Michael blinked rapidly as if he was coming out of some kind of spell. Realization dawned, and he squeezed his eyes closed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Fuck, Dahlia, I’m sorry.”
“No, don’t.” I didn’t want him to feel guilty about something that hadn’t happened. “We didn’t do anything. We talked, we hugged. End of story.”
He looked like he wanted to argue but whatever he saw in my face made him stop. Instead, he nodded and put on his seat belt. “I’ll take you home.”
I flushed from the memory of that night. Michael had driven me home, the atmosphere between us thick with sexual tension that refused to abate, and I dove out of the car to get away from it. It hadn’t taken long for us to get back on track as friends. I think mostly because we were addicted to each other’s company. Neither of us would admit it, so neither of us knew at the time how the other felt.
But he was my safe haven from the bad blood between my mom and me.
Bad blood I didn’t understand then, and I still didn’t understand now.
Dillon’s death had been the end of whatever possibility my mother and I had of finding our way together. I understood that. I just didn’t understand everything that had come before.
Maybe if I could, I’d find a little bit of peace. And perhaps if I could mend the hurt between Michael and me, I’d get closer to that peace. Facing my mom was the scariest thing to happen to me since returning to Boston.
Facing Michael for the second time, knowing how much he despised me, was just as terrifying. However, I’d faced Mom and survived.
I could survive Michael.
I hoped.
Walking into the precinct at the start of his shift was better than walking into it at the end. It never used to be like that for him. Not until night shift. At this time in the evening, the precinct was busier, more alive, and that’s what he was used to having worked day shift most of his career. He was worn down, but he couldn’t remember if he’d felt that before or after his change in schedule.
“Hey, Mike!” Wilma, the precinct’s main receptionist, called to him as he passed. “A friend of yours is here. I told her to wait at your desk.”
Confused, he gave a vague nod, wondering who had turned up. It couldn’t be Kiersten. She made it clear she didn’t want to see him again when they’d filed for divorce.
He turned the corner, striding down the open-plan office space toward his area, and he almost stumbled mid-stride when he caught sight of the person sitting perched on his desk with her head bent toward the phone in her hand.
Dahlia.
Michael’s heart felt like it had lurched up into his throat, and he hated she still could make that happen. Years ago when she was with Gary, he’d be waiting for them somewhere, a restaurant, a party, and as soon as he saw her, his heart would leap in his chest.
She could make him feel like a prepubescent teen with a crush.
When he was younger, that feeling made him pine for her. Fuckin’ pine.
Now it pissed him off.
Michael picked up his pace, and as if sensing him, Dahlia’s head jerked up, and she gave him those big wounded blue eyes. “Michael,” she said, slipping off the desk as he came to a stop.
Jesus Christ, he thought, taking in her attire. She did this to him deliberately. She wore a fitted T-shirt tucked into a tight skirt that was high at her waist, showing off how tiny it was, and tight around her thighs. He didn’t want her to turn around. He’d never get the vision of her gorgeous ass out of his head.
“What are you doing here?” he bit out. Michael couldn’t believe she’d ambushed him at work, for Christ’s sake. How selfish could this woman get? He had to concentrate here. He couldn’t allow her and all the garbage she brought back up to distract him.
She straightened her shoulders, her features hard with determination. “Can we talk? I’m sorry for coming here, but I didn’t have your address.”
He glared at her, hating the way his skin seemed to crackle with life around her. She was dangerous. He needed her gone. If that meant giving her this last chance to talk, then he’d do it to get rid of her.
“Follow me.” He exhaled heavily and turned around, hearing her light footsteps behind him. Once he found a free interview room, he pushed open the door and gestured for her to go ahead. Manners were ingrained in him but, Jesus, as she strolled past him into the room, he wished he’d forgone them for her.
The skirt cupped her ass in a way that he knew if he stripped it off her, her ass would be round, pert, and goddamn luscious in his hands. And the shoes. Shit, he hadn’t seen the shoes. They were high heels with a strap around the ankle. What the hell kind of shoes were those to be wearing in late October? At least she was carrying a coat in her hands.
Michael slammed the door shut behind him, making her jump. “Well?” He crossed his arms over his chest.
Her gaze danced nervously around the room before coming back to his. “I wanted to clear the air between us.”
The anger that had seethed in his gut for nine years flooded upward out of him. Michael took a step toward her, and he knew all that ire was blazing out of his eyes. “Clear the air? Okay, let’s start with you answering a few questions.”
Dahlia gave him a wary nod. Everything about her current demeanor pissed him off. The Dahlia he knew would tell him to go fuck himself for his demanding attitude. “Okay.”
“Why did you stay away all this time without at least letting me know where you were?”
“Michael, I didn’t tell anyone,” she said, her voice soft, placating, as she stepped toward him. “Only my dad.”
“Why?” The torment she’d caused still resided in him. Like the fragment of a bullet that had never worked its way out of his body. Only his parents had ever hurt him like that, and it royally fucked him off that the one person he used to confide in about all that shit had caused an even worse affliction. “You used to tell me everything. Or was that a lie?”
“No.” She was more forceful now, her annoyance obvious. “You know that’s not true.”
He liked seeing that fire. But at the same time, he thought maybe it would be easier to get rid of the Dahlia who acted like a whipped puppy around him because that wasn’t the Dahlia he’d known and loved. “All I know is that I can’t trust a word you say. Let’s make this quick so I can get back to work.”
She clenched her jaw and hugged her coat to her body. “Michael, I don’t want to go back to Hartwell without making peace between us. I know we’ll probably never be friends, but I don’t want to leave here with you hating me.”
The urge to rush her, to grab her and kiss her until her mouth was bruised with the imprint of his was overwhelming. His lust for her seemed to cloud his brain, but he wasn’t a stupid kid anymore. The damage this woman could cause him … fuck, she was still doing it. He never gave Kiersten a chance. Not a real one. Because he didn’t want to be hurt the way he had been by Dahlia.
And now she was standing in front of him and, despite it all, he still wanted her more than he’d ever wanted any woman.
He pretty much despised her for it.
He needed her gone.
For good.
“I do hate you,” he said with a calm he didn’t feel, using his blank cop expression so she’d have no idea of the battle raging inside him.
As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he wanted to pull them back in. He might as well have backhanded her.
The color drained from her face, and she didn’t hide the damage his words caused.
Her blue eyes were bright with agony.
Every instinct in him was to reach for her, pull her into his arms and reassure her he was lying, that he didn’t mean it, that he was sorry.
And Michael was sorry, but he wasn’t sure it was a lie. Because he didn’t get it. He didn’t understand how she could stay away from him all these years if she cared about him as much as her pain seemed to suggest.
Thankfully, before he could take it back, Dahlia l
ifted her chin and strode slowly past him with her head held high. But the tremor in her full mouth gave away her upset almost as much as the way she had to fumble with the door handle to get out of the room.
The sudden fear that something would happen to her while she was distracted by his words, by the apparent turmoil they’d caused, washed over him. Michael’s feet moved before he could think about it too hard and he followed her out. However, she must have started to jog or something because she was already out of sight. Hurrying to catch up with her, he turned the corner, saw no sign of her in the office, and picked up the pace.
When he came out into the main reception, he pulled up short. Dahlia hurried down the steps to the precinct doors and a man in uniform rushed down the steps after her. He grabbed her arm, drawing her to a stop.
It was her brother. Dermot.
Whatever he saw in her face made Dermot’s expression tighten. He asked her something, and she shook her head frantically and pulled at her arm.
Dermot held on and said something else.
His sister seemed to slump into him, and to Michael’s relief, he watched as Dermot led her to the door. Her brother was taking care of her.
Good.
As Dermot held the door open for his sister, he turned, as if feeling Michael’s gaze. His was questioning. Michael gave him nothing.
Yet he wasn’t giving him nothing, was he? He was standing at the top of the steps watching her leave. That pretty much said it all. If he didn’t give a fuck, he wouldn’t care how she got home.
Dermot seemed to understand and gave him a nod before he took his sister by the arm and led her out.
The ache in Michael’s chest flared worse than ever.
He thought getting rid of her would be like exorcising a ghost, but he was wrong.
Inflicting pain on her was worse than petty. It was revenge.
A hard knot formed in his gut.
“What was that all about?”
Michael jolted out of his thoughts. He cut a look to his left where Nina, a police sketch artist he’d known for years, stood staring at the now-empty entrance. “What?”
Nina gestured to the doors with her coffee cup. “Who was that gorgeous number McGuire led out of here? The one who seemed to be running away from you as if her sweet little ass was on fire?”
Michael flinched. “It’s McGuire’s sister.”
“Yeah?” She shot Michael a look out of the corner of her eyes. “What she do to you?”
He realized Dahlia was a bullet fragment. One, it seemed likely now, that he’d never be able to work out. And she was slowly filling him with poison because Michael never thought he’d be the guy who would hurt Dahlia McGuire the way he’d hurt her. And he fuckin’ hated himself for it.
“You ever been in love, Nina?” he asked.
Nina raised an eyebrow, but answered, “When I was eighteen. She was older. It didn’t work out.”
“Do you hate her now?”
“Not really.”
“You still love her?”
Nina sighed. “Are heart-to-hearts going to become a regular thing between us? Because I’d like to prepare myself.”
Not in the mood, Michael turned to leave, but Nina grabbed his shoulder.
“No, I don’t love her anymore. You okay? This about McGuire’s sister?”
“I used to love her,” he bit out, feeling cold. So fuckin’ cold.
“Ah, okay.”
“She did something. Now I hate her.”
Nina studied him, not saying a word, but it was the way she did it, like she could see what Michael wasn’t saying.
He looked away, gutted. “But I still love her too. How fucked up is that?”
“Mike …” Nina tightened her hand on his shoulder and squeezed. “That’s when you know it’s real.”
He frowned in confusion.
“My mom always told me when you love someone, even on the days you hate them, that’s when you know it’s real.”
That ugly knot in Michael’s gut tightened because he didn’t want it to be real with Dahlia. It hurt too much.
“Maybe you shouldn’t be in tonight, Mike. Your head is somewhere else.”
“I’m fine,” he snapped.
“You’re not. If I were you, I’d sort your head out. Say you’re sick and come back to work tomorrow night.”
That was the problem, wasn’t it? Because it would take more than a goddamn night to sort his head out. It had been eleven years since he’d met Dahlia McGuire, and his head, his heart, had never been the same since.
Something broke inside me after my confrontation with Michael. With my mom, I’d always been able to convince myself that she was partly to blame for my behavior and that her vitriol was not my fault.
However, Michael was a different story. One of the reasons I’d fallen for him was because he was that guy who didn’t judge—he understood that people made mistakes. And he forgave. He forgave Gary for a lot of stuff he’d pulled over the years because he knew that Gary hadn’t had it easy growing up with an abusive single father.
He forgave his mom for never defending him against his dad because he knew it wasn’t in her nature to be confrontational or … brave, really. It hadn’t meant she didn’t love him and so he’d forgiven her.
That he couldn’t forgive me, that he hated me, made me realize the magnitude of what I’d done. How could everyone else forgive me? How could Darragh and Davina? Even Dermot, who had been kind to me when he saw how fucked up I was by the encounter with Michael? He’d taken me back to Dad’s where I’d promptly locked myself in his old room.
Because I couldn’t face Dad.
Out of everyone, my father should be the one who couldn’t forgive me. I’d made him promise he wouldn’t tell my family where I was, and I’d put him in the middle of that. I’d driven a wedge between him and my mother.
I’d … I was the catalyst in his youngest daughter’s death.
Why didn’t he hate me?
Like Michael.
“I do hate you.”
During the car ride home, all I kept thinking was that if I could just hear the voice of someone who loved me, someone I hadn’t hurt, I’d be okay. So I called Bailey. I couldn’t remember much about the conversation, only that she said she wanted to come to Boston and I’d told her no. My selfish crap wouldn’t disturb someone else’s life. Again.
Yet as I laid on the bed in my brothers’ old room, I felt like that twenty-two-year-old all over again. So goddamn lost, I could hardly breathe.
I didn’t know how many times my dad knocked on the bedroom door. The only way I knew hours had passed was by the light that began to break through the curtains.
It had been quiet for a while as I laid in the shadowed room trying to pull all the pieces of myself back together again.
I was stronger than this.
I could do this on my own!
A knock sounded at the door. “Dahlia, someone is here to see you.”
I turned my head, the whisper of my hair across the pillow sounding especially loud to my ears. “Tell them to come back later.”
“Dahlia, it’s me.”
I blinked, wondering if I’d misheard.
“Dahlia?”
Bailey?
I lurched out of bed, dashed across the room, and yanked open the door. Bailey Hartwell stood in the doorway, my dad behind her.
Relief flooded me, and I threw my arms around her, drinking in her unconditional, unafflicted love.
She closed her arms tight around me. “It’s okay,” she promised. “I’m here now.”
* * *
Bailey and I sat on the guest bed, the bedroom door wide open, but there was no Dad. I assumed he’d left to give us privacy.
Bailey’s eyes were brimming over with concern. “I think I’d feel better if you were crying. This scary quiet you’ve got going on is somehow more disturbing.”
I ignored that. “How did you get here?”
“Well, I have your
keys, so I snooped in your apartment until I found a number for your dad. He gave me the address and told me I was welcome to stay here. Aydan and Vaughn are watching the inn for me, so I’m here as long as you need me.”
I wanted to cry, but the tears had all dried up. “I love you.”
“I love you too. And I’m seriously worried about you.”
“Where’s Dad?”
“He went downstairs. Do you want me to get him?”
“I can’t face him.” I shook my head. “Bailey, why does he forgive me? Why do any of them? If Michael and my mom can’t, then maybe the rest of them shouldn’t.”
The flash of temper flared in her cat-shaped eyes. “Like hell! I cannot believe he said what he said to you. As for your mother, she’s psychotic when it comes to you. I’m not saying that with bias. I am saying that as an emotionally mature human being. If Michael can’t deal with the past and move on, that’s his problem. You tried to mend the breach. You tried. That’s all anyone can ask.
“And your dad and your brothers and sister forgive you for leaving because they love you. As for the other thing, there is nothing to forgive, and if you don’t get that through that stubborn head of yours, I’m going to physically haul you back to therapy.”
I smirked at her no-nonsense attitude. “Your bedside manner leaves a lot to be desired.”
“You’re not sick, Dahlia. You’re sad. And you’re loaded with guilt. Yes, you could have come home sooner, and yes, you made your family worry about you. That is your fault. You know that. You’ve explained, you’ve apologized, and everyone but Michael is moving on. But Dillon is not your fault. None of them believe that—and my guess is that not even Michael believes that. You have to let it go.”
“My mom believes that, Bailey. Maybe she’s right. Maybe I was born to hurt the people I love.”
Frustration flashed in her eyes. “No. I won’t hear it. And I won’t let you do this to yourself. Not again. Christ almighty, this isn’t the Dahlia I know and love. You’re stronger than this.”
“Bailey.”
We both jerked around, surprised to see my father standing in the doorway. We hadn’t even heard him approach.
Things We Never Said: A Hart's Boardwalk Novel Page 12