And eventually him.
But never Livia. That was the only hope the old man had of ever meeting up with a saving grace. He’d always been good to Livia.
“I thought he just started getting physically violent when you were in high school.”
He’d forgotten that she just knew basic facts.
“After a couple years of tests and treatments, Livia went into remission. And Dad found another job. A guy we met, whose kid was going through the same treatment as Livia, offered him a job. It lasted as long as her remission did.”
And the second time around, life had been pure hell. For all of them. Ending with Livia’s death. His mother’s unbearable grief. Her anger. His father a drunk who eventually ended up in jail.
An imploded family.
* * *
ELLA COULDN’T SPEAK. Her throat was choked up with an effort not to cry, even as her eyes filled with tears.
“Without help, boys who witness domestic violence in their homes growing up are far more likely to become abusers.” Brett’s quote was uttered without inflection of any kind.
That’s when she found her voice. “You had help.”
She wasn’t ready for his fountain of words to dry up. Not by a long shot. He owed her a good ten years’ worth of them. At the very least, another ten minutes.
“So what you’re saying, then, is that every boy who grows up in an abusive home is destined to live life alone, or become an abuser?”
“Of course not.” She heard the disdain that time.
“So why are you putting that on yourself?”
He didn’t respond. Typical. But disappointment filled her anyway.
Along with a load of compassion she couldn’t afford to carry.
If Brett had talked to her about this even a little bit years ago, so many things would have been different.
Not everything, but maybe the process of splitting up wouldn’t have been as hard.
Maybe she’d still be married, or married again, instead of on her way to spinsterhood.
“Do you have any idea how hard it is to live with the fact that your husband didn’t trust you enough to be completely open with you?”
The pain that filled the darkness scared her. She hadn’t known there was so much of it left.
“Do you think I wanted to hurt you? That I felt good about it?” Brett sat forward. Lifted his beer and set it back down again without drinking.
She wanted to drink. Seemed to be the way of dealing with the darkness. Which was why she put her bottle in a cup holder on the next chair.
“I saw what I was doing to you, and the sadness in your eyes ate away at me until I couldn’t stand to live with myself anymore. I had to do something...”
His hands were inches from her knees. She stared at them. With very little effort, even a rocking of the boat, she could be touching him.
“You could at least have told me before you talked to a divorce attorney.”
“You’re right, of course.” Not the answer she’d been expecting.
“So why didn’t you?” Not a question she should have asked.
“Because you would have understood and loved me anyway,” he said, his voice raw with honesty. “I couldn’t trust myself not to be as selfish as my old man and let you talk me into staying.”
She’d asked. Maybe forgetting that nothing with him had been easy.
“You knew I loved you enough to do that, and then turned your back anyway. Why throw it all away when there was as much chance that it would be good as that it could go bad?”
“Because it was already bad, El. I had a knot in my stomach every single morning. I couldn’t be the man you wanted me to be and the more I tried, the more tense I got. And with the baby coming... It certainly wouldn’t have been the first time an abusive situation started when a pregnancy was thrown into the mix.”
She’d read about triggers. Some men with control issues—and out-of-control jealousy issues—sometimes felt threatened by the introduction of a child into the relationship. This could trigger the start of a domestic-violence situation. And didn’t describe Brett or their relationship at all.
“The tenser I got, the more chance there was that the tension would get the better of me someday,” Brett was saying.
“If you’d talked about it, we might have been able to work through it. Loving’s not easy.”
“No, and it’s not a guarantee of happy-ever-after, either.”
Had he just said what she thought he had? That he did love her? At least that he had?
Was it possible that someplace, locked away in that heart of his, he’d loved her the way that she’d once believed he had?
He’d asked her why she’d stuck with him through college.
A better question might have been why had she married him?
She knew the answer to that.
Ella had tied her life to Brett’s because his life was the only one that felt as though it was the other half of hers. She’d married him because she’d believed he loved her as much as she loved him.
It had taken years to crush that belief. Even after his initial rejection of their child. He’d been unprepared when he’d come home from work one day as usual to find her there, gushing happy tears, holding a home pregnancy kit result out to him. He’d seen her tears, not understanding they were happy tears at first, and then, in the confusion of her explanation, had been unable to mask the look of horror on his face. Still, she’d told herself that it was just the shock. That it was normal for a man to be nervous about being a father. It wasn’t until he’d told her he’d seen a divorce attorney, that he’d lost her.
Up until then, she’d believed that, deep down, her injured warrior needed her to believe in him.
You’d have thought that moment, the one when her husband had so backhandedly told her he wanted a divorce, would have been the one to sever all her faith in him.
But no, it had taken another couple years for that to happen.
She’d lost too many years of her life to this man. She couldn’t afford to go back. To care if he’d ever loved her.
She couldn’t afford to lose her heart to him ever again. He was who he was. A product of his childhood, just as he said. She was listening to him now. Believing him. Oh, not that he’d ever lift a hand to her, or would have to their child, but believing that he’d been irrevocably scarred by his father. Emotionally scarred. She might have continued trying to work on him the first time, if he’d given her a chance, but not now. Because she was older, wiser and knew that there were some battles she couldn’t win.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
HE WASN’T GOING to sleep. And didn’t much want to spend the night sitting on the porch.
“Let’s take her out,” he said, standing.
“Take who out?”
Brett was already at the front of the boat, reaching for the key they’d left in the ignition.
“The boat?” Ella asked, joining him up front. “Are you kidding? It’s almost midnight. We’d wake up the neighborhood.”
He heard one thing. She hadn’t said no.
“It’s not the speed boat, El. It’s not going to be any louder than a car starting. We’re far enough away from the cabin that the noise won’t carry, and who else is in the neighborhood besides us? In case you hadn’t noticed this afternoon, most of the places around here are closed up.”
“It’s dark. We can’t go out on the ocean this late. Who knows what’s out there? And no one would know where to look for us if something went wrong.”
When had she become so cautious? The Ella he’d known had had a wild streak that he’d found captivating.
He suspected he was in large part to blame for its loss.
Which made it vitally important all of a sudden that he get her to agree to do something slightly crazy.
That and the fact that it seemed clear to him that neither of them was going to sleep, and the cabin was way too small for them to pretend the other wasn’t close by. Taking the
boat out seemed the safest option.
“We’ll stay in the lagoon.”
She stood next to him by the driver’s seat, looking up at him. If they didn’t get going, he was going to kiss her.
“Move over, I’ll drive.” Ella touched him, but not in the way his mind had been imagining. She pushed him aside and sat down.
Standing behind her as she reached for the key, Brett waited until he heard the engine start before jumping onto the dock to free the pontoon of her restraints.
* * *
THE WIND CHILLED Ella’s face and fingers and blew softly through her hair, tossing it lightly around her arms and back. She’d had it tied back earlier in the day when they’d been out on the water, but had taken out the ponytail for bed. Brett stood wordlessly beside her, watching the front of the boat.
Her lookout, she assumed.
He gave no direction. No suggestion. Just rode where she took him.
The ocean beckoned. They’d taken the speed boat out earlier in the day, only for a few minutes and within sight of their alcove, but not the pontoon.
“It’s suicide, taking a pontoon on the ocean,” Brett said from above her. Before she’d even headed in that direction.
In some ways he knew her so well. There was comfort in that.
The lagoon was over a mile long. She had plenty of space to travel.
And knew that she would never have enough room on earth to get away from him. Brett Ackerman was her one and only.
She’d known so. Had spent years convincing herself she’d been wrong. But now, after seeing him again, she could no longer doubt herself. Or the truth her heart had made clear that day on her college’s campus when Brett met up with her and Jeff as they arrived with a carload of stuff, and helped unload Ella’s in her dorm room before heading off to the apartment they’d agreed to rent with two other guys.
She understood something else, too. Just because she’d found her one and only didn’t mean that she had a happily-ever-after in her future.
Brett was damaged goods. He’d never convince Ella he was as damaged as he believed he was, but that wasn’t the point. He believed it. And so, in any way that it counted, that made it true.
It didn’t change the fact that just being near him made her want to be connected to him in every way possible. She drove. He watched. So close if she leaned her head back, it would rest against his thigh...
Eventually he took the seat next to her, his unfinished beer left behind in the back of the boat as he looked out into the night.
Tears sprang to Ella’s eyes, seeing him there. Farther away from her.
He was such a good man. Deserving of love. Needing love.
And alone.
No. She swiped an arm across her face, getting hair out of her way—and tears—at the same time. She couldn’t help loving him, but she could control where she let her thoughts take her.
She could control the choices she made.
For his sake, as well as hers, she had to let him go. To block any empathy she might feel. Any desire to help.
All hope.
Hurting her hurt him. She understood that now.
And somewhere in that knowledge, she’d have to find some peace.
* * *
BRETT TOLD HIMSELF the boat ride was doing the trick. He was relaxing. Having a seat, he wanted to think he could just fall asleep out there.
Anything was better than going up to the cabin.
Where his best friend was having sex with his wife. And then sleeping cuddled up naked beside her.
Where his own wife—ex-wife—was lying in bed just feet away from him. They had never, not once, spent the night in the same place without spending it in the same bed together.
He’d barely slept the night before, and he’d been shut in a room with Jeff. But tonight? With Ella sleeping all alone? He was supposed to just curl up on the couch and relax? He couldn’t do it.
The boat had stopped.
He sat up. Glanced around. They were in the middle of the lagoon.
“I’m sorry.” Ella was standing by the crank that would lower the anchor. “I thought you were asleep and was just going to let you rest.”
She stood there, her hands raised as though she didn’t know what to do with them. Lower the crank. Drive.
Touch him?
God help him, he’d been reliving the touch of her fingers on his skin since they’d arrived at the cabin last night.
Hell, who was he kidding? He’d never stopped having fantasies about the woman.
He’d known he couldn’t be married to her. Had no doubts on that one. Even now his resolve didn’t waver.
But making love had never even come close to bringing out violence in him...
“I’ll just get us going again and head to shore,” she said, leaving the anchor. She turned, and the light of the moon gave him a bounteous gift.
A clear view of two things. Ella’s lips. And her nipples showing against her sweater where her wrap had dropped open.
She was chewing on her lower lip. All the sign he really needed.
But the hard points of her nipples were added fuel for his raging fire.
“Don’t do that with your lips. It makes me want to kiss you.” She’d wanted openness.
“Brett.” She chewed again, staring at him. Ella never had played coy with him. She knew he knew she wanted him.
Just as he knew she now knew about him, too.
“Would it be so awful, El?” He heard the craziness come out of his mouth. She was still standing closer to the crank than the steering wheel. She hadn’t made up her mind to go back, or she’d have walked away from that crank.
“It would just make it that much harder to get over you a second time.”
“Unless you don’t have to.” He was known for his instant solutions. But why in the hell hadn’t he thought of this one before?
With a stumble, Ella fell into one of the back seats. “What do you mean by that?”
He heard the hope in her voice. And rushed to quell it before this got out of hand, and everything was ruined.
“We don’t have to be married, or live together, to have sex.”
She didn’t say anything for so long, he wasn’t sure what to think.
She’d changed. In some ways he didn’t like.
For instance, this ability she’d developed to close herself off from him. He wanted that for her. Understood that it was necessary. Didn’t mean he had to like it.
“You think you could be satisfied with that? Sex without commitment?”
He couldn’t tell a damn thing about what she was thinking.
“I think that sleeping with you would be better than not sleeping with you.”
His penis was hard. His heart pounding. “I’m not seeing anyone,” he continued when she remained silent. “Jeff tells me you aren’t, either. It’s not unheard of, you know. Two people who can’t live together, but still care about each other, being attracted to each other, seeking each other out for physical company now and then.”
Leaving her in the morning was a given. He had full confidence on that score. Had proved his resolve to himself—and to her—enough to know that it was rock solid. It was the next hour he was concerned about.
“I’m asking seriously, Brett. Can we really have sex and walk away without scalding ourselves?”
She wanted it as badly as he did. The fact that she wasn’t driving them the hell out of there was proof of that. That peculiar little tremor in her voice said so more quietly. It was that tremor that called him to his feet, to cross the carpeted expanse between them. Keeping his hands to his sides, he leaned over and placed his lips against hers. The choice was hers. She could grab hold. Or step back.
Ella opened her mouth. The boat lurched.
And Brett didn’t think of anything but getting them naked.
* * *
THE SPLASHING SOUND woke Ella from her doze. She hadn’t been deeply enough asleep to lose awareness of the fact that s
he only had a few hours left in Brett’s arms.
But the rest of the world had ceased to exist.
There it was again. That splash. She blinked against the darkness.
And that was when she remembered... “The crank!”
Jumping up from the bed of clothes on the floor of the boat, tripping over them, she rushed to lower the anchor. And saw that they’d docked against the edge of the lagoon that led into the ocean. A few feet more to the right and they’d have floated out to sea.
“I’d say fate was smiling on us tonight.” Brett’s low tones, soft and sexy and relaxed behind her, had her instantly wanting him all over again.
“Or you could say that we were just incredibly stupid,” she whispered, holding on to the crank for dear life.
She no longer felt like the Ella Ackerman she’d been before meeting Brett again. She was hot and desperate and willing to do anything to keep him with her.
In the dark.
As long as it stayed dark.
Which would only be another couple hours based on the moon’s position in the sky.
“Can you go again? Or are you too sore?” He was rubbing his penis between her legs from behind.
She couldn’t answer him. Because her mind was screaming no. So she nodded. Felt Brett nudge against her. His kisses on the back of her neck.
And when he offered himself to her, she took him.
CHAPTER TWENTY
MORNING CAME. IT always did.
Brett hoped the weekend hangover didn’t kill them all. No one had even come close to getting drunk. It was the emotions that had flowed too freely that might do them all in.
He and Ella had made sure to return to their respective sleeping places by dawn.
Chloe got up first and made breakfast while Ella and Brett got up separately, avoiding each other.
Ella cleaned up the cabin. And then showered.
Brett packed the cars. He’d shower later. After a long, hard swim in his pool.
As planned, Chloe said goodbye to Jeff—with a long hug and trembling lips—then buckled her son into the car seat in the back of Ella’s vehicle, before climbing aboard herself.
Ella pulled away. She didn’t glance back.
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