Mac shoved his hands into the front pockets of his jeans and began to pace the length of the porch.
“I don’t believe this,” he said harshly. “In this day and age…we’re two smart, responsible adults and you’re pregnant. Un-fucking-real.”
His tone grew more dangerous, and Lily’s hackles were up when he turned on her. His eyes fell from hers, traveling down her body until he rested on her stomach, there where her hands laid in a protective manner. It was then that it hit her. He blamed her. He blamed her for everything.
Pride kept her head up. “I didn’t have to tell you, you know, but I’m not ashamed of this, and I’m not going to hide so you’re going to have to deal with it. I’m having this baby, and if it’s the legalities that you’re worried about, I’ll have my lawyer draw up papers tonight. I’ll absolve you of any and all involvement with this child, both legally and financially.”
He stared at her for so long that her knees began to wobble again, and Lily thought she was going to crumble at his feet.
“Jesus Christ,” he whispered roughly. “You make me sound like a goddamn bastard. I can’t be the only man on the planet who doesn’t want a wife or kids. I’d be a disaster as a father.”
Again, with the punch to the gut. Tears stung the corners of her eyes, hot pricks of pain that she forced away.
“I’m sure you’re not,” she managed to say. “But I also think you’re wrong. I think that if you wanted to, you’d be able to love a child and a woman without reservation. And I think that if you walk away from me now, one day you’ll regret it.”
He glanced down at the floor, shoulders hunched forward. Pain radiated off him in waves, and the bruise along his cheekbone took on a purplish hue as the sun hit him. A bruise put there by his father. God, no wonder he was so screwed up, but it didn’t stop her from hoping that she would be enough. That the “thing” they had together would be enough to heal his pain.
“I get that you didn’t want this,” she began.
His head snapped up.
“You don’t get anything, Lily. I’m not cut out for this. I don’t want to be responsible for another human being. It would never work out. I’d only end up hurting you…hurting the kid.” Anguish tinged his face. “I’m no good. I’m no different than Ben or his father before him. I’m selfish and arrogant. I drink too much, and my temper is off the charts. I don’t deal with shit real well, and I can’t…”
“You can’t what?” Angry now, she took a step forward.
“I just can’t do this. You. A baby. It’s not going to happen. Jesus Christ, Lily, it was never going to happen.”
In some secret corner of her soul, she had thought that maybe when he found out, things would be different. She’d thought that he would be different.
She hugged her stomach and stared at the man she loved. A man who had managed to tear down the walls she’d built up around her heart and yet he wouldn’t let her do the same to him. It was tragic, really. And it was her life.
“We’re all born innocent, Mac. I truly believe that. We come into this world with no direction and only the guidance of those around us. Some people get lucky and some, like us, well, we’re pretty much screwed. We can’t pick our parents. We can’t pick our family or where we grow up. We just get what we get. We become a product of our environment.” She paused and exhaled.
“I know your father is a bastard and I know that your mother broke your heart. I know their relationship molded you into the man that you are, but, Mac, you’re hiding behind all that crap. I know because I was there. I hid behind a reputation I didn’t deserve and a sister who used me. I hid behind a father who didn’t deserve my love and a mother who didn’t want it. But I got past it. My brother and Jake helped me get past it.”
And so did you.
How could she make him see?
“I was broken inside and I never thought I’d be whole again. The difference between us is that you don’t want to be fixed. You’d rather go through life only half-alive. I guess I was hoping that I might be reason enough for you to change but…” She glanced down at her flat stomach. “I can’t hide behind my masks anymore. I won’t do it. I can’t afford to be that selfish anymore. I’m going to give this baby everything that I never had. He’s never going to want for anything.” She couldn’t help the tears that slid down her face—there were too many of them.
Angrily, Lily wiped them away. “And I hope he’ll never know that he wasn’t enough for his father. I’ll do everything in my power to keep that from him.”
“Boston.” She didn’t care that his voice was full of anguish or that the pain in his eyes was as great as hers. Right now, she couldn’t get past her own.
“Don’t call me that ever again.” Lily glanced back out at Gibson. “Can you leave please? I’ll have my lawyer send the papers to your New York address.”
A cool breeze swept in, rolling across the lawn. It lifted up her hair, and for a second she was blinded, but by the time she yanked the long blond strands from her face, Mac was down the steps, his long legs eating up the distance to his Mercedes.
She didn’t wait for him to leave.
She ran into the house and barely made it to the bathroom before she lost everything inside her stomach.
Chapter 28
It was close to midnight before Jake found him. Mackenzie had been sitting out on the Edwardses’ dock, staring into a clear night sky for hours. He never went back to the cottage he’d rented—he was too ashamed to face his nephew. Too ashamed of the violence Liam had witnessed.
Dammit, he should be stronger—or at least strong enough.
So here he was. Right back where he started. The place he always went to when things went south. He’d brought a bottle of Jack along, but he hadn’t touched it.
That was something at least. That was heading in the right direction.
Mackenzie watched Jake drag a chair over to him and the two men settled into a silence that was a long time in the making. It was the kind of silence that had seen things—dark things—and it was the kind of silence that he needed right now.
Overhead the night sky was lit up with a million diamonds, and as Mac leaned back and stared out at the vastness, he saw a shooting star. He followed its trajectory until it burned out, and then there was nothing.
Watching it left him feeling empty, but he supposed he was already empty to begin with.
“Lily’s pregnant,” he said, voice scratchy.
Jake didn’t say anything for the longest time, and when Mac finally looked his way, he found his friend’s eyes on him. They were dark and intense but instead of anger or condemnation, they were filled with compassion.
“I know,” Jake replied. He dug into the cooler he’d brought and offered Mac a cold beer.
Mac declined and Jake popped open his can, taking a good long drink.
The water lapped gently along the edge of the beach, small waves rolling in as the wind picked up, and even though the night was star-heavy, Mac smelled rain.
“How is she?” he asked, feeling that damn vise around his heart tighten as he sank lower into his chair and closed his eyes.
“Not good.”
No. He didn’t think she would be. Christ. When had everything gone to shit? Was he cursed to go through life in a pit of misery? Thinking back on things that he should have done differently?
Take Boston for instance. He knew that he was no good for her and still he went after her. He pursued her relentlessly. He took advantage of the undeniable attraction they felt for each other, and now things were as bad as he should have known they’d get.
He thought of the freckles on her nose and the way the right side of her mouth lifted when she smiled. He thought of how amazing she smelled and how soft she was to touch.
He thought of what it felt like to wake up with her in his bed and how he looked forward
to arguing with her over sports or music or movies, or just about anything. He loved getting her worked up. He loved listening to her voice.
He loved listening to her breathe, and he loved watching her sleep.
“I love her,” he said, voice barely above a whisper.
Jake crumpled his can and tossed it into the cooler. “I know that too.”
He looked at his friend in surprise and Jake shrugged. “It’s pretty damn hard not to, and, buddy, you’ve had it bad for her ever since you saw her on Memorial Day.” Jake settled back in his chair, stretching his long legs out as he did so. “I hate to tell you this, Mac, but you didn’t have a chance where Lily was concerned. I’ve never met two people who belonged together as much as you guys do. I gotta say I didn’t see it at first, but I do now and it would be wrong for you to throw it away.”
Mac didn’t answer right away because he wasn’t sure that he could convey what he was feeling. He listened to the water. He let it lull him into a place of peace, or at the very least, as close to peace as he was going to get.
“I’m no good for her, Jake, and I sure as hell can’t raise a kid.”
“Bullshit.”
Mac sat a little straighter. “What?”
“I call bullshit.”
“You can’t call bullshit on something like that.”
“Why not?”
Was Jake trying to get under his skin?
“Because this is serious. It’s not a fucking game.”
“I know that and I still call bullshit.”
“Who’s calling bullshit on what?” The voice slid out from the dark, and Mac glanced down at the end of the dock, where a figure was slowly making his way toward them.
Cain.
The rocker looked like hell with several days’ worth of stubble on his chin and clothes that looked as if he’d slept in them.
“Shit, Cain, I thought I looked bad,” Mac said, moving over and giving him some room.
Cain slid into a third chair and sighed. “Maggie’s, uh, not exactly in a good place right now. She’s ready to have this baby, but the baby doesn’t want to come out and play. She thinks she’s as big as a house and ugly as sin, and goddamn, but she cries at the drop of a hat. It’s like walking on broken glass these days.”
Cain sighed again. “I’m telling ya, having a baby is tougher on the father than the mother, that’s for sure. That’s something they don’t put in those stupid baby books that she leaves laying all over the place. The ones that she says I don’t have to read but then when she quizzes me on them and I screw up she gets a little upset.”
Jake tossed Cain a beer, but Mac still wasn’t in the mood to drink.
Cain opened his can and glanced between the two of them. “So who called bullshit and what’s it about?”
“Mac doesn’t think he’s good enough for Lily,” Jake said. “And that’s his excuse for bailing.”
Cain shrugged. “He’s right. He’s not.”
“See?” Mackenzie interjected. “You can’t call bullshit on that.”
“Well, I wouldn’t go that far, Draper,” Cain continued. “None of us are good enough for the women in our lives, not really. You just gotta hope that they never figure that shit out.”
“So my bullshit call stands,” Jake said.
“Whatever,” Mackenzie muttered. “It doesn’t change anything. I’m no good for her and now she knows. After the show I put on at the ballpark and the way I reacted earlier today, trust me, she’s already figured that one out.”
Cain glanced his way. “What about the baby?”
Damn. “Does everyone know?”
“No,” Jake answered. “Just us. Just the ones who count. Just the ones who know you. The ones who know that if you walk away from this woman and your child, a woman you just told me that you love, you will never forgive yourself. Sorry, Mac, but that’s a bullshit move and something your father would do.”
A shot of resentment ran through Mac, and it wasn’t because he was feeling sorry for himself or pissed off at his situation. It was because, as much as these two men were like brothers to him, closer than his family even, they didn’t know him. Not like they thought they did.
Jake and Jesse had grown up in a home with two loving parents, raised in luxury on the lake. And even though Cain’s dad had left before Mackenzie had met him, his mom was amazing, and Cain had always known that he was loved. Neither one of them had ever faced the belt or the back of a hand, or visiting the doctor with a mother who was coaching him to lie because it was his father who’d broken his arm and not a fall down the stairs.
That kind of shit never went away, and as far as Mackenzie was concerned, it would spill over into any kind of life he built for himself. So why the hell would he drag Lily down with him? Why would he tempt fate with a kid?
God, an innocent kid.
Just like he’d been at one time.
“I appreciate that you guys are looking out for me. Christ, it’s more than I deserve.”
“I hate when you do that,” Jake interrupted.
“What?” Mac said, sitting a little straighter.
“I hate when you talk as if you don’t deserve anything good. For fuck’s sake, Mac, you, more than anyone I know, deserve to be happy. You survived that house, that toxic mess that your parents created, and don’t think for one second that you survived it just to go through life alone. How is that fair? How is that not letting Ben win? Don’t let him win, Mac. Take what you deserve and live.”
“Jake, you don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yeah,” he said, leaning forward. “I do. You think that you’re going to turn into your father. You think that if you and Lily get together, you’re going to bloody her face or put her in the hospital. You think that if you accept her and this baby, that you’re going to be an asshole father like Ben was, but you’re wrong. I’ve seen you with your nephew. I’ve seen you with Lily. You’re not that guy, Mackenzie.”
Jake heaved a sigh, his dark eyes intense. “You were never that guy.”
Mac yanked on the brim of his cap, suddenly feeling exposed and wanting to disappear into the darkness.
The three of them sat together like that for a good, long while. Long enough for the dew to fall nice and heavy and soak their clothes through.
Long enough for each of them to lose themselves in their thoughts and for Mackenzie to run over the scene with Lily a hundred times.
God, he had hurt her.
With a groan, he sank his face into his hands and closed his eyes.
“Guys, I gotta go,” Cain said. “It’s nearly four in the morning, and if Maggie wakes up and finds me gone, she just may kick my ass. And that woman may be pregnant and all, but trust me, if she decides that she’s going to kick my ass all over Crystal Lake and back, she’ll do it.”
“You didn’t tell her you were heading out here?” Jake asked.
“Hell no. She was already asleep and right now sound-asleep Maggie is the nice Maggie. It’s the Maggie I hope I see when I go home.”
Cain got to his feet and offered Mac his hand. He shook it and stood to clap his buddy on the shoulders, in the way that guys did.
“Thanks for coming out, Cain.”
“Just don’t do anything rash, alright? Don’t make a life-changing decision until you’ve talked to Lily again.”
He nodded but thought of how he’d left things, and he knew that it was easier said than done.
Jake jumped to his feet. “I should go to. You want a ride home? You must be tired as hell.”
“Nah,” Mac said, sliding back into his chair. “I think I’m going to stick around for a bit. It’s been a while since I saw a sunrise.”
“Okay,” Jake said. He paused. “You’ve never been alone, you know that, Mac. Even back in the day…” Jake halted and ran his hands ov
er his chin. “Back then, you knew that you could count on us, right?”
Mackenzie tried to smile, but he knew it was lame-ass attempt and gave up. “Sure,” he answered. “I knew.”
He watched Jake slowly walk up the dock and settled back in the chair, cold and wet and uncaring.
Sure, he knew that he could count on his buddies, but the problem was, at the end of the day, they all went home to houses that were free of violence and hatred.
And Mac? Well, Mac wasn’t so sure he’d ever really left that place.
He wasn’t so sure that he ever would.
Chapter 29
He must have fallen asleep because when Mackenzie opened his eyes, the sun was shining and the smell of fresh-brewed coffee filled his nostrils.
“Sorry, hon. Didn’t mean to startle you.”
Mac stretched, wincing as muscles cramped and protested. He shoved his Detroit Tigers cap back and looked up into the gentle eyes of Marnie Edwards.
“I figured you could use a cup.”
He took the mug and moved over a bit when she settled into the chair her son had vacated a few hours earlier. Wrapped in a large, purple blanket, with slippers on her feet and her hair pulled back in a clip, she looked…safe. And nice. And caring.
Everything that a mother should be.
“It’s going to rain today,” she murmured, eyes on the horizon. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky.
“I know,” Mackenzie said. “I can feel it.”
She took a sip of coffee. “That’s good. Rain is good. It changes things. Cleans things.”
Mackenzie wasn’t sure where she was headed so he remained silent, and the two of them slowly sipped their coffee and watched the lake slowly come alive. They were getting into the dog days of summer; Labor Day was less than a week away, and pretty soon the vacationers would leave and both the lake and the town would go into hibernation.
He used to love this time of the year. A time when he and the rest of the Bad Boys would reclaim their lake.
The Day He Kissed Her Page 23