a whore and a lazy piece of crap, and he didn’t do a single thing. He just didn’t care anymore. She’d broken him long before she got to me. And yet he should have cared. He should have done something. But he didn’t. He never fucking did. Then when I was fourteen, he just packed up everything and left. He fucking left me alone with her. Mom changed our names back to her maiden one the next year, but I still haven’t heard from him. He could be dead for all I know, but hell, it’s not like he’d have ever found a way to tell me if he’s alive or not. So, yeah, relationships end up like that, Owen. At least with my blood, they do.”

  “Lizzie, that’s on them. I could kill them for what they did to you, but that’s on them.”

  “But they used to be happy. Then they had me and Mom started drinking. She hated the way she looked after the C-section. Hated the fucking scar and told me that often. Her boobs sagged after breastfeeding me, though she’d only done it a week before saying it hurt too badly. I went straight to formula after that, apparently. She told me she never had any time to do anything because she’d been strapped with a little blonde leech. And then, of course, Dad apparently didn’t want her anymore after the baby, or so she said. So she would scream that she had to find men who actually wanted her since my dad was a useless piece of shit.”

  “Jesus Christ,” Owen growled. “She told you all of that? How old were you?”

  Liz shrugged, picking lint off his shirt. “Seven or so the first time, I think. I don’t really remember since it’s been most of my life. She was an abusive drunk who loved to throw words at Dad and me. Then when words weren’t enough, she’d throw things at Dad since he didn’t fight back. He’d been raised not to hit women, you see. But he never protected me. He just watched as she hit me with the belt, with her hand. I think the only time he stepped in was to tell her not to use the crystal glass she’d been drinking vodka out of on me. But that was probably because I’d end up in the hospital, or hell, because the crystal had been his mother’s and given to them on their wedding day. I don’t know.”

  Owen stood then, coming toward her, and she held out her hands, shaking her head. “Lizzie. None of that is on you. They should have gone to jail long before they ever had the chance to hit you a second time. Your dad too, Liz.”

  She pressed her lips together, her body oddly numb. “That’s not the end of it, though. I can’t be in a relationship, Owen. Things always get fucked up if I try.”

  He took another step forward. She took one back. “But we’re not them. We’re not any of them.”

  “But I’m my mother’s daughter. My father’s daughter. You see? When I was seventeen, I got to go to college since I worked my ass off to graduate early. I was smart, but not smart enough to get out of the city we grew up in. I found a boy who was nineteen, and I thought he liked me. Turned out he just liked my boobs or whatever. I found my mother fucking him in my dorm room two days after I gave the guy my virginity. I told the guy to get out, and my mom patted him on the cheek, telling him he was a good boy who needed to look higher for prime pussy. She was so drunk at that point, I don’t think she could even put together sentences beyond that.”

  “That fucking little prick,” Owen growled. He moved toward her so quickly, she didn’t have a chance to back away. When he cupped her face, she didn’t cry, she was all out of tears it seemed. “Lizzie, that’s on pencil dick. Not you. None of this is your fault.”

  She blinked, unable to really hear him, not when she was in the past with her mother. Alone, so alone. So cold. “She beat the shit out of me that day, too. I don’t even know why.” Her voice sounded hollow to her ears, but maybe that was because she was so far away. “I dropped out of college the next day and moved the meager things I owned to another city and went to school there instead. The school wasn’t as good, but without my mother’s lack of income to get me grants and financial aid, I couldn’t really afford anything better. But I met Tessa, so I guess everything worked out in the end.”

  His thumb traced her cheek. “And you haven’t been with anyone since then?”

  “Not in a relationship. I’ve had sex because that’s all there is for me, Owen. That’s all there can be. My mother used to be a nice, sweet girl before she met my father. My dad had apparently been a gentleman before my mother went off the rails. They broke each other, and I refuse to do that to anyone.” She stepped back. “I refuse to do that to you.”

  He shook his head, his eyes sad—yet they held no pity for her. “Lizzie, that’s not how things work. We aren’t our parents.”

  “Your parents were amazing, though. So you can’t really say anything.”

  “My parents worked themselves to the bone for us and neglected themselves. I don’t want to be my parents.”

  “Don’t compare them,” she said softly. She’d tried to snap at him, but she found herself unable to find the energy. “Just go. Please. I just need you to go.”

  In the distance, she heard the front door open and knew Tessa had come home from work. Liz could talk to Tessa if she needed to, but right then, she just wanted to be alone.

  Owen studied her face before slowly lowering his hands. “I’m going.” Her heart splintered. “But I’m not going for good. I’m not leaving you, Liz. I’m letting you breathe. But I’m coming back, damn it. I’m coming back.” With that, he placed a gentle kiss on her forehead before leaving her in her bedroom and walking out in only his jeans.

  She heard him murmur to Tessa, but Liz couldn’t hear the words. She just slowly slid to her knees, her eyes unseeing, her senses dulled. Dimly, she heard Tessa move into the room, barely felt the other woman’s hands on her shoulders.

  But when her best friend held her close, Liz finally did the one thing she’d promised herself she would never do.

  She wept.

  9

  “Call it. Time of death, five forty-two p.m.”

  Liz stood motionless as Dr. Wilder’s words hit her, the meaning of them crashing into her far harder than they should. She didn’t know this patient, had only been working on the man for seven minutes since she’d been called into the room late as additional support, and yet the words broke her ever so slightly.

  She’d known her job would entail this when she signed up for nursing school. There had been no hiding from the dark parts of the job, even as a student. Yet she’d also known that saving people’s lives would be worth it. It had to. She’d saved countless lives, helped others through the ER when she thought she wouldn’t be able to, and yet today, she hadn’t been enough. The doctors, techs, nurses, and aides hadn’t been enough for this man and the car accident that had been too much for his body.

  This had been the second patient today that had died when she was in the room. Twice, time of death had been called. Twice, they hadn’t been enough. Twice, others had had to come into the room and clean up the mess left behind, the only evidence that someone had once been alive in the room but would now forever be lost to the powers that were far stronger than the strength in the hands of the doctors, nurses, and staff who’d tried to save them. It wasn’t uncommon to lose more than one person in a day, not in a trauma center, but today of all days seemed harder. Did it ever get easier?

  Damn it.

  Damn it all.

  Fuck it all.

  Just fuck everything.

  After almost an hour of crying
the night before, she’d finally fallen asleep in Tessa’s arms, her body drained. Thankfully, she had a swing shift today, so she’d been able to sleep in a bit, her body heavy from sobbing and too many emotions warring within her mind and soul. She hadn’t meant to tell Owen everything or, honestly, anything at all. Pushing him away had been the only way to keep things safe, and yet, in the end, she wasn’t sure how much good it had done. He’d said he would be back, but would he? He now knew the darkest parts of her, the parts she’d wanted to keep hidden but had let bleed out in a rush.

  Damn it. It didn’t matter. She was at work, and she couldn’t think about Owen or anything having to do with him. She needed to clean herself up and try to keep the next patient alive. Because if she lost this one… She held back a shudder. She couldn’t think like that. It wouldn’t do anyone any good.

  “Liz? Can I speak to you for a minute?”

  Liz jolted at Nancy’s question and gave a quick nod. “Sure. Where?”

  “The lounge, please,” she clipped before moving quickly away with Lisa on her tail.

  After letting out a sigh, Liz followed them, the knot in her stomach tightening with each step. Nancy didn’t have the ability to fire her, but she would be the one to let everyone know who would be let go with the upcoming budget cuts. Liz just prayed today wasn’t the day because she really wasn’t sure she’d make it through it.

  Liz got waylaid by two doctors asking questions on her way to the lounge, so she was almost ten minutes late by the time she made it in there. And while she might have been doing her job, from the look on Nancy’s face, being late was a cardinal sin.

  “Sorry I’m late, Dr. Mendez and Dr. Johnson needed a few questions answered.” She went straight to the coffee pot and poured herself some, seeing as Nancy and Lisa had already done the same for themselves.