by Lucy Score
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It was a wiggle of fingers that woke him. His head rested on the coarse cotton of hospital sheets, hand wrapped around Waverly’s cold fingers. They were wiggling against his palm.
He lifted his head, foggy and too terrified to be hopeful. But those sea green eyes were watching him.
“Angel,” he whispered it reverently.
“You found me. You saved me,” she whispered back, her voice raspy and weak.
He rose up, bringing his forehead to hers. When she winced, he pulled back. “What is it, baby. What hurts? Tell me, and I’ll call a nurse. A doctor. A team of doctors.”
She gave him a pale-lipped smile. “I head-butted him.”
“You remember what happened?” he asked, brushing his fingers whisper soft over her forehead.
Her eyes fluttered closed for a second before reopening. “I remember everything. I knew you’d come for me.”
He leaned in, stroking her face and hair. “I told you I’d never be done with you.”
“You told me you loved me.”
He opened his mouth, closed it. And then nodded. “I may have said that. I thought you were unconscious.”
Her eyes were heavy. She was having trouble keeping them open. “I won’t hold you to it. You were under duress.”
“I meant every word, Angel.”
That ghost of a smile played on her lips again. “Good. Because I’m pretty sure I love you, too.”
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It took three days, but Waverly was cleared by a team of doctors to go home. She cuddled up against Xavier’s side in the back of an Invictus Tahoe. Xavier had shrugged off her attempts at conversation in the car but wouldn’t let her wiggle out from under his arm. So she’d leaned against him and closed her eyes for the duration of the ride.
The foot of the driveway was a madhouse. There were twenty photographers waiting outside the gates, pushing back against the team Xavier and Micah had deployed to keep them off the property. She ignored the chaos on the other side of the tinted windows as the SUV slid through the gates.
He hadn’t left her hospital bed for twenty-four straight hours until she’d begged him to go home to grab a shower and some sleep. It was the last she’d seen him until he arrived to take her home looking just as exhausted as he had when he left.
She hadn’t been alone in his absence. Kate, Mari, Louie, and her father had taken turns guarding her bedside and driving her generally insane. Her mother had flown in, and, much to Waverly’s shock, flew back to finish out her rehab. She would be home in another week, and after seeing her in the hospital, sharp, focused, and sober, Waverly felt the first sparks of hope for her mother that she’d felt in a long time.
But Xavier’s absence made her nervous. She spent hours wondering if her confession of love scared him off. Perhaps he hadn’t meant it when he’d whispered it to her over and over again when he thought he was losing her and again when he thought she was sleeping.
They would talk, she promised herself. Saints were talkers, and they could clear the air. She wasn’t going to let him just drift away. Not now that she knew what love was and how precious life could be.
Her father had hired a private nurse for her for the next few days to help change Waverly’s dressings and keep an eye on her. The plastic surgeon was thrilled with how she was healing and was confident that most of the scars would be practically invisible.
Her doctors had been thrilled with how quickly she’d bounced back. “It must be all the hot yoga I’ve been doing lately,” she told them weakly, but Xavier hadn’t been there to get the joke.
There had been a lot of her blood pooled on the Walk of Fame and she’d learned just how touch and go it had been for a while. She’d yet to see the video of the… incident. But she did get to meet the bystanders who’d been dragged into her near execution. And, as a special thank you for his hard work, she’d smuggled Arnie the photographer into her room and let him take a photo of her with them. With her permission, he sold the picture to a big-budgeted celebrity news magazine for six figures and immediately quit his job.
Rumor had it Douchebag Joe nearly had a heart attack when he got his autographed copy from Arnie in the mail.
Waverly sat up when the SUV came to a stop in the driveway, but Xavier anchored her to his side and carefully lifted her out.
“I can walk, X,” she said, with a teasing smile. “I’m going to be hitting up barre class in a day or two.”
But it didn’t bring a smile to his handsome face. Nor did the beautiful summer bouquet from Xavier’s family that waited for her on the pool house’s kitchen table.
She sank down on the couch and let Xavier fuss over a glass of water for her. She wasn’t about to admit it, but even walking short distances exhausted her. The doctors assured her it was temporary but also warned her to take it sloth-like easy for a while. She closed her eyes and leaned her head against the couch cushion and listened to the blissful silence. No beeping monitors, no worried visitors, no vitals checks by the nurse.
Xavier set the glass down in front of her as well as a steaming bowl of chicken noodle soup and then just stood there looking at her. Nerves jittered out of him. He looked gaunt, haunted. Like a man who hadn’t ate or slept in days.
She patted the cushion next to her, but he shook his head and shoved his hands in his pockets.
Waverly knew something was wrong. A queasy anxiety rolled through her stomach. “Where is everyone?” she asked, breaking the silence.
“I told them to give you some time to settle in. You haven’t been alone in since… since before. I thought you’d like some time to yourself to get settled.”
“Thank you,” she said quietly. As distant as he was keeping himself, he still knew her. And knew she’d be suffocating under the constant watchfulness of others.
“So, I’m going to go,” he said, briskly. But he made no move toward the door.
She took a settling breath. “Okay, while I’m settling, why don’t we settle whatever’s made you turn into the Invisible Man? What’s going on?”
He must have been waiting for the question because the words rushed out of him.
“I almost got you killed.” He said it flatly as if he’d felt every emotion in the gamut and was now empty. God, she knew that feeling well.
“Xavier,” she said firmly. “You saved me.”
“You trusted me, and I failed you. I let you down,” he argued dispassionately. His mind was made up, but about what, she wasn’t sure.
“You shot and killed the man who was trying to execute me,” she said evenly.
Xavier unfroze from his spot and began to pace. “He never would have had the chance to get to you if I had been doing my job. But I wasn’t. I let my personal feelings get in the way, and I missed the trap. I walked you right into it.”
“You didn’t want me to go to the club in the first place. You were worried that something like that would happen.”
“And even expecting it, he still got past me.” There was feeling now. A simmering anger.
Waverly carefully pushed to her feet, but Xavier stepped away from her. She crossed her arms against the chill that was settling over her.
“You saved my life. I’m alive because of you.”
“Don’t you get it?” he snapped. “You wouldn’t have been in this situation if it weren’t for me. I almost cost you your life because I was so blinded by lust and anger—”
“So it’s lust now?” It was her turn for a cool, empty tone.
“You do things to me that I can’t handle. You make it so I can’t function,” he said.
“Make up your mind, X. Is it your fault or mine?”
He was reaching. She recognized the fear and wished she could make it go away for him. He glared at her floor, still avoiding looking directly at her.
“Xavier, how many cops were there in that club? How many FBI agents? Yet it’s your fault and your fault alone?” She reached for him, b
ut he shrugged her off.
“You trusted me to keep you safe, and I failed.”
“I am trusting you not to walk away, X. We have something here. You are the only person in my entire life who ever made decisions based on my best interests, Xavier.”
“Don’t guilt me into staying,” he snapped. “Did it ever occur to you that maybe it’s time you start making your own decisions?”
She winced at the anger and truth behind his words. “I thought you understood.”
“I did. I do. But I’m not going to be your new jailer, the next person that you live your life for. When are you going to stand on your own two feet?”
“I love—”
He held up his hands cutting her off. “Don’t say it. You can’t say it.”
“I can’t tell you that I love you? That you’re the only person I’ve ever said those words to? That even though you’re backing down off of yours, I still love you?”
“It’s not love!” He snapped the words out like a whip, but at least he was finally looking at her. “We are toxic together, Waverly. What I feel for you? It’s not healthy. It’s an obsession. I’m no better than Ganim.”
“What are you talking about?” she felt the tears rising. “What are you telling me?”
“I’ve done nothing but obsess over you since I met you. Everything I’ve done since that first day has been about you. I go to sleep fantasizing about you and wake up more fixated with you every day than the last. I touch you, and it’s never enough. I stay close to you, and it’s never close enough unless I’m inside you, and even then, I’m wanting more of you.”
He stopped, and she noted the tic in his jaw, the line between his eyes. This wasn’t just a fight.
“I can’t be around you anymore, Waverly.”
“What?” Her gasp made her stitches sing. She shook her head. “No. No. Why are you doing this? We have a chance, Xavier. We survived. It wasn’t for nothing. We have something—”
“We have nothing that we can build on,” he argued. “We have sex, and we fight. That’s not a relationship. But you wouldn’t know that, would you? You’re…” he trailed off, tucked the words back inside.
“What? Say it. I’m what? Damaged?”
Xavier looked away, and Waverly stepped in to face her worst fear. “Maybe so, Xavier. But I’m willing to fight. I’m willing to try.” She hated the plea she heard in her voice, but damn it, for once in her life she was going to fight for what she wanted. “I’m alive because of you, and I want to see where this life will take us.”
He looked sick and caged. She was standing between him and the door.
“Tell me how we can make this work, X,” she said. A tear worked its way down her cheek.
“I can’t fix you. I’m not your future. I’m just an extension of where you already are. You would just move from under your parents’ thumb to mine. Trade a cage for a cage because that’s what I would keep you in. I keep seeing you, bleeding out on a sidewalk.” His voice cracked, shuddered.
“I’m not bleeding on a sidewalk. I’m standing in front of you asking you to give me a chance!”
“You’re not hearing me, Waverly. I don’t want to make this work. You’re not good for me. You’re damaged, and you’ll damage me, too.” His face was ashen, tortured. “You already have.”
Waverly sank down on the couch as her knees buckled.
“Get out.” She said the words quietly with a strength she didn’t feel.
“I’m sorry—”
“Get out of my house. Save yourself before it’s too late.” Ice and fire went to war in her belly. She stood again and wobbled.
He reached for her on instinct, but she froze him with a look.
“Leave your key and get out of my house.”
She held her head high as he slowly dug his keys from his pocket. He pulled two off and laid them on the coffee table.
“Can I call someone for you?” His voice was tight with emotion.
“Leave now,” she said mechanically, using every ounce of her shaky will to hold back the tide of pain.
He nodded and walked, shoulders hunched, out of the room and out of her life.
She didn’t care if he heard the crash as she upended the coffee table, sending bowl and glass and keys flying. She didn’t care about anything anymore.
Her sneakers crunched through the debris, and she dragged herself into her bedroom. She lay face down clutching a pillow to her chest, grateful that this was one place she’d never made love to him.
She started to sob and was afraid she’d never stop.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Waverly wallowed in grief for another two days. Her heart bled worse than the knife wounds, and she wondered if this anguish was what would kill her. She loved him. For the first time in her life, she’d opened herself to someone, given him free rein with her heart and her body. And he’d betrayed her. And she was dumb enough to be surprised.
She couldn’t think about it, about him. Couldn’t think about the aftershocks that Xavier Saint would send through the rest of her life.
Her world had been reduced to her bed and the couch in the pool house. The usually outspoken Kate stood stoically by her side, a sentinel to Waverly’s endless tears. Mari and Louie took their turns plying her with food she didn’t eat. She knew they meant well but wished they would all leave her alone so she could let her grief swallow her.
Her body hurt, and her heart ached, and she didn’t see an end to her pain. If this was what love did, her mother had been right to close off to it.
Waverly was wiping silent tears away when her father knocked on her bedroom door. She didn’t even try to paste on a smile. What was the point? “Hi, Dad,” she offered flatly.
Robert entered holding a brown paper bag with twine handles. “I brought you something, sweetheart.” He settled on the edge of her bed and handed her the bag. When she didn’t make a move, he dumped the contents on her duvet.
“Hot dogs?” Waverly asked listlessly.
“Do you remember when you were little and thought it was the biggest deal to roast hot dogs outside in the fireplace?”
She did. The memory hit her like a warm embrace. Her mother and the chef before Louie had made them all vegan for a few weeks. Robert and Waverly would sneak out onto the patio and fire up the massive stone fireplace and roast hot dogs.
It had felt… normal.
“You want to roast hot dogs?” she asked him.
Her father nodded. “I want to roast hot dogs and talk. Also, just in case you’re wondering, I’m not taking no for an answer.”
Waverly raised her eyebrows. Her father being firm? What had the world come to?
“Well, then. Let’s go,” Waverly said. He helped her out of the room, Marisol was in the kitchen and gave Robert an approving nod when he opened the front door for Waverly.
It hurt to move, and she realized that it wasn’t necessarily the wounds that hurt the most, it was the rest of her body that had atrophied. When had Waverly Sinner turned into a woman who could be destroyed by the capriciousness of a man? she wondered with the first flush of embarrassment. Feeling anything besides pain was a relief.
Robert pulled two loungers up in front of the massive outdoor fireplace and produced a pair of brand-new roasting sticks. He glanced at her, studying, and then nodded. “You look hungry,” he decided and speared two hot dogs on both sticks.
She offered him a sad smile.
On the side table between them was a bag of rolls and a collection of mismatched bowls and spoons. Ketchup, mustard, chili, irregularly diced onions. “Did you do all this?” Waverly asked incredulously.
Her father glanced at the hodge-podge of toppings. “I hope I didn’t forget anything important.”
She looked at him for what felt like the first time. He was dressed in casual shorts and a three-hundred dollar polo that was going to end up with ketchup on it. And he was present. His phone wasn’t clu
tched in his hand. There wasn’t a beautiful girl he was making eyes at. He was sitting with her, being present. He handed her one of the sticks and sat next to her. They stuck the sticks into the gas flames and Waverly focused her attention on slowly rotating her hot dogs.
“We’re overdue for a conversation,” Robert began.
“Sinners aren’t big on talking,” Waverly said evasively.
“I think we should consider changing that,” he said. “Your mother is coming home this weekend. And there are a lot of things that are going to change.”
“I’m glad you’re feeling hopeful, Dad. But you can’t count on her recovery,” Waverly reminded him.
“I know that. And I’m going to support your mother in her ongoing treatment, but I can’t control the outcome and neither can you. What we can do is be more honest with each other.”
Waverly spared her dad a glance. “Uh, Dad? You sound like a therapy session.”
“Good. That means it’s working.”
She bobbled her hotdogs and barely rescued them from the marble of the patio. “You’re in therapy?”
“I started after Greece.”
“Wow.” Waverly didn’t know what to think. Her mother in rehab, her father in therapy. What was her world coming to? “Uh, how’s it going?”
“Good. Painful, but good,” he admitted. “And speaking of painful, I have to tell you something.”
Waverly closed her eyes. More pain. There was always more, a never-empty well of it in this lifetime.
“I went to see Xavier.”
“What?” This time she did drop her hot dogs. Her father picked them up for her.
“The fire will sterilize them,” he predicted.
Still in shock, she took the stick back from him.
Robert cleared his throat a pressed on. “When we were in Greece, he—shall we say—encouraged me to step up and be a better man.”
“Oh, God.”
“I went there with the intention of doing the right thing by my daughter, threatening him with bodily harm if he ever so much as thought about you again.”
Of course this was the moment her father chose to stand up for her. When a father’s interference would add to the humiliation.