by Stella Noir
“Suit yourself. So, it sounds like your interested? I’d really appreciate it, man.”
“Just keep your pants on. I’ll let you know, and if it’s yes I’ll be over in about an hour.”
“Sounds good! Later.”
I hung up the phone and looked over at Avery. I knew I didn’t want to bring any of that part of my past back into this house … our house … but I couldn’t deny that I was interested to see how it would feel to be around that sort of thing after all these months. But there was no way I could even consider doing anything without talking to Avery. She was everything to me now and there was absolutely nothing in the world that was worth throwing what I had with her away.
“What’s the matter? Is everything ok?”
“Yeah, Landon wants me to come over for a little while tonight.”
“It sounded like he wanted you to help him with something? What’s going on?”
“Well, he found someone in his tunnel and he … well he …”
“You don’t have to say it, I know,” she said as she looked down at the pillow. “Do you want to?”
“He said he just wants me there for moral support. Apparently he hasn’t done anything in a while and he feels like he just wants me there. And yeah, I do. I really want to be there for him. He’s done so much for me and been there for me throughout most of my life.” Ok, that wasn’t the entire truth, but I couldn’t bring myself to tell her that I was actually intrigued by watching the whole thing. I was going to have to work on that, but I felt like I was being pretty damned honest.
“Does that make me a horrible person?”
“Well, I can’t answer that for you, Colin. You’re the only one that knows the answer to that question.”
“Yeah, I guess that’s probably true. But what I really want to know is … will you still be here when I get back … if I go over there tonight?”
Avery snuggled up next to me under the covers and wrapped her hand around my waist.
“Of course I’ll be here. I’m not the police and I’m not your mother. I’m not here to tell you what to do or judge you or make you do what I think is right. I want you to do what you believe is right, not because you think it’s what I want, or because you think you’ll lose me if you do something I wouldn’t approve of. Because if that were the case we’d just wind up resenting each other.”
“Yeah, I guess I’m just trying to take the easy way out,” I said as I smiled faintly at her. It really did seem like it would be so much easier if she would just tell me what to do so I didn’t have to make the decision for myself, but I knew that wasn’t fair to her at all.
“Look, I trust you, Colin. I trust that you will tell me what’s going on. So, if you want to go and see what it’s like over at Landen’s house tonight, go ahead. It may help you figure some stuff out.
You told me once that talking to me about your past was one of the hardest things you had ever done, and that you thought that sort of thing seemed easy for me. Well, it’s not. I’m not saying that what we’ve been through and what we are working toward is too hard or anything, but there are no easy or right answers for either of us.
We both just have to go little by little and day by day and figure out what feels best. And I think the closer you get to forgiving yourself the clearer your choices will probably become.”
“I don’t know about that,” I said as I looked at her, but I knew she was right. I still didn’t understand how I was supposed to forgive myself though, especially since I was still working on forgiving my father. I wrapped my arms around her and just felt her warm breath on my neck. I couldn’t understand how it was that someone so much smaller than me, someone who felt so helpless and delicate in my arms, could make me feel so safe, but I knew between the two of us she was by far the stronger one.
“I don’t want to ever do anything that would make you want to leave me, Avery. If you don’t want me to go I won’t go. I would die if I ever did anything again that hurt you, you know that, don’t you?”
“I know. I won’t leave, Colin,” she said as she looked up at me, her eyes glistening with tears and the most beautifully sad look I’d ever seen. “I understand that you have to do this. I really do.”
I grabbed her head with both hands and moved my lips across her face and onto hers and as I did I felt the world stop around us and I wished that we could stay like this forever, wrapped in each others arms and floating in nothingness, but a nothingness where I let myself feel everything. Everything that we were together, everything that I wanted to be, everything that she meant to me, and everything that she was letting me be even though it’s not what she wanted at all.
One of the things I was starting to realize, one of the things that Avery had taught me, was that it was possible to love someone without loving every single thing about them. Even when some of those things seemed unforgivable.
The End
Also by Stella Noir
The Devil’s Dream
Caught: A Hitman Romance
Her Godfather
Crux: A Dark Romantic Suspense
Bone: A Dark Billionaire Romance
Silent Daughter: Taken
The Dark Doctor
Stella Noir’s Amazon Page
Also by JB Duvane
Bad Patient: A Bad Boy Romance
The Dark Doctor
Colin: A Serial Killer Romance
JB Duvane’s Amazon Page
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