Chapter 33 Hayes
Hayes
“Wanna tell me why our booth is corded off and marked for fucking construction?” Ryker asks from the couch with his right arm draped across the back and one leg crossed over the other.
My door swings open. Fucking Axel. “His girls defiled it last weekend,” he says plainly. “Put on quite a show. Your bestie here says no one is allowed to touch it until further notice.”
“Define defiled,” Ryker asks, with slight concern marring his expression.
I’m not ready to talk about it yet, but shortly after Raegan and Demi handed my keys off to Roxie, I got the text from creeper extraordinaire over there, informing me that he caught Raegan devouring Demi’s perfect cunt on my usual booth.
Did I watch the footage? Fuck yes, I did.
I was only blessed with so much restraint and watching the two of them together is my newest obsession.
I may have also jacked my dick until I came all over myself shortly after.
“Hayes, my man!” my bouncer and Axel’s best friend, Dom shouts from the doorway. Fuck. Here we go. What could this twit want? “I have a great idea for you.”
We all stare silently back at him, waiting for him to continue. He has a lot of ideas and most of them revolve around some form of nudity. I swear, I’ve never met a man quite so obsessed with his dick and being naked.
“I think we should try a themed night. Like, no pants Friday.” His grin spreads from ear to ear as he bounces, eagerly awaiting my approval.
I prop my elbows against my oak desktop and run my fingers through my hair, groaning at the ridiculousness of it. Releasing a breath of air, I grumble, “You’re all fucking fired.”
“Is that a hard no?” Dom asks.
“Get the fuck out,” I shout, aggressively pointing at the door.
Dom raises his hands in surrender, but does as I ask. Axel is quick to follow, no doubt about to chastise his friend. My dick of a best friend remains.
I shoot Ryker a pointed look.
“You can’t fire me. I own half the place. What’s going on with you?”
“Nothing. Don’t you have somewhere to be?”
“Eh. Bella is working and she’s meeting me here after work for some VIP room time, if you know what I mean. I have at least a few hours to kill.”
“You’re annoying.” I snark.
“And you’re a fucking grumpy asshole lately. I’m going to venture a guess and say this has to do with your girls, as Axel put it.”
My eyes drift to the stack of papers that have been burning a hole in my desk since the day Raegan showed up. I’ve forgotten them more than once and I’m starting to think I’m subconsciously sabotaging my own divorce.
Then there’s the matter of a certain little pixie that has effectively injected my days with energy and humor. She’s so fucking infectious in the best way. It’s hard not to love her. The problem is… she left us.
Demi’s been gone for almost a week and I haven’t heard from Raegan since she left. I’m not even certain she’s still in town. That’s how radio silent she’s been. And my days have been considerably long–and boring.
“I’m not a grumpy asshole,” I counter. “I just have a lot going on. The owner of the land is itching to sell to someone else if I’m not able to get the paperwork finished soon. He won’t give me an exact timeframe, but he’s pushing–hard.”
My door swings open, yet again and I’m suddenly fucking over it.
Without looking up, I shout, “No. Get the fuck out! Whatever it is… it can wait.”
“Hayes–” It’s the same angelic voice I’ve heard in my dreams for the past two decades. Raegan.
“That’s my cue,” Ryker cuts in, standing and sliding past her to get to the doorway. “If you need me, I’ll be… somewhere.” He’s gone before I can stop him, leaving me alone… with my wife.
Raegan doesn’t move. She just waits, her feet anchored to the floor. Waiting for what? I’m not sure.
Eventually, I tip my head up to regard her.
She’s not dressed in her usual pencil skirt and blouse ensemble.
Fuck. This time, she’s sporting a skin-tight baseball tee with high-waisted jeans and tennis shoes.
With her hair down, draping over her shoulder in soft waves, she’s all casual, all damn day.
The sight of her like this, instantly transports me back in time to the day we met.
And most of our time together, if I’m being honest. The Raegan I married had a freedom to her that I haven’t quite seen since her return… until right fucking now.
The fluorescent light of my office bounces off her auburn hair and fair skin, casting a glow that has me itching to call her my angel again. She’s so fucking stunning, but I have to remember she doesn’t want to be my wife anymore and I definitely deserve to lose her… again.
“The papers are right here.” I tap my index finger against the simple, yet elusive stack of divorce papers. “I’ve marked the pages that need signatures. Once we’ve both signed, I’ll make sure they’re filed and I’ll obviously cover the filing cost.”
“How gracious of you,” she responds harshly before taking another few steps toward my desk. “Except, I don’t really give a fuck about the papers right now, Hayes.”
My eyes snap to meet hers, attempting to decipher what I’m seeing in them. If she’s not here for the papers, why is she here?
“I’m about to ask you a question and let me make myself perfectly clear when I say I expect the complete truth. No more of this vague, non-committal, skirting thing you usually do. Are we on the same page?”
“I guess that depends on what you’re asking, Raegan.”
“Promise me,” she commands firmly. I don’t miss the slight tremble in her lips, betraying her otherwise stoic stance on this.
I nod subtly. “Fine. What’s your question?”
She pauses, closing those sparkling emerald eyes that I could get lost in–for just a moment–before sighing. “What made you leave me?”
Every muscle in my neck tenses along with a very rapid rise in my blood pressure. Not this. Anything but fucking this. “Why does it matter? It doesn’t change anything.”
“No,” she stops me, pointing her index finger at me, full of accusation. “That. That is exactly what I didn’t want. It matters because I said it does, Hayes. We got married so fucking fast, but the month we were together was the happiest I’ve ever been. I thought you were happy too.”
“Raegan, I was hap–”
“Let me finish!” she scolds, rounding my desk until she’s at my side and I’m forced to turn and face her. “I thought you were happy. Then one night–out of nowhere–you sneak out under the cover of darkness, never to be heard from again, until I randomly got divorce papers–of all things.”
A slow stream of tears begins to make its way down her flushed face.
“Put yourself in my fucking shoes for one goddamn minute and tell me how you’d feel if the love of your life left you without a fucking word.”
The love of her life. Her reality hits me like a hard punch to the gut. I’ve always known what she meant to me, but she’s right. I never stopped to consider her. Well, I thought I was. Except, I thought wrong.
“I thought you’d be better off without me,” I admit quietly.
“Why would you think that?” She lowers to her knees and scoots closer to me, placing both hands against my calves. “Did I do something to make you feel that way?”
I let my head fall, partly to avoid her seeing the tears threatening me and partly from the pure shame of it all. “No,” I whisper. “It wasn’t you. It was all me.”
“Tell me,” she pleads, desperation lacing her breathy tone as her voice cracks.
How in the hell do I admit that I let my piece of shit father get in my head and fuck it all up for us. My thoughts flit to Demi. She’d tell me to man up and just fucking tell her. Fuck, I miss her.
“My mother died giving birth to me.”
Raegan sucks in a choked gasp as one hand flies up to cover her mouth.
“Yeah. My thoughts exactly. My father has always blamed me for her death. His disdain for me started simple. Like snapping at me for little things or berating me for not getting a good grade. I remember being in the first grade and just knowing I needed to do better if I wanted him to be proud of me. It wasn’t until about fourth grade, when my teacher asked him at parent teacher conferences if Mrs. Adler would be joining us.
She was a brand new teacher. It wasn’t her fault, she didn’t know. ”
My heart pounds a heavy and steady thumping rhythm against my ribcage, increasing in pressure and speed with every bit of information I recall. My elbows rest against my knees as my hands find my face. A feeble fucking attempt at hiding my pain.
Raegan’s hands wrap gently around my forearms, tugging them from my face until they fall and drape over my legs. “Hayes, look at me.”
My eyes shift to meet hers and to my surprise, they’re met with sympathy and compassion. Not what I was expecting.
“Keep talking,” she instructs, reaching up to wipe away a rogue tear with her thumb. “I’m here with you and I’m not going anywhere.”
I clear my throat. “After that, he lost whatever filter he’d been holding onto since I was born.
” My brows furrow as she holds eye contact with me, nodding for me to continue.
“He made sure to tell me, multiple times a day, that I was the reason my mother died. As I got older, he started adding onto it to make sure I always knew I’d never be able to keep a woman safe when I couldn’t even protect my own mother.
He even went so far as to tell me more than once that he’d wished I’d died and she’d survived. ”
“Oh my fucking god, Hayes,” she exclaims, then lifts onto her knees and moving further into me.
Her hands cradle my face cautiously, but still she holds me steady to meet my gaze with her own, tears effortlessly falling to the ground in front of her now.
“Your mother’s death was not your fault.
You were a baby. There was nothing you could have done and I’d be willing to bet your mom would have wanted it this way.
She would have wanted you to survive so you could live your life.
What mother wouldn’t want that for their baby? ”
“Rationally, I know that. I think,” I admit.
“You think?”
“Yeah, I emancipated as soon as I could and moved in with Ryker. His parents helped me get into therapy. It helped a lot, until I let you get hurt while we were fucking around.”
“Baby, that was an accident,” she cries.
“I watched you sleep that night, after we got home from the hospital. It was like six years of hard work to eradicate my father from my head went down the drain in a matter of seconds. I heard his voice so loud… so clear. You were just proof that everything he’d said about me was true.
“I know it doesn’t make sense, but I loved you too much to not leave you. I was so twisted up inside, I couldn’t see any other option. I had no choice, Angel.”
Raegan crawls into my lap, straddling me, wrapping her arms around my neck and nuzzling her wet face into my neck. I return the gesture, wrapping my arms around her middle, tugging her into me and burying my tear streaked face into the soft skin of her chest.
We stay like this for a while. Holding each other through more than one cycle of tears. We cry… then pause… then cry some more. My hands eventually rub circles against her back and she sighs.
I’ve done more therapy since I tucked tail and ran from my wife. I thought I’d always feel the weight of my fathers abuse, like it was just this unavoidable hitchhiker I had no choice but to carry. Fuck if I don’t feel lighter all of a sudden.
Raegan sits up suddenly, her green eyes bloodshot and puffy from all the crying. She slaps me playfully on the chest before asking, “How the fuck did you build all of…” She pauses, to wave her hand haphazardly in the air, before continuing, “this and end up a Dominant who teaches bondage classes?”
“A lot of fucking therapy and a best friend that wouldn’t let me fall, no matter how hard I wanted to sometimes.” It’s the fucking truth. My therapist played her part, but without Ryker, I wouldn’t have survived and ended up here.
“Why didn’t you come back for me?” Devastation and sadness are all I hear in her question.
I wish I had a good answer for that. I’m not sure anything I can say will ease the pain I’ve caused, but I know it won’t.
“Looking back, I see how fucking lame it is, but I think–somewhere in my messed up brain–I’d convinced myself I lost you and there was nothing I could do to change that.
Even if I’d thought I could try, I was too ashamed.
Too weak. Why do you think I’m so obsessed with safety?
The last thing I’d ever want is to repeat my mistakes or see anyone else make them.
I knew jack shit about BDSM back then, but I know now.
I have a responsibility to pass that knowledge along. ”