by Chloe Walsh
"Tell him he's better off without me."
"Teagan," I called out, rushing out the front door. "Come on. Don’t run again!"
I watched in dismay as she climbed into her uncle's Mercedes. The lights of the car came on, the engine roared to life, and then they were gone.
"Damn Max Jones," I muttered under my breath. How the hell was I going to explain this to Noah when he got back – if he got back?
Noah had said calling the cops was my choice. Like hell it was. I couldn’t rat out my own uncle and my… Lucky. And now he and Lucky could be in a prison cell right now and the cops out looking for me, the accessor to their crimes.
Oh shit…
Stomping back into the house, I slammed the front door behind me and ran up the staircase with every intention of hiding under my duvet.
But then I thought better of it.
I was all alone in this big old house – a house I didn’t have the best track record of staying safe in. Hello, kidnapped baby anyone?
Yeah, screw this…
I was hauling ass back to Thirteenth Street. Whether he was still mad at me or not, I knew my dad would keep me safe.
Grabbing my car keys off my nightstand and my purse off the back of the door, I rushed back down the stairs and straight back out the front door.
****
My heartbeat had returned to a somewhat normal pace by the time I reached my parent's house. I wasn’t a nervous person by nature, but all this mob business had put me on edge.
Hopping out of my truck, I raced up the driveway and up the porch steps, mentally noting the absence of both of my parents' cars in the driveway. Either way, I was coming home for the night
Sliding my house key into the lock, I turned and let myself inside. I knew it probably sounded crazy that I found this house so peaceful, considering all the terrible things that happened here, but to me, it was home. It was a shrine of happy memories and loving words.
Feeling better already, I shrugged off my coat and hung it on the already overflowing banister before heading into the living room.
I felt like a complete creeper as I stood at our bay window in complete darkness, spying across the street at Max Jones' house. I noticed that the light in Teagan's old room was on and a huge pang of sadness washed over me.
"What the hell are you doing here?"
"Ahhhhh!" Literally screaming at the top of my lungs, I swung around and grabbed the closest weapon at my disposal – which just so happened to be a fruit bowl. Yanking an apple out of the bowl, I took aim and flung it at the intruder in my parent's home.
"Jesus fucking Christ," a familiar voice cried out and I balked.
"Lucky?" Flicking on the lamp closest to me, I gaped at Lucky who was kneeling on the floor, cupping his crotch. "Are you okay?"
"Fuck," he hissed. "You've got some arm, girl."
"So I've been told." Lowering the other apple I had aimed, I walked over to him and offered him my hand. "What the hell are you doing here? In my parents' house? In the middle of the night?"
"It's complicated," he replied, reluctantly taking my extended hand.
"As in illegally complicated?" I asked. "Because if that's the case, don’t tell me."
"Okay, I won't tell you," he replied with a smirk.
Just then, Noah walked into the living room with a duffel bag in one hand and a set of car keys in the other. "There's a ford focus parked at the end of the street and enough cash in here to keep you going for the next six months. By the time you run out, the heat will…" He stopped short when he noticed me standing next to Lucky. "Hope."
"Noah," I growled, so relieved to see my uncle in one piece it was hard to sound mad. "You're okay."
He nodded once.
"Okay." Sighing, I held my hands up in front of me and backed out of the room. "Don’t tell me what's happening. I do not want to know." Turning in the doorway, I rushed into the kitchen and out of earshot.
****
Noah
"You know you did what you had to, right?" Lucky said. "It was his family or yours."
"Yeah," I replied, knowing that the Dennis family had already robbed me of my mother, my father, and my daughter. If I hadn't acted, they would have robbed me of my wife, too. But I didn’t think I'd ever sleep again, knowing there was an innocent in there.
"Hey," Lucky said, intercepting where my train of thought had gone. "Your baby was an innocent, too. And your wife. It didn’t matter to him then and it wouldn’t have mattered again."
He was right. I knew it. But it didn’t take the guilt away. The sound of that woman screaming was imprinted in my memory. I'd burnt them alive…
Sinking onto the couch, I dropped my head in my hands and exhaled a shaky breath.
What the fuck was happening to my life?
"It's time for me to go, man," I heard Lucky say and my heart sank. This was just one more thing to feel guilty about. He was going on the run – because of me, and his loyalty to my family.
"Will you be okay?" I heard myself ask, feeling extremely anxious at the thought of being away from him having spent the best part of a decade in each other's pockets. I knew it was safer this way. Separating for a while until the dust settled over the motel fire was Lucky's idea, and I knew it was a good one, but hell, it hurt like a bitch. I didn’t want to see him leave. I needed him and that scared the shit out of me because I wasn’t the type of man who allowed myself to need anyone.
"I can't believe it's over," I whispered, more to myself than anyone else. "He's really gone."
"You deserve a shot at a decent future, Noah," Lucky replied. "Don’t you ever feel bad for protecting that future."
Standing up, I walked over to the man who was as close as family to me and wrapped my arms around him. "This isn’t for ever," Lucky whispered in my ear, tightening his hold on me. "You're not getting rid of me this easily, Messina." Chuckling, he added, "One of these days, I'm gonna come looking for a favor."
"Better not wait too long then, Casarazzi," I shot back, releasing him from my grasp, even though I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that I wouldn’t be seeing Lucky for a very long time.
"You're leaving?"
We both turned in the direction of the doorway to where Hope was standing, looking surprisingly upset.
"Afraid so," Lucky replied before winking at her.
"But why?"
We both stared knowingly at Hope and she blushed. "Illegally complicated, right?" Concern was etched on her face as she stepped into the living room. "Do you have to go tonight?"
Lucky looked hard at Hope before turning his attention back to me. "Actually, I have to go now." Picking up the duffel bag and car keys, he nodded once more in my direction before walking out of the room. "I'll be seeing you, Messina," he called out. Stopping in the doorway, he looked down at Hope and said, "I'll be seeing you, too."
And then he was gone.
I sank back down on the couch and dropped my head in my hands.
What the hell was I going to do without that guy?
How was I ever going to repay him for the sacrifices he'd made for the good of my family?
"Noah?" Hope's voice came from nearby and it was only then that I realized she was still standing there. I'd been lost in my own thoughts.
Raising my head, I looked at Hope. "Yeah?"
Hope bit down nervously on her lip and exhaled a heavy sigh. "I have something I really need to tell you."
Immediately I was on edge.
"It's about Teagan," Hope added and my heart stopped in my chest.
Bracing myself, I held my breath while Hope delivered the tumultuous final blow to my heart.
She was gone.
She had left me.
Again.
"Noah, wait. Don’t do anything stupid. Please."
Hope was calling after me, begging me to stop and think about what I was doing, but I couldn’t, not when she was across the street.
I moved purely on instinct, my legs breaking
into a run as I crossed the street and thundered up the porch steps of my former next door neighbor.
She was in there.
My wife was in that goddamn house and I wasn’t leaving this street without her.
I continued to wrap my knuckles against the door in an unyielding tune until, finally, the porch light came on and the door opened inwards.
"Noah," Max Jones acknowledged. He stepped onto his porch and pulled the door shut behind him. "How are you?"
"You couldn’t fucking help yourself, could you?" I shook my head in disgust and sneered. "I called you for help, Max, and you take her from me?"
"Whatever you think my motives were for bringing Teagan here, you're wrong." Sympathy seeped from Max's voice, and for some reason that only made this horror of a night worse. "My niece is very unwell, and you are worn to the bone trying to care for her on your own." He exhaled a heavy sigh. "I'm a doctor, Noah. I'm the best one to take care of her right now."
"And I'm her husband," I roared, shaking. "In sickness and health…You know what, fuck this! Let me see her," I demanded, feeling like I was going through a serious fucking case of déjà vu. I couldn’t count the number of times I'd stood on this porch demanding to see the girl in the bedroom upstairs.
"Noah," Max said in a strangely tender tone of voice. "Please just listen to me for a minute."
"I'm going to tell you the same thing I told you years ago," I warned my wife's uncle, refusing to listen to any goddamn thing he had to say. "You can try to keep her from me, but I'm not going anywhere."
I had expected a fight; hell I had banked on it.
No one was more surprised when Max stepped aside and gestured me inside.
"She hasn't left her room since I brought her home," he told me in a worried tone. "She hasn't eaten a bite. Not a damn thing. I've given her diazepam to relax her." Sighing, he added, "I'm praying she can get some sleep. She needs it. You both do."
I moved for the staircase, taking three steps at a time, only halting when Max called out my name again.
"Noah," he said, looking up at me with an almost desperate expression on his face. "Try and remain calm. Her behavior is a direct result of her grief, not how she feels about you."
"Why are being like this?" I asked, appalled. "Nice to me?" I shook my head and frowned. "You hate me."
"I misjudged you," he replied, correcting me. "You love her. More than I realized. I see that now."
"I've always loved her," I shot back, unable to take any sort of compliment or apology from a man who'd never hid the fact that he loathed my guts. "Since she was seventeen years old. Why the sudden change of heart towards me?"
"I watched the way you were with her – after losing the baby," he replied, voice thick with emotion. "Nursing her. Caring for her. Loving her more than you love yourself." He sighed heavily. "How could I not have a change of heart?"
My life must be really going down the shitter, I thought to myself, when Max Jones was being nice to me…
****
Teagan
Leaving Noah for the second time in my life was the first hardest decision I'd ever made. He was the man I had vowed to share my life with, to halve my soul with. I couldn't be there now.
Not after Einín...
Being back in my uncle's house was like an out of body experience. The last time I had stepped foot in this house was the night I fled thirteenth street all those years ago.
I could hear Noah talking to my uncle from somewhere outside of my room.
He'd come for me and all I wanted to do was tell him to stop.
Give up.
I wasn't the woman he remembered. I wasn't his Thorn anymore.
So I continued to hide in my old bed, curled up on the same duvet I'd spent countless nights with the teenage version of my husband hiding beneath.
I cried into my musky scented pillow, praying for god to take pity on me and stop my heart from beating. The cruelness, the unfairness of it all was too much for me.
I had failed Noah.
I had broken my vows and I had let him down again.
When my bedroom door creaked inwards, I didn’t dare look up and face him. I couldn’t. It was too much.
"Thorn."
His voice in my ears caused my body to rack with shivers – a basic human reaction to hearing the voice of the person you loved most in the world.
The floorboards creaked under his massive frame as he approached my bed. I heard him sigh heavily before my bed dipped and a warm hand touched my face, cradling my cheek. Clenching my eyes shut, I leaned my cheek against that warm hand, wishing more than anything his touch could heal me.
If this was a scene from a movie, I would turn around and enjoy the feel of my husband pulling me into his arms. He would kiss me and tell me everything was going to be okay. I would smile and put my complete faith and trust in his word. And then we would make love…
But this wasn’t a movie, and I didn't know what to say to Noah. Being honest, there was nothing to say. We shared a bond, a broken bond, and that was it. Without sex and chemistry and hunger driven lust, there were gaping holes in our marriage. Ones we couldn't fill.
"I hear you're leaving me," he said in a low tone, voice hoarse and broken.
Flinching, I tucked my chin downwards and tried to stem the flow of tears that were now flowing freely from my eyes. I was so tired of crying. So tired of everything. "I'm sorry," I managed to strangle out. "It's better this way."
"For who?" he asked, torn, as he stroked my hair with his hand. "You? Me?"
"I'm no good anymore," I squeezed out. "For you. Or for anything else..."
"I will never let you go," he warned me. "So don't even try."
"Our marriage is over," I sobbed, wanting to be done with this conversation. Wanting to be done with everything. "Just accept it. Please."
"It's not over." Cupping the back of my neck, he pulled me into a sitting positon and forced me to look at him. "Until I'm six feet under, it will never be over, Teagan. Fucking never."
"You'll meet someone better than me," I cried, delirious with grief. I wasn’t sure what I was saying or why I was saying it, but I knew I didn’t deserve to feel happy ever again. Not when my daughter was dead. "Someone good for you," I added, sobbing. "Someone who will give you living children."
"I don't want another woman," he roared, trembling now. "I don't want anyone else."
I shook my head, tears trickling down my face. "You don't know what you're saying."
"Stop telling me what I do and don't know, Teagan," Noah snarled, tone furious. "And start fucking listening to me." Releasing me, Noah stood up and began to pace. "I've been around," he told me, eyes dark and wild. "I've felt pain. I've felt grief. I've lost a child, too. And I've never fucking loved you more. You're mine. My wife. I don't want anyone else. I will never want anyone else. And I'll tell you another thing, sweetheart, I will never give up on you. I will never stop loving you. I will never stop fighting for you."
"Maybe you should."
Stalking back to where I was sitting, Noah wrapped his large callused hand around my arm and drew me closer to him. "Maybe I should," he choked out, voice thick with emotion. "But I won't. There's not a chance of that happening. I will love you for all of my life. I am yours, Teagan Messina. And you sure as hell are mine."
It was all I could do not to throw myself at the mercy of this wonderful man. The only thing that held me back was the image of my baby's lifeless face and the knowledge that I was never going to be okay again. I would never be happy or normal or even sane and Noah deserved better than that.
"You're better off without me," I whispered, closing my eyes, blocking out the image of his face.
"Says who? The depression inside of you?" he croaked out. "You need time?" he said after a long pause as he stared into my eyes, his brown eyes dark as night and full of pain. "Fine. I can give you that. You need space? I can understand that and try and give that to you, too. But you're not leaving me, Teagan. Beca
use. I. Won't. Let. You."
****
Chapter Twenty-Four
Hope
Teagan was gone and Noah was self-destructing and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do to fix any of it. God knows, I'd never felt so helpless in my entire life.
An entire month had passed since the night Teagan left South Peak Road with her uncle.
In that month, I'd witnessed Noah go through every stage of grief imaginably possible.
He'd gone from drinking himself into a stupor, to breaking up the house, to stalking Max Jones' porch, to setting Teagan's guitar on fire. If I didn’t love the guy as much as I did, I would have hauled ass out of this madhouse, but I couldn’t go.
I couldn’t leave him.
Everyone Noah had ever loved or trusted had either abandoned him or had been taken from him. I wasn’t about to join either of those lists.
So I stayed…
I stayed and I tried to repair the broken pieces of my father's kid brother. Of course, Noah being Noah, he didn’t accept my help, but that didn’t stop me from cooking him meals and tidying up after his latest explosion. I'd helped him in other ways, too.
The morning after he and Lucky went AWOL, the police had shown up at the house, looking to know of my uncle's whereabouts the night before. Apparently there had been a suspected arson attack on a motel eighty miles or so from here and the cops suspected the Dennis gang to be involved.
I hadn't thought twice about telling them he had spent the evening at home with me. The lie had come so naturally from my mouth that I knew the cops were fooled.
Noah's latest coping mechanism was the one he'd used for most of his life.
Fighting.
He'd accepted a rematch against Cole for the title belt next month and had thrown himself back into an insanely grueling training regime. He was at the hotel now, working out in my father's gym and probably pummeling one of my misfortunate brothers' half to death.