Chapter 23 NOVA #2
“You missed the big moments in my life. High school graduation. My prom. The father-daughter dances and the days when I came home and just needed my dad. You missed them all because you were with them.” I pointed to his real daughters in the photo.
“You missed my life. And when you needed me, when everyone but me abandoned you, I was here. You asked me if you could count on me, and I always said yes. I have never once asked you for anything. I have never once begged.”
Dad didn’t move as he listened, but with every one of my words, the anger drained from his eyes. In its place, the same pain I held in mine.
“I love him,” I whispered, losing my fight with the tears.
Damn it, I didn’t want to cry but I loved Emmett. And I’d lost him. I’d lost him because of my own father. Even if I never won Emmett back, I’d do what I could to protect him.
“You said you kept our identities a secret to protect us.”
“I did.”
“The Tin Kings won’t hurt us. They have no reason to come after us. If. You. Stop.”
He didn’t move.
“If you hurt them, you hurt me. If I am truly your daughter, if you ever loved me, if I was ever more than just a kid you kept for the occasional weekend hug, then I am asking you now to stop. I am asking. I am begging. Will you stop this?”
He stared at me for a long moment, then gave me the slightest nod.
“Say it. Out loud. Show me that I’m more important than your broken club. Show me that you’ll give me this one gift and be the dad I always needed you to be. Leave them be. Please. Promise me.”
He cleared his throat. The silence that followed was heartbreaking. Until he finally nodded again and said, “Promise.”
“Thank you.” I left the photo and the file on the table, standing and going to the door without a backward glance. It was done. And before I said more, before I let him see me break, I knocked for the guard and left my father in that small, gray room.
I managed not to cry as they checked me out. I managed not to fall apart when I stepped outside and into the cold air, knowing I’d never be back here again.
Knowing that I’d never see my dad again.
I didn’t cry.
Until I started through the parking lot and saw a man leaning against the side of my car.
Emmett.
The tears came in quick succession, one after the other as I closed the distance between us. How many tears could a woman cry until she’d cried them all? A million? A billion? There was a decade of tears in my heart and not even crying a river would set them free.
I swiped at my face, pulling myself together, because whatever Emmett’s reason for being here was, it probably wouldn’t make my day better. I wasn’t giving in to foolish hope.
He wore his signature faded jeans, the denim molded to his thighs and falling to his scuffed boots with frayed hems. Beneath his leather jacket was a gray hoodie, one I’d worn countless times.
I should have stolen that sweatshirt when I’d had the chance.
He stood tall, shoving off the car. When I was close enough, his hand stretched out like he was going to catch one of the tears, but he must have thought better of it because he pulled his hand away and shoved it into a jeans pocket.
“How did you know I was here?”
“How I’ve always known where you are.” His eyes flicked to the purse tucked beneath my arm.
“My phone.”
He nodded.
“Why?” Not that it bothered me. I didn’t care that he’d followed me. But I asked because right now, I was running long on questions and short on answers. And I’d take whatever he’d give me.
“The Warriors,” he said. “Thought they might come after you.”
So he’d put a tracking device or software on my phone to find me.
“Why are you here?” I asked.
“Why are you?”
I turned and took in the prison for the last time. The tall walls and narrow windows. The unscalable fences and unbreakable doors. “I think I just said goodbye to my father.”
And damn it, the tears just kept on coming.
I hated my father for keeping us a secret. For lying to me and Mom and May and TJ. I hated him for making me feel . . . less. I hated him for manipulating me.
I hated that I couldn’t hate him the way I should hate him.
It wasn’t fair.
The tears streamed, dropping to the pavement beside my heels. One moment they were forming the start of my river, the next, they were falling into a soft gray hoodie.
Emmett’s arms banded around me, pulling me close as I cried.
I buried my face in Emmett’s chest, clinging to him as I let the regret and pain pour from my heart. I was crying too hard to speak but I hoped he could feel my sorrow for the misery I’d caused him.
He held me like no one ever would and when I finally reined in the tears, he still didn’t let me go.
“You took the blame for the fire,” I said, the words muffled against his body.
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Because I should have burned it down a long, long time ago.”
I squeezed my eyes shut, holding him tight as I wished for our reality to be different. I wished to rewind time. I wished to go back to the days when I sat on his kitchen counter while he cooked me dinner. When we talked and laughed and kissed and made love.
If there was a miracle to be had in my life, I wanted it to be him.
Emmett dropped his cheek to my hair, blowing out a long breath. “I can’t do this.”
There would be no miracles. No wishes granted.
The ache that spread through my bones and muscles nearly dropped me to my knees. It shouldn’t have hurt as much as it did. I should have expected this from him because with all I’d done, I couldn’t blame him.
I deserved this.
I unwound my hands from his waist and stepped away, somehow managing to keep my feet. I wouldn’t crumble in front of him either. He didn’t deserve to bear any guilt for this when it was my fault.
“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Emmett.”
He stared at me like he wanted to say something. He stared at me with his feelings etched on his face. “Everything I know about you is a lie.”
If he really thought that, then he hadn’t been paying attention.
Yes, my name, my family, my motivation from the beginning had been a lie. But the moments together, our moments, those had been as real as anything in my life. The moments when we’d fallen in love.
I did love him.
He loved me too.
Those were words we would not voice. Could not voice.
He held my gaze, silently asking if I was okay.
I nodded and took one step away. Then two.
He didn’t watch my third as he spun and strode for his bike parked beside the Nova. Then he was gone.
I stood there until the rumble from his motorcycle was a ghost on the wind. Then I pulled my sunglasses from my purse and I got in my car on shaking knees.
I loved him.
He loved me.
Words that would forever remain unspoken.