Redemption

by Rebecca Sharp

  It probably didn’t.

  How the hell could I regret what I did but not where it brought me? The whole idea of it seemed wrong, and yet, it was how I felt.

  “Thank you, Ash,” the leader of our group in Larry’s absence, Dan, said softly.

  There was soft commotion as everyone stood and he closed out the meeting. As I gathered my few things, I was stopped by every single person in attendance to privately thank me for sharing. In all the times I’d shared my story, this had never happened before.

  “I wish Larry had been here to hear that,” Dan said as he walked with me to the door.

  “Well, I’m sure somehow… someway… it will get back to him,” I replied dryly with a crack at a smile as I stepped through the door.

  Glancing at the clock on the way out, I saw we’d finished a little early. Wondering how I was going to explain this to Taylor, I stepped out behind a few others from the group onto the steps of the church and realized there was nothing to figure out.

  She was here.

  My body lit up with tension, first at seeing her, and then noticing the cup in her hand—realizing who was responsible.

  Dammit Larry.

  This wasn’t his goddamn secret to spill.

  My discussion with my sponsor on how to mind his own damn business was going to have to wait though, judging from the look in her eyes.

  “Ash…”

  I growled, “I know I owe you an explanation, but not here.”

  I could say the things I wanted to publicly, but I wanted to tell her privately

  Taking her free hand, I led Tay to where I’d parked my truck half-a-block down the street. She trailed after me, jogging slightly to keep up.

  I yanked the door open. “In.”

  I hadn’t felt this on-edge in a long time. From the second I touched her at the doctor’s office—it wasn’t just the connection I felt to the life growing inside her, the feeling of responsibility for her and for the baby, the feeling that all my fuck-ups had led me to this moment. It was the need I felt for her. It thrummed through my body like electricity with no limiter.

  My phone buzzed on the console about a second after I began to pull away. Without thinking and desperate for a reprieve before the questions—and confessions—began, I answered.

  “Ash, hey,” Danny’s voice echoed on the other end of the line. Taylor’s face flicked toward mine, hearing the other woman on the phone.

  Murphy’s Law… Ashton’s Law… Same difference.

  “Hey, what’s up?”

  “Ash, we need to talk.”

  My fingers tightened on the steering wheel; I’d been around the block enough to know what was coming next. I knew this was coming. I bailed on her so many times because of Taylor, she had every right to break up with me; she deserved better.

  Still, I wasn’t too thrilled about the idea of being dumped with Taylor next seat. Just one more thing for her to add to her already inflated sense of guilt.

  “Can I actually, ahh, call you later?”

  The strained, regret-filled laugh on the other end of the line was my answer.

  “No, Ash, I think it’s better if we just did this now. I want you to know that I admire what you’re doing for your family friend, and I do believe you that there is nothing between you, but regardless of whether we hold the same position in your life or not, there isn’t room for the both of us. At least right now.”

  I bit back a curse. The flowers I sent her would have made a much bigger impact had I not gone and broken four of the five subsequent dates that we’d tried to have since Taylor got here.

  I tried. I swear I fucking tried.

  “Shit. Danny, I’m sorry. Really, I didn’t mean to—”

  “I know,” she cut me off. “I’ll be fine. You’re a good man, Ash Tyler. We were friends when this started, and I hope that’s where we’ll get back to.”

  “I’m sorry.” I let out a long exhale that was filled with more relief than I was ready to admit.

  “Goodbye, Ash.”

  The click of the line was the bullet from a gun. My chest ached as the burning from the wound spread, radiating once more through my body what a disappointment I was—not treating Danny right, letting Taylor down.

  The last time I felt this sense of self-loathing was the day Blake slammed the door in my face, hoping I would be happy with the knowledge that I’d broken her heart and her chance at happiness with my best friend.

  Taylor had to know what that phone call was about, and I almost wished the next question out of her mouth had to do with it. But my Pixie always kept her focus on what was most important.

  “You’re an alcoholic?” she rasped weakly as I turned off Ocean Avenue.

  “Recovering.” My fingers tightened on the steering wheel.

  “For how long?”

  “Larry took me to my first meeting the day after I got here. Been sober five months,” I told her bluntly.

  She stared in shock out the front window. Color was gone from her face, those eyes not seeing the road ahead only the road behind that led me to this point.

  I’d never felt sicker.

  I’d always wanted her, and I’d never felt good enough. Back then, the alcohol made me forget. Now, I had nothing to erase the sight from my eyes. Soon, that disbelief would change into abhorrence for my sins. I knew her family. I knew it would.

  Drunks, liars, and cheats. They were to be scorned, left for only Jack or Jesus to save.

  Taylor

  Ash was an alcoholic. A recovering alcoholic.

  It made no sense and every sense all at the same time.

  It fit easily with all the partying and the drinking, the easy to set-off mood swings, and the inexplicable choices he’d made. It fit with why he’d left Nashville and the band. It fit with why I hadn’t seen him drink anything but water and coffee even after the added stress my unexpected presence put on his life. And it fit in the space where I’d felt him hiding something from me.

  But it didn’t make sense why he’d come here to heal. It didn’t make sense why he’d shut out his family and friends. It didn’t make sense why he just hadn’t said something the first day that I asked him what had changed.

  Here I was, running to him with my life, my fears, my guilt, practically an open book, and he couldn’t even tell me that he struggled, too? Was I not worth it? Was I not worth the truth?

  Anger and hurt mingled in me like a hurricane—wind and rain spiraling and forming something dark and destructive.

  “Does anyone know? Does Blake know? Does Zach?” I asked, my voice elevated to hurricane-level hysteria.

  Silence burned through all the oxygen in the air, leaving me desperate to hear anything—anything that would keep me alive.

  “Why?” I demanded. “Why didn’t you just tell me, Ash? This whole time… why couldn’t you just tell me?”

  No answer as we pulled down the drive and he threw the truck into park, his face harder and sharper than the jagged cliffs that dropped into the ocean.

  How could this happen after this morning? After he swore to be there for me whether I needed him or not—never saying that he was only giving half himself?

  Some people are too stubborn to be proud of the progress they’ve made because it means acknowledging where they came from. The gist of my talk with Larry hit me full-force.

  His door slamming shut brought me back to reality. I hopped out and met Ash around the back of the truck, pointing an accusing finger at his stupidly-sculpted chest.

  “How. Dare. You.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “How could you not tell me? Why would you keep this from—”

  “Why?” he cut me off with a laugh so cold and so hard I swore it could bring snow to the shore. “You want to know why? Why the hell do you think, Taylor?” he demanded as he got in my face, my finger now definitely pushing against his chest. “You think it’s easy to admit I was so fucked up for a really long time? You think it’s easy for me to admit I ha
d no good reason for having a problem, for having an addiction? Good family. Good friends. Good grades. Why was I any different than any other frat football player in college? I wasn’t—and still, I ended up this way.”

  My heart raced as the pain seeped from his words like a sink overflowing.

  “It’s not easy to think about how I didn’t have my shit together. How, at my own choosing, I buried my dreams—shutting them out to help Blake and Zach with their careers because I thought it was the right thing to do? When the truth is it made me resent both myself and them though they had nothing to do with it.”

  His breath was hot with anger on my cheek. It vibrated with the same intensity I’d seen that night, only now, without the shroud of alcohol, its vengeance was trained inward.

  “But you wouldn’t understand that. You always have it all together. You’ve always had a plan from the start. I didn’t. And I don’t need to hear how it’s no wonder I got so fucking lost.”

  My head began to shake because he was wrong. I didn’t have a plan. Not anymore.

  “I’m trying damn hard to fix myself. It’s hard enough to live with the knowledge of what I did. I know I messed up. I repent every goddamn week in that church. I don’t need to be reminded of how much of an asshole and a failure I was… when I live with what I did to Blake.”

  His laugh was like a chisel against my heart, hammering it into little pieces with the self-loathing in his voice. And my heart complied easily, breaking so many times for the man who wouldn’t stop punishing himself.

  “Actually, you want to hear how I don’t even remember? How the last thing I truly remember was seeing the two of them in the car in Denver? How between then and the moment she confronted me I drank so much I can’t recall anything clearly?” Revulsion coated every word like the smoothest wax.

  No, I didn’t want to hear. My hand went to my bump. I already knew.

  “These are my demons. My mistakes. You don’t need to be tainted with them,” he rasped so hoarsely I thought he might lose his voice. “Haven’t even been able to get through step—the part where I make amends to those I’ve hurt. How could I tell you, Taylor, when you’ve always been the one person who is too fucking good? Without even trying, it’s just who you are… always too fucking good. You’ve literally lived the law when all I ever did was fall short. The last thing I needed was for you to look at me with alcoholic added to my already extensive list of sins…”

  “How dare you,” I charged as tears leaked down my cheeks. I hated how my lip quivered with sadness even as I spoke with anger.

  “What?” He gasped.

  “You still think I have it all together? Me? Do I need to remind you of this?” I motioned toward my stomach. “Do I need to remind you how I showed up on your doorstep and basically overthrew your life because I was scared? Because I was the one who needed to get away from the disapproval of my family? Because I’d been raised to be ashamed of the position I’m in?”

  I was yelling and crying, and I no longer cared. Everything hurt because of him and even though I knew he was hurting, knowing he’d kept this from me because he thought I would judge him… it was too much.

  It hurt too much.

  And my heart felt like it was going to explode.

  “You told me all that stuff about how things were different here, how you were there to lean on if I needed it, but I’m not good enough to return the favor? You think I’m here to judge you? After everything?”

  Calloused hands cupped my cheeks to calm me, but I pushed them away.

  “I’m not here to judge you,” I forged on, desperate to make this one point clear as my breath choked and tripped trying to get into my lungs. “I’m not here to judge you, Ash,” I wept. “I’m not my parents.”

  “Jesus, Taylor…” This time, when his hands framed my face and began to fend off my tears, I welcomed their warmth. “You’re too good.” His lips pressed to my forehead first. “You’ve always been too good for me.” Then they drifted lower and began to kiss up my tears as he murmured against my cheek, his mouth so close to mine. “And I think you’re here as my cosmic punishment… to see how long I can survive around something I can never have.”

  Now, it was my turn to laugh bitterly. Never have.

  “You don’t want me,” I murmured regretfully as my eyes locked on his deep blue ones, his mouth poised just in front of mine. “How could you want—”

  His lips on mine silenced me.

  Warm, firm, and everything I wanted. Everything I needed.

  This had only happened one time—but that one time emblazoned every detail into my brain like a secret code only his lips could unlock.

  So, when his tongue pressed against the seam of my lips, they parted and let him inside.

  Silken and strong, he savored every inch of my mouth like it was the most exceptional meal he’d ever tasted. My hands wound up fisted in his shirt and then slid up around his neck when he lifted me, setting my butt on the back bumper of the truck, his hips wedging between my thighs.

  He kissed me like he was starving, eating at my mouth and tongue in ways that need and pregnancy hormones made my body drip with desire.

  I arched up against him, the back latch of the truck digging into my back as I craved more. More friction. More fire. More Ash.

  From firm and demanding—punishing me for ever thinking he didn’t want me, to deep and heavy, his tongue stroking along mine, every pass leaving a trail of burning hot embers down the length of my body right to my core, to soft and sweet, nipping and tugging on my lips, he kissed me, claimed me, in every way.

  And I wanted more.

  So much more.

  Rolling my hips, I felt him long and hard between my thighs and I moaned against his mouth. My body needed this almost as much as my heart did. Instantly, I was reminded it wasn’t wrong to want this—to want him.

  I never should have been ashamed of this. I never should’ve been ashamed to show feeling in ways where words fell short.

  We were both broken, and when we kissed, those jagged pieces fit together and became whole.

  Lean on me.

  Seconds later, big fat raindrops began to fall in a slow-clap around us. It wouldn’t be long before the thunderstorm’s full applause came pouring down.

  With a strangled groan, he tore his mouth from mine and stepped back.

  “I’m sorry,” he rasped.

  Our heavy breaths appeared like flickering fog in the space between us. The rain feeling as though it sizzled right off me for how hot my body was.

  The line had been crossed.

  The one between redemption and resolve.

  The one separating him and me.

  “Let’s go inside before it opens up,” he said with a low voice. “I’m thinking I should get busy making you some real food for dinner. I’m sure you only ate sweets at Roasters.”

  He might not have been wrong.

  I wanted to tell him that food was the last thing on my mind, but I didn’t have the courage; I was too overwhelmed by so many emotions to act on that one.

  Taking the hand he offered, I tried not to be too obvious in the way that my thighs rubbed together, feeling the way my damp panties slid around between them as we jogged inside.

  Ash

  I shouldn’t have kissed her.

  She was pregnant and emotional and just because she kissed me back didn’t mean she really wanted me.

  And she definitely didn’t want to be fucked in the bed of my pick-up. In the rain.

  But fuck, I wished she did…

  She tasted new and familiar at the same time; it made no sense. It was like I could remember her taste but not tasting her. It was the most fucked-up kind of déjà-vu I’d ever had. Maybe because I’d thought about—dreamt about—kissing her so many times, it was as though I already had.

  But I hadn’t.

  I sucked in a breath as pain seared through my head, feeling the soft touch of her lips against mine… but the recollection wasn’t
from tonight. A hesitant kiss. Pleading words. Frantic touches.

  I looked over at Tay and shook my head.

  I was delusional. I’d wanted her for so long that one kiss and I was going crazy.

  We’d come inside, both of us needing to collect ourselves—and our thoughts—from where they’d burst through every boundary outside. The kiss… was something to talk about, but there was a bigger conversation to be had first, and an unspoken agreement passed between us that the conversation shouldn’t happen without some food first.

  So, I cooked while Tay pretended to read though I knew her mile-a-minute brain was trying to process it all.

  “I’m sorry about Danny… if I ruined the start of something,” she said softly from where she sat on the couch with her legs crossed and the book she’d been pretending to read open between them.

  Shit. I’d completely forgotten about that.

  I felt her eyes on me as I stood at the stove, the sizzle of my lemon-rosemary marinated chicken fell into beat with the rain splattering on the shack, its scent infused the heavy air.

  “Not your fault,” I insisted.

  Her head dropped like a silent gong of guilt told me she disagreed.

  “It wasn’t serious, Tay,” I admitted, flipping the chicken thighs one more time and sending another burst of rosemary into the air. “With her job and the restaurant… it just wasn’t the right time or place. She was nice, but she wasn’t—” I broke off with a start.

  “What?”

  Shit.

  “She wasn’t the right one.” I cleared my throat. Dammit, Larry.

  “I see,” came her soft reply, and I pretended I didn’t hear the faintest hint of hope threaded through her voice.

  There was another prolonged silence as I finished up the chicken and vegetables, but I knew what was coming.

  “How, Ash…” she started quietly.

  The rain landed in hail-like splatters on the windows. This was the first time I was having the conversation about my addiction with someone outside of my AA group. It wasn’t lost on me that the heavens opened up at the same time I did.