“Who is it?”
“Jonathan Dare.”
My eyes narrowed instantly and my heart kicked.
What the hell is he doing here?
I was put on the defensive just hearing his voice. He was so sure of himself and there was no trace of compassion in this man’s body.
I debated whether or not I wanted to open the door or tell him to go to hell after the way he treated his family and the things he’d said about my mom, but a huge part of me was extremely curious why he was here.
My fingers hesitated over the knob for a brief second before I twisted it and pulled the door open. I instantly wished I’d made him say whatever he was going to say through the door. I felt uneasy and I didn’t like that he had the upper hand because I couldn’t see the smug smile that I was sure was planted on his face.
“Ryland’s not here,” I replied incase that’s why he was there.
“Of course he’s not,” he said so matter of fact, and I gritted my teeth. “But I’m judging by the fact that you were in such a haste to put your clothes back on that you couldn’t button your dress right that he was here.”
He stepped past me into the apartment. I pushed the door and it slammed into place. I didn’t give him the pleasure of touching my buttons to see if he was right.
“Sure, come in.”
He must have been busy inspecting the place because he didn’t answer right away. I could only imagine his disgust.
“No point in pretending to be polite, Araya. You already know that’s not my style.”
“Well, I won’t pretend I’m a very good hostess, then. What are you doing here?”
“You know,” he said, and his voice shifted and I knew he was looking around the room. “I thought I paid my employees well enough that they didn’t have to live in squalor.”
“I hardly doubt you came all the way out here to insult where I live. Let’s not make this longer than it has to be. You want something or you wouldn’t be here, so what is it?”
“It’s no secret that I don’t want you dating my son. Whatever’s going on with the two of you is Ryland’s way of getting back at me, for whatever it is he thinks I need to be punished for. So you two… It ends now.”
“You’re a real piece of work,” I said, feeling a slow dose of rage burn through my system.
“I know you meant that to be an insult, but I take that in high regard, Araya.”
“I’m not surprised.”
“You’re a fast learner, then. That’s good because I thought this was going to be a lot harder.”
“I am a fast learner. I’ve had to be. Let’s hope you’re a fast learner too. Believe it or not, not everything is about you. Ryland isn’t with me to get back at you for being a bad father. He doesn’t need to play games with me like that. I’m not going to cower in the corner because you think you’re big and bad and can come over here throwing out threats. You’re not going to make me feel insecure and try to convince me Ryland is with me for any other reason than because he wants to be. If there isn’t anything else, you can show yourself to the door.”
My heart was racing and my stomach was in knots, but I refused to back down from him. Not after my speech anyway.
“You’ve got balls, Araya. I’ll give you that. You’re not like your aunt. She did cower.”
I wanted to tell him I was like my mom, but I wouldn’t give him the chance to bring her into things again, so I didn’t say anything at all.
He moved around the room, figuring out his next move. He hadn’t expected me to put up a fight, so he needed to pull out his backup plan and a man like him, he had backup plan.
“Let’s say Ryland is with you because he wants to be. Do you honestly believe it’s going to last with you two?”
“I don’t know what’s going to happen, Mr. Dare. I learned a long time ago that nothing lasts forever, and if you’re lucky enough to find something worth risking everything for, you don’t question it.”
“You’re naive, Araya.”
“And you’re a bully,” I countered.
If he was resorting to name-calling, he was running out of bullets.
“Is that what you’re going to let Ryland do? Risk it all for you?”
He caught me off guard as he threw my words back at me. I didn’t respond right away and that gave him the edge he needed to continue.
“Ryland has his entire life ahead of him, and let’s be honest, Araya. You aren’t going anywhere. Not only are you blind, but you’re an uneducated blind girl. You can’t do a lot of things blind people can do these days. You can thank your aunt for that. If I know Ryland, and I do, he’ll want to take care of you. Take you away from this hole you live in and be your Prince Charming. How is he going to take care of you, finish school, and get a job? You’ll let him give up everything because of you. Sometimes the things that don’t last forever are for good reason.”
His words stung and they took away my ‘you don’t scare me’ attitude. There was no chance in hell I was going to agree with him, but there was a tiny piece of me that listened to what he was saying.
“You know I’m right whether you want to admit it or not,” he said, still feeling empowered. “So here’s what I propose, and nobody has to get pregnant.” He laughed.
He thought he was funny. I thought he was slime.
“Whatever gets you out of here faster.” I crossed my arms and waited.
“You leave Ryland… for now,” he added when I rolled my eyes, “and I’ll help you get into Madison Academy for the Blind. It’s the best school for your kind—highly recommended. They’ll help you, teach you not to be so helpless.”
I gritted my teeth. He was baiting me and I would only be giving him the satisfaction if I took it.
“And if I say no?”
“There is no if, Araya. I get what I want no matter what.”
“You can’t force us to do what you want! We’re not your puppets.”
“Of course not,” he said patronizingly.
He wasn’t going to take no for answer. He was used to getting what he wanted and he was prepared to wait me out and wear me down. If I wanted him out of here, I was going to have to tell him what he wanted to hear.
“How long do I have to decide?”
“Twenty-four hours.”
“Fine,” I snapped.
I hated giving him the gratification of thinking he’d won anything.
“You’re doing the right thing, Araya.”
He passed me and walked to the front door and I turned and followed him. The hinges squeaked when he opened it and I grabbed the edge of it.
“I haven’t agreed to anything,” I reminded him, the cocky jackass.
“No, but it’s only a matter of time, Araya. You’re young and foolish and you let love and sentiment control what you do.” He sounded disgusted by that.
“I know you meant that to be an insult, but I take that in high regard.” And before he could respond, I slammed the door in his face.
An hour later, I crawled in bed feeling drained. My afternoon high from Ryland was completely gone and I lay there thinking about everything that had happened today. Nina and Carl were still a no-show, but that was the least of my worries right now.
After J.D. left and I could breathe easily again, I’d moved around the room touching everything that had been in path of my devastation today and it was all put back in its place—what had survived, anyway—and I wondered when he’d done it.
He’d awakened me and I could still feel his lips as they moved over flesh, biting and nipping at my skin, and the memory created a rush of heat down my body.
He kissed me, told me he was sorry and that he didn’t want to, but he had to go pick up Sebastian, who was raising hell and drunk somewhere. He kissed me again and put something in my hand.
“What is it?” I rubbed my thumb over the smooth surface.
“A cell phone.”
I smiled. “You’re giving a blind girl a cell phone?” I teas
ed and he laughed.
“I promise it’s not a douche-bag move this time. If you need me, you press the side here.” He moved my thumb until I felt the raised edge of the button and pressed it. It vibrated in my hand. “Now say ‘call Ryland.’”
“Call Ryland,” I repeated and the animated voiced spoke and then Ryland’s phone began to ring.
“If you need me, call me, okay?”
“Okay.”
“Promise me you won’t go out on your own again.”
“I promise.”
Thinking about the end of our conversation made me think about my conversation with Jonathan Dare, and that was the last thing I wanted to think about. I didn’t have a choice and my mind continued to shoot out bits of our conversation.
I didn’t want to believe what he’d said was true. Ryland wouldn’t be giving up anything for me, we could be together, and Ryland could still have his big and bright future, even if I didn’t have one.
It wasn’t set in stone that I couldn’t have one either. Maybe I couldn’t get into some rich school for the blind, but I could get into another school. I’d gotten into Julliard at the age of fifteen; I could do this. I couldn’t dance at Julliard, but maybe I could dance again. I got into the number-one dance school in America for a reason.
I danced because I was good, not because I could see. I danced not because it was second or third nature to me; I danced because it was first nature.
I could have a big and bright future too, and I could have that with Ryland.
Jonathan was wrong and I wouldn’t be taking his offer—not now, not ever.
Ryland
Thirty-Three
I stood in the middle of my bare room and it somehow felt very different to me. I no longer felt any connection to the belongings in the room or the people left in this house. Except for Annie. She was always the exception.
My room was the size of an average single-floor house and was fully decorated and furnished by the lady of the house herself. This was back when she lived life through a pair of rose-tinted sunglasses and thought she could change the man who’d damaged all our lives.
She’d gone through so much effort to make this room what she thought I wanted. But all of it was what she wanted and deep down it was her manipulative way of trying to get me to want to be in this house.
Maybe if we’d been raised differently it would have been easy to be caught up in the insatiability of it all. Maybe if our parents would have shown affection, even the false kind, the money and material things would have mattered and we would have been more like the kids we grew up with. But it wasn’t different and we grew up despising the very thing that everyone thought made the world go round.
Twenty-one years was jammed into this room and I was leaving with two duffle bags of clothes and a small box of birthday gifts from Annie. That’s what two decades of memories amounted to—a box I could carry under my arm.
Hauling my stuff down a hallway I would never again have to walk through, I stopped before I reached the kitchen where I knew she would be. Saying good-bye to this place was easy. Saying good-bye to Annie, even if it wasn’t forever, was a different story.
I set down my stuff and turned into the doorway, leaning against the frame. She was at the sink, washing the morning dishes. She’d spent most of her life in this kitchen, and it saddened me that she would probably spend the rest of it here too. These people—it was so easy to refer to my parents that way—didn’t deserve her.
I smiled and crept up on her, knowing she would catch me before I got halfway, but it was our thing.
“You’ll never learn, will you, boy?” She spoke softly, and her voice was sad.
She’d already heard.
“What can I say? I’m a lost cause.” I leaned into the counter with my back.
She looked up at me and tears reflected in her brown eyes.
“Never that, Ryland. None of you are. You’re just hurt. You’ll learn to forgive, even if you can’t see it now. You’ll forgive your parents because if you don’t, it’ll eat at your heart and darken your soul. You’ll forgive Careless because despite how angry and betrayed you feel by her right now, she’s your baby sister and you would walk through fire for her.”
I know Annie wanted to believe that with all her heart, but forgiving Careless wasn’t something I could find in me to do right now. I didn’t have the heart to tell Annie she was wrong.
“Careless is a completely different person to me now, Annie.”
“Everyone is allowed to make mistakes, Ryland. Don’t pretend you’re a saint.”
“I may not be perfect, Annie, but what Careless did…”
“You’re allowed to be angry, Ryland. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t hurt by Cara’s actions too. But she’s had it hard.”
“Newsflash, Annie, we’ve all had it hard.” It angered me that Annie was defending Careless. “Including yourself, and we’ve all managed not to screw over the people we love.”
She stared at me a full minute before she finally spoke. “You’re angry, so I’ll move past the way you just talked to me… this time. I’m not defending Cara’s choices. Don’t mistake my love and compassion for her being human as naivety. We’re all going to do things we’re not proud of in our life, and this will always be Cara’s number one. Believe me when I tell you that she is and will be punishing herself far worse than you can. You don’t have to make it harder.”
She loved Careless and I knew she didn’t play favorites between the three of us, but she carried a soft spot for her. Maybe because she was the only girl, maybe because she was the baby, but either way, I knew what Careless did was killing her. She already felt like she’d failed to keep Sebastian from going off the deep end and now she would carry the guilt of Careless’s actions.
“I know you tried really hard to protect Cara from your parents’ poison, honey, but no matter how much love we gave her, nothing can replace the need to have the love of your own mother and father.”
She placed her hand against my cheek. “Move past your anger and you forgive, Ryland. Even if you don’t forgive, don’t be a prisoner to your past. Otherwise, you’re not giving your future a real chance.”
I smiled. “What am I going to do without all your sound wisdom, Annie?”
“Make your own wisdom? I’ve taught you well, hun.”
I hated the sadness consuming everything about her right now.
“This isn’t good-bye forever, you know?”
She smacked my arm. “Of course it isn’t! You three couldn’t be rid of me if you tried!” I laughed and then she gave me knowing eyes. “Besides, you have Araya and she’s the best thing that could have happened to you. That lovely young lady seems like she has some good wisdom too. Let her make an honest man of you, honey.”
I laughed and kissed her cheek. “Don’t get ahead of us, Annie.”
“Pish-posh. I’m not saying to do anything crazy right now. You’re both still young. I’m just saying don’t let this one getaway. Girls like that, well, sadly, they’re few and far between. Know a good thing when you have it, fight like hell to keep it, and love like it’s the only thing you know how to do.”
***
Annie’s advice still buzzed through me as I shoved my bags into the trunk of my car. It wasn’t like what she’d said was a big revelation to me. I knew I loved Araya after the other night, but Annie was right. I wouldn’t let my past or people in it ruin what Araya had changed inside of me.
I slammed the hood of my trunk and my expression immediately turned hard. I hadn’t even heard her come up to the car, but there she was, silently waiting for me.
Her face was paler than usual, but the pink blotches from her crying and the dark smudges under her eyes distracted from that. Her hair was pulled up into a messy nest on top of her head.
She looked different, and not because I saw her different. She was always a full armor of indifference, and it was shocking to see her looking vulnerable. She looked fragile and tin
y in her white tank and cut-off shorts. I recognized those ‘shorts’ and smiled to myself at the memory. Careless was sixteen when she got them, a full-blown pain in the ass.
Coraline had taken a very pissed off Careless, shopping, spending a ridiculous amount of money on someone who hated buying clothes at that age. Coraline had been so excited for Careless to wear the two hundred-dollar designer jeans, but before our mother got the pleasure of seeing Careless in them, she’d made a few… alterations.
Coraline should have known better after the massacre of seven-year-old Careless’s frilly dresses that she tried to force her to wear. She should have never allowed Careless to have scissors again. She learned the hard way when Careless came down for breakfast in a nice new pair of cutoffs.
Our mother had screamed and then cried dramatically, locking herself in her room the rest of the day.
We Dares, we did and said things for their shock value.
Careless was returning my smile, mistaking its meaning, and mine quickly dissolved. I picked up the box at my feet and brushed past her to the driver’s door. Seeing her now made me angry all over again, and I yanked on the door a little too forcefully.
I put the box on the passenger seat and I wanted to get in the car and drive away without giving her what I knew she wanted right now. A chance to explain. If I really wanted to just drive off, I would have already without thinking about it, but I was still standing here.
One hand rested on the lining of the door and my other arm rested on the top of my car, and I sighed, angry with myself because no matter how much I wanted to turn it off, I still cared enough that I couldn’t leave her feeling rejected.
I turned my head to the side, glancing at her from the corner of my eye. She stood with her back to me still, twisting her hands nervously.
Her ability to make me feel sorry for her fueled my anger and I cursed, slamming the car door. She flinched, but didn’t turn around.
“You have a lot of nerve coming out here looking for sympathy, Careless,” I snapped.
“I’m not—”she cried in a way that made me feel like a foot stomp should have followed.
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