Chapter 37
Shay-Lee
I parked my car in front of Blaire’s house, as her clinic was finally done with the renovations, then took off my sunglasses and turned to face a nervous-looking Camilo, who was chewing on his gum like he had a personal vendetta against it.
“Spit it out.” I held my palm open in front of him.
Camilo glanced at my hand and then at me, clear hesitation on his face.
“Come on.” I nudged my hand closer when he finally did.
“Is this really necessary?” he asked while I threw the gum into my empty coffee cup that had been in the cup holder for two days now. “Maybe I don’t actually need to speak to anyone.” He rubbed the back of his neck while looking out the window.
He’s so damn cute.
I placed my hand on his thigh, and his eyes jumped to me.
“Yes, it’s necessary that you talk with a professional.” I smiled at him before moving my hand to stroke his cheek. “I can go in there with you if you want.”
Biting the inner side of his cheek, he shook his head. “Nah.”
“You sure? ”
“Yeah, I’m just nervous, but I’ll be fine.” He tried smiling, but it fell short.
Ugh. He really is adorable sometimes.
“I swear to God, therapy is fun.” I chuckled. “You just go in there and talk about yourself for an hour.”
That made him snort. “Not everyone is as self-centered as you, Llorón.”
I sighed and rolled my eyes. “It’s not my fault most people are too ugly to love themselves.”
“The sad part is that you actually believe that.” He grunted when I laughed.
“Of course I fucking do.” Although now, I was just trying to put a smile on his face—which worked, as he seemed a little less nervous.
“Hey.” I poked his cheek. “It’s going to be alright. I promise.”
Camilo held my gaze for a second longer before nodding. “Okay.”
He moved to get out when I spoke. “I’ll be waiting for you here.”
“What will you do in the meantime?” he asked, his hand already clutching the door’s handle.
I adjusted my rearview mirror to have a better picture of what was going on in the street before I turned to look at him, a big smile on my face. “I have something to do around here, so I’ll just wait.”
Camilo gave me a short nod before he got out of the car and closed the door behind him. I bent down and watched him walk until he entered the house, and only then went back to my rearview mirror.
“Fucker,” I hissed when I spotted the car that had been following me for the last two days parked at the end of the street.
Today was an important fucking day, in which Camilo finally started his treatment—a huge step toward his recovery—and here I was, bothered by a desperate stalker.
With a grunt, I put on my sunglasses and got out of the car. The weather was starting to get warmer, and while I hated the cold, I also hated sweating. However, right now wasn’t the time to think about bodily fluids staining my sweatshirt, as I had more important things to attend to. Without a drop of fear, I walked toward that damn car I could recognize in my sleep, my blood boiling even more the closer I got. Maybe the moron thought I wouldn’t notice he’d been following me around, but I had. The car’s windows were tinted, so I couldn’t see who was sitting in there. Not that I needed to see in order to know who it was. Pissed off and not in the mood for this nonsense, I clamped my lips shut and kicked the car’s right headlight until it smashed. Not surprisingly, that was enough to make my stalker jump out of the car with a stunned face. Yet, before he could spit a word out of his pathetic mouth, I spoke.
“Why the fuck are you following me, Jordan ?”
Diesel
Feeling like some lab rat trapped in a cage, I looked around the stupid clinic. Everything seemed so “in place.” From the vase of flowers sitting on the counter to the curtains open just enough for the right amount of light to get into the room. Fuck. I hated this.
“You can sit down if you want,” the therapist said after she scribbled something in her damn notebook.
“What are you writing in there?” I nudged my head at her. “I haven’t said a word yet.”
She smiled. “Just my grocery list for later.”
Her questionable answer made me sneer. “Are you supposed to tell me that?”
“I’m not supposed to do anything but help you, Diesel.”
Putting the book I’d been flipping through to pass the time back in place, I fully turned to face her. “And how are you planning to do that?”
“Well.” She closed her notebook and placed it aside before waving her hand in the direction of the opposite couch from hers. “We could start by talking.”
“I don’t need to talk.”
Crossing her legs, she leaned back on her chair. “I often find that the same people who claim they are in no need of a conversation are usually those to make the most of it.”
Not in the mood for that philosophic crap, I circled the couch and slumped my ass down. “Well, I mean it.” I scratched my jaw. “You’re a shrink, right? So just scribble me a prescription for something, and we’ll call it a day.”
“Prescription for what exactly?”
“Playing dumb, I see,” I muttered under my breath while sending one arm to rest behind the armchair and pretending to look around.
“You don’t need to whisper insults, Diesel. You can say everything to my face.”
I glanced up to meet her determined stare, and shit . She looked unfazed. To be honest, she seemed like a nice lady, but I was still not in the mood for this crap.
“Listen, Claire—”
“Blaire.”
“Whatever. I’m only here to make him happy. Okay? I’m not buying all this therapy bullshit. It won’t work for me. So instead of wasting both our time, just give me some pill that will make me fall asleep like a dead man, and we’ll be fine.”
Her brows pulled close, and it seemed like she’d finally heard me when—
“Why wouldn’t therapy work for you?”
My jaw twitched because instead of understanding me, she just asked another stupid question. Irritated, I stood up. “I see this shit is completely pointless—”
“It will stop being pointless the second you stop being a coward.”
Pissed off, I glared at her .
“Are you mad?” I asked.
“Not at all. I’ve just seen far worse cases than you, and I’m not scared of telling the truth as it is.” She nudged her head in the direction of the couch. “Now, stop acting like a stubborn child, and sit down so we can actually start.”
Some strange lady had just scolded me, and instead of putting the bitch in her place, I just did as she said and sat down like a good fucking boy.
“Are therapists allowed to speak to patients like this?”
“To be fair, I really don’t give a shit what therapists are allowed or not allowed to do,” she said while fumbling with a drawer next to her before pulling out a—
“Want one?” She offered me a cigarette.
“I quit smoking.”
She shrugged before putting one smoke in her mouth and lighting it. “You and Shay-Lee are so much alike.” She huffed out the smoke. “When he first came here, he also acted like a brat, but that’s okay. I’m used to all kinds of human behavior.” She leaned forward. “And if I told you the number of clients who swore therapy is crap, then changed their mind, the list would never end.”
She took another drag from her cigarette before using her coffee mug as an ashtray. She then pulled up her sleeves, and I noticed the ink she had. It was a good job that was clearly done to hide the scar she had underneath. My guess? It was a burn scar.
“I don’t think therapy is useless,” I said after tearing my eyes away from her forearm.
“So why don’t you want to talk to me?”
“Because I know what’s triggering me, and it’s not something I can cure.”
Putting her cigarette aside, she focused solely on me. “And why’s that?”
“Because I’ll never leave him.”
A crease formed between her brows as understanding hit her. “Are you saying that Shay-Lee himself is what’s triggering you? ”
I’d had those annoying panic attacks for the last four years, but they were distant from each other. Enough for me to pretend I didn’t have a problem. That was until Shay-Lee came back into my life, and seeing his beautiful face made me think back on all the crap I’d done. The longer I was with him, the more relaxed I became, and the easier it was for those demons to return and mess with my head. I saw Christian’s dead face whenever I closed my eyes, and it was fucking me. Bad . Was it guilt? Regret? Maybe just the fear that I was capable of being such a monster? Probably all of those reasons, not that it mattered. The cruel reality was that being with Shay-Lee brought it all back, and I was starting to lose my mind. But after living away from him for so long, I didn’t care what would become of me. I’d choose madness every time over being without him.
“It really doesn’t matter,” I finally answered her question, my eyes focusing on my hands.
“But it does.”
I looked up to meet her stare. She seemed like a real badass, and she might have been able to help me if the circumstances were different. But like I’d said many times before, “what if” was the mindset of a fool.
“I’ve done things that I can’t take back. Bad things. And I guess this is just my punishment.” Brushing my hands over my jeans, I got up. “Thanks for… well, whatever this was,” I said before I began walking toward the door.
“You are not bound to your past, Diesel. No matter how dark it is, it shouldn’t shade your present, let alone your future.”
My hand was already on the door handle, yet I couldn’t bring myself to push it open and instead stayed rooted to the clinic floor.
“Our past will always come back to hurt us, and it’s scary. Terrifying. But whether it’s abuse, trauma, or fear, there isn’t an obstacle your mind can’t get through. All you need is a leap of faith and a bit of trust.”
“Trust?” I half turned to face her. “Trust in what? ”
Her green eyes shone, almost like she was holding back tears. Which was a bit odd, but I’d give her that.
“Yourself,” she said.
Somehow, the kindness that showed on her face reminded me of my mom. She used to say that as long as we trusted our hearts, everything would work out for the better, and I used to do that as a kid, thinking her words were true. But I guess, somewhere between shooting herself in the head and my whole life turning to shit, her message got lost. Not to mention, every decision I’d made since her death was more destructive than the last, resulting in me becoming more like my father than anything. But you trusted your heart and fell in love, and look how that turned out . Since Shay-Lee, without a doubt, was the best thing to have ever happened to me, maybe it was time to try and trust myself again or, at the very least, trust this therapist who claimed she could help me.
“Anything I say stays in here?”
“Of course,” she said and sat back in her chair, clearly waiting for me to do the same.
It took me one more second of self-doubt and my typical pessimism before I moved my ass and sat back on the couch.
Shay-Lee
“I’m surprised you actually stayed in there the whole hour,” I said and pushed back from my car just in time for him to catch me in his arms.
“I’m surprised myself.” Camilo smirked, then ducked down to kiss me.
His lips were a bit cold, but I loved it anyway, and I opened my mouth to allow his naughty tongue to slip inside when something caught my attention, and I pulled back. “Why do you smell of cigarettes?” I frowned while giving him another sniff to make sure I wasn’t imagining things .
“Did you know Blaire’s a smoker?”
My eyes widened as fury went through me. “Don’t tell me she gave you a cigarette!”
Knowing her, I was worried she’d do something outrageous, as that woman’s methods were, more often than not, unheard of. I mean, Soren had brought me to her for a reason. Those two were the definition of toeing the line of professional ethics.
Laughing, Camilo brushed my hair out of my face before cupping my neck. “Relax, I didn’t take it.”
“That’s good to know.” I closed my eyes while getting lost in the warmth of his touch when I realized what he’d just said. “Wait, so she did offer you one?”
“She did.”
“I’m going to kill her,” I hissed before breaking our connection and pulling out my car keys.
“Relax, Llorón, I swear I didn’t smoke.” He muttered something about how shitty it was quitting when I started walking toward the driver’s side to get inside the car. But the second I applied too much weight to my right leg, a jolt of pain shot through me, and I grunted. As it turned out, kicking Jordan’s headlight with my fucked-up leg wasn’t such a smart idea.
“Why are you limping?”
Shit . I hoped he wouldn’t notice.
Forcing a smile to hide the fact my ankle was killing me, I looked at him. “I’m not.”
“You are.” He scowled, moved to my side of the car, and held the door open for me. “What happened?”
Since I had no intention of troubling Camilo with Jordan’s bullshit, as he already had too much to deal with, I came up with a reliable excuse. “Just one of those days, you know.” I tried shaking my leg a little bit. “You’ll have to give me a good foot massage tonight.”
“Will do.” He slipped the keys from my hand. “I’ll drive, okay?”
Since it sounded like a great idea, I hummed a yes and limped my way to the passenger seat, all while promising myself that next time, if need be, I’d use my fists, not my stupid legs.
“So what did you do while I was at Blaire’s?” he asked after we began driving.
“What do you mean?” My eyes drifted to the mirror, only to check, once again, that Jordan wasn’t tailing us.
He wasn’t. Good .
“You said you had something to do around here.”
“Did I?”
“Have you hit your head or something?”
I turned to frown at him. “No, why?”
He looked at me oddly. “You sure you’re okay?”
“Eyes on the road, handsome,” I scolded him. “And yeah. My ankle is just bothering me.” Lifting my leg up, I softly caressed the hurt area. It didn’t ease the pain, but it was still nice.
“Why the fuck are you following me, Jordan?” I snarled when he fully got out of the car and moved to examine the damage.
“You broke my headlight!” he whined, bottom lip quivering, while I was trying to stand straight despite the pain in my leg.
“Fuck your stupid headlight. Why are you following us?”
Looking up from the damage to his precious car, he frowned at me. “I’m only following you , not him.”
That made me huff. “Wonderful.”
“I just want to talk to you.”
“Well, I don’t want to talk to you.” My eyes locked with his. “So get the hell out of here, and don’t you dare stalk me again.”
“Shay-Lee—”
“If you don’t drive off right this second, I’m going to call the new security company I’ve hired.” Only I hadn’t hired anyone, and maybe it was about time I did. “And trust me when I say that a broken headlight will be the least of your problems if they arrive.”
Jordan didn’t seem scared, more like disappointed, before he retreated and got back inside his car. Only after he drove off did I allow myself to fully swear at my damn ankle, which hurt like a motherfucker —
“Shay-Lee.” Camilo’s voice snapped me back to the present, and I glanced at him.
“What?”
“You sure nothing happened while I was with Blaire?”
“Yeah, I’m sure. And speaking of, how did it go with her?” It wasn’t a blunt attempt to change the subject, as I actually was curious.
Smoothing one hand over the steering wheel, Camilo sank deeper into his seat. “It was… okay, actually. She’s easy to talk to.”
A warm glow spread through me. “She is, isn’t she?”
“Yeah.”
“When did you schedule to meet again?”
“Friday.”
“Seriously?” My face hurt from how hard I smiled.
“Yeah.” Pressing his lips together, Camilo tapped the steering wheel with his fingers, clearly bothered by something. “But is it cool that we both see the same therapist? I mean, you’re in a better place, thanks to your meetings with her. Last thing I want is to stand in the way of your recovery, Llorón.”
God damnit. This man knew how to melt my fucking heart. Maybe he had a point, but currently, I was too happy about him going to another session with Blaire to care about that. Therefore, without stopping to think about technical issues, I placed my hand on his thigh and squeezed his firm muscle until he glanced at me.
“Don’t worry about it, okay? The only thing that matters is you getting better.”