Chapter Eight
Nash
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING here?” Paisley stops several feet shy of her car when she finds me leaning against the passenger door waiting for her.
“Take a ride with me,” I say in lieu of actually answering her question.
Frustration tugs at her features, but it doesn’t deter me. It’s always been one of my favorite looks on her. The way her petite nose flares. The way she drags her bottom lip through her teeth like she’s physically trying to restrain her mouth from spouting off what she truly wants to say.
God, she’s so fucking beautiful it’s breathtaking. I mean, I’ve always known it. Hell, from the first time I saw her when I was only six, my first thought was how pretty she was. And she is. In a way that can’t be easily explained with words. And she’s only gotten more so as the years have passed.
“What?” She looks at me like I’ve sprouted a third eyeball or something.
“Take a ride with me.” I push away from her car, closing the few feet between us.
“Why would I do that?”
“Because I’m asking you to.”
“I don’t know what reality you woke up in today, but in case you missed the last four years, you aren’t really in a position to expect me to do anything you ask.”
“I don’t like how we left things,” I tell her, dropping my head slightly to keep her gaze when she tries to look away.
“Well, I didn’t like how we left things four years ago, but alas, you left anyway.” She shoves past me, heading toward the driver’s side door.
“P, wait.” I reach her before she can tug it open, pinning her between me and the door.
“Move, Nash.” She grinds her teeth together so violently that I can quite literally hear it.
“Not until you agree to take a ride with me.” I press a little closer, not missing the hitch in her breath as she stares up at me. “I just... Please.” I soften my approach.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she finally says after a long moment.
“Why? Because you think Felix will be upset if you do?” I challenge.
“Because I don’t want to.”
“Uh-huh.” I try to figure out which buttons to push to get her to agree to my request.
“Felix trusts me.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
“You.” She flattens her palms to my chest in an effort to push me away, but it has the opposite effect because the instant I feel her touch, all I can do is lean farther into it.
Fuck, how I’ve missed the way my body responds to her. A simple press of her hand and I’m overcome with the desire for more. The only thing that has ever made me crave something so intensely, with my whole being, is drugs. Because that’s what Paisley has always been to me, an addiction. Only this is an addiction I don’t ever want to be cured of.
Standing here now, I don’t know how I survived four years without this.
“Come on, it’s just a ride.”
“And what do you hope to accomplish by this ride?” She’s trying so hard to remain defiant, but I can tell by her very demeanor that I’m close to breaking her down.
“We were best friends once.” I wrap my hand around one of her hands still pressed to my chest, and as if just now realizing they are still there, she pulls the other away. “I need you in my life, P. Even if it’s just as my friend.”
“I could never be your friend again.” Her words sting, but I have to believe she doesn’t truly mean them. If she did, she wouldn’t still be standing here.
“Why?” I use my free hand to bring her face back to me when she attempts to look away.
“Too much has happened,” she croaks, looking anywhere but in my eyes.
“It can’t be too late for us, P.”
“We can’t come back from what you did.”
“I don’t believe that.”
“I’m with Felix now.” She regains some of her composure, her bright green eyes coming back to meet mine.
“As you’ve made very clear. I’m asking for your friendship here, not your hand.” If I didn’t know any better, I could have sworn a glimpse of disappointment crossed her features, but it’s gone so quickly, I’m resigned to believe I’m just seeing things I want to see and not what’s actually in front of me.
“I can’t just be your friend.”
“Then be something more.”
“Nash.” She blows out a heavy breath. “I love Felix.”
“And I love you.”
“Don’t say that.”
“Don’t say what’s true? Because it is. I’ve never stopped. The thought of you, of one day standing in front of you again, it’s the only thing that got me through the last four years. I know I can’t erase the past, but please, at least let me try to atone for my sins.”
“Why should I?”
“Because we have too much history to just let this be the end. You’re with Felix, fine. But being with Felix doesn’t mean you can’t also be in my life. I need you, Paisley.”
“Yeah, well, I needed you too, and you still left.” She holds onto her anger like a vice. I get why, but it doesn’t make it any easier to swallow.
“I won’t ever be able to apologize enough for what I did to you, for what I put you through. But I mean it when I say that I love you, Paisley. And whether you forgive me or you hate me forever, there will never be a day when that’s not true.”
“I need to go.” She pulls her hand out of mine, again as if just realizing I still had a hold of it. “Please move.”
“One day, you’re going to have to forgive me, P. For both our sakes.”
“Yeah, well, today is not that day.”
When she pushes me this time, I let the impact move me. Not because I want to, but because I can see that’s what she needs.
“I’m not giving up on us. Even if the only thing you can give me is friendship, I will never stop fighting for you,” I tell her, taking another step back as she tugs open her car door.
“Then I hope you’re prepared for a lifetime of disappointment,” she says as she quickly climbs into the driver’s seat.
“I love you, P,” I tell her seconds before she slams the door between us.
I don’t get a response, not that I expected one.
She speeds out of the parking lot moments later, knowing with complete certainty that this will not be the last time I have to watch her leave.
But even knowing that. Even knowing I’m in for the fight of my life, it only makes me want to fight harder. Because she is worth it.
She’s always been worth it.
“I TAKE IT YOUR SAD attempt at winning her back did not go as planned?” These are the first words that leave Iris’s mouth as she approaches the front porch where I’m currently sitting.
“What gave it away?”
“I would say the fact that you’re home, but really, it’s the look of defeat you’re currently wearing that was my telltale sign.”
“Defeat.” I snort. “This is the look of determination.” I gesture to my face.
“Or the look of a man glutton for punishment.” She plops down in the rocking chair next to mine. “So what was your grand plan, anyway?”
“I didn’t really have one. Just figured I’d wing it.”
“Wing it?” She shakes her head at me. “So what did you do?”
“I waited by her car for her to get off work. Tried to convince her to take a drive with me.”
“A drive?” She almost laughs.
“I just thought, maybe if we could visit some of our old spots, I don’t know, that she’d remember how good we are together.”
“Because taking her to the rocks worked out so well for you.”
“If you’re just gonna piss all over my plans, you can leave at any time,” I grunt.
“You know she’s never going to leave Felix for you,” she says instead. “Paisley doesn’t quit someone when she’s made a commitment. That girl will walk down the aisle, to a man who will never measure up to you, and say I do for no other reason than she’s incapable of letting people down.”
“I know. But I also know she still loves me. And as long as I know that, I won’t give up until that happens. Hell, maybe even after.”
“So what? You’re just going to spend your entire life chasing after a woman who chose someone else?”
“If that’s what it takes.”
“You really do love misery, don’t you?”
“Misery is living without her, Iris.” I rest my head against the back of the chair, watching the sky glow orange as the sun begins to dip beneath the horizon.
My dad was a piece of shit, but he did one thing right in buying this place. Not that he ever took care of it, which is apparent pretty much everywhere you look, but there’s no denying the beauty of the land. The house leaves a lot to be desired, but the land... it’s everything.
When I first arrived here, I couldn’t wait to sell it, to rid myself of the place that held nearly every bad memory I’ve ever had, but now, I don’t know, I find myself wanting to hold onto the place. To rebuild and take something filled with pain and anger and give it new meaning.
“So we try again.”
I turn back to Iris. “We?”
“You can’t possibly expect to win her back by yourself. Let’s face it, you’re not exactly the grand gestures type. I can help you.”
“I appreciate the offer, but this is something I have to do on my own.”
“Well, if you change your mind, the offer stands. She was my best friend for a very long time. I like to think I can offer some pretty useful insight...”
“Can I ask you a question?” I cut her off. “If you knew something, something that would end Felix and Paisley’s relationship in an instant, would you use it?”
“Why? Do you know something?” She looks at me almost excitedly, her curiosity clearly piqued.
“We’re speaking hypothetically here.”
“Okay, well, hypothetically, do you know something like that?”
“Let’s say you have a card that would clear the table and you’d walk away a clear winner. Would you play it?”
“Hell yes, I would.” She slaps her leg to emphasize this.
“But what if it would hurt a lot of people?”
“All’s fair in love and war.”
“But what if the people it would hurt are the people you want to protect?”
“What do you know, Nash?” She hitches a brow in my direction.
“Nothing. The card I’m referring to doesn’t actually exist.”
“Then why are we talking about it if it doesn’t exist?”
“I don’t know.” I shrug nonchalantly.
“Bullshit. You know something.”
“I was best friends with Felix for a very long time. I know a great many things.”
“But you know something big, I can tell.”
“So what if I did? I could never tell Paisley.”
“Why?”
“Because this goes beyond Felix.”
“Now I’m really curious. What do you know?”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“Try me...”
I shake my head slowly. As much as I want to, as much as I want to tell her everything I know, I can’t. I can’t risk it getting out, even if I know with complete certainty that it would change everything.
“Seriously, you aren’t going to tell me?”
“Afraid not, Iris.” I chuckle at the look she gives me.
“Is it really that bad? I thought you would stop at nothing to win Paisley back. Now you’re telling me you’ve got an ace up your sleeve, but you won’t play it. I don’t get it.”
“I don’t want to win her back by default. I want to win her back because when it’s all said and done, I’m who she wants to be with.”
“And what if you’re not? Don’t you think she deserves to know whatever it is you know? I mean, if that’s so big of a secret that you can’t even tell me.”
“She deserves the truth, but she can’t learn it from me. She’d never forgive me for knowing and not telling her.”
“Jesus, Nash. What is it?”
“Maybe one day.” I push to stand. “Until then, I’m pretty hungry. Are you hungry?”
“That depends. Do you have more than canned soup or ramen noodles in there?” She gestures at the house.
“I do not,” I admit with a laugh. “I guess if I’m going to be staying for a while, I should probably get some food in this place.”
“Well, come on then.” She stands, unlocking her car sitting in the driveway with the key fob in her hand.
“Where are we going?”
“You can’t honestly expect me to send you into a grocery store alone...”
“You know, you don’t have to babysit me, Iris. I’m not going to do anything stupid.”
“I know. Honestly, you’d be doing me a favor anyway. I really need to get out of the house more.”
“I guess I could use the help,” I admit.
“Then it’s settled.”
“Let me go grab my wallet,” I tell her, quickly entering the house.