CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
Connor
B efore I end my call with Rhys about meeting him at Shane’s gun range for weapons testing next week, I tell him to hack Raina’s phone to see what online marketplace service she’s using to sell her books, and create a profile to pay triple whatever the last person was willing to pay.
Rhys doesn’t give me much of an argument.
I take a minute to get my head together and finish this cigarette at the curb, far away from the store and kids. The last drag always gives me a rush. But it’s nothing compared to the satisfaction I get from Raina.
Thinking she’s still in the store, stressing over what to buy for the baby, I look over my shoulder.
Raina stands a few feet from me, her arms stiff at her sides, a cold fury simmering in her eyes.
I barely get the chance to change the shape of my face before she shoves the bag of candy into my chest. “I’m going home.”
My eyebrows dip into a frown. “What?”
“I’ll take my chances that Tahiri won’t kill me,” she snaps. “I don’t need you. I don’t want you.”
The words slice through me, sharp and unexpected. What the fuck just happened?
I grab her wrist before she can storm off. “Jesus, Raina, can you just tell me what I did?”
Her eyes flick to my hand. Not the one holding her, the one holding the lit cigarette.
I glance down at my fingers. “This?”
Her lips press into a thin line, her entire body rigid. “That disgusting habit that kills people, yeah. That. ”
“I never smoke indoors,” I tell her. “ Never around the kids. Never in places where it’ll bother people.”
I expect her to roll her eyes and maybe tell me off again. Instead, she swallows hard, her voice quieter now. “My mother died of lung cancer. Small cell. It killed her in nine months.”
The words hit like a gut punch.
“Oh shit, baby. Come here.” I toss the thing onto the sidewalk and grind it out under my heel. “I’m so sorry. Let me hold you.”
She keeps her distance, looking like all the blood has drained from her face.
“Raina, I don’t need to smoke.”
“You’re just saying that. So did my mother. She ended up sneaking around, and it made her bitter and angry toward me. She couldn’t stop, Connor.” Raina shakes her head like she can’t believe she’s telling me this. “Even at the end, when she could barely breathe, she still smoked.”
I stare at her. Her hands tremble slightly at her sides, and she won’t look me in the eye.
Without another word, I fish the pack from my pocket and slam it into the garbage can beside me. “Here. That’s it. I’m done.”
“Do you know how many cigarettes, packs, and cartons my mother threw out in front of me?” she says with restrained anger. “I’d find her an hour later digging through a dumpster.”
Fuck, that’s hardcore.
“It’s an addiction. I get it.” She paces in tight circles. “She was awful to me whenever she tried to quit. Withdrawal made her so mean.”
I cup her face, forcing her distant eyes to look at me. “I’m not addicted like that,” I say with a steady voice, leaving no room for doubt. “And as far as I’m concerned, that’s the last cigarette I’ll ever smoke.”
Raina blinks up at me, staring at me like I’m a fucking liar. A tear slips down her cheek, and she wipes it away fast with a slap to her face, like she’s mad at herself for letting it fall.
“She smoked my whole life,” she whispers. “I have asthma because of it. That near-death experience you shared with me earlier was from secondhand cigarette smoke.”
“Raina, I swear. I’m done.”
“I never meant enough for her to stop.” She looks at me, eyes raw. “Why do I mean that much to you ?”
“Because it’s different with a partner.” I anchor my hands around her waist. “You couldn’t stop being your mother’s daughter. You can leave a partner at any time.”
Not that I’ll let her leave me. I was serious about never touching a cigarette again. Not if it means it will hurt her and she’ll hate me.
Raina looks at me as if she’s trying to absorb the words, to believe them.
“We spend more time in this life with a partner than we do with our parents,” I add. “Yeah, those years shape us. They fuck us up, too. But being with someone you care about? That’s stronger.”
She stands there, quiet, confused.
“Just trust me.” But with smoke lingering on my lips, I won’t kiss her. “If I need help quitting, I’ll get it. Patches. Hypnosis. Surgery. Anything.”
She pulls back, her eyebrows knitting together. “Do you really mean that?”
I take her hand, pressing a kiss to her knuckles that look so bare. “Aye.”
Raina stares at me for a long moment. Then she lets go of a steady breath to get under control.
I watch the rise and fall of her chest. I can still taste smoke when I breathe, and it will forever remind me how my heart fell into my stomach hearing Raina tell me she never wants to see me again.
Talk about aversion therapy.
“I didn’t think I could want someone this much,” I whisper, my thumb brushing over the edge of her jaw. “Didn’t know I could be afraid to lose something.”
Her lips part, but she doesn’t speak.
“You said you didn’t want anything to do with me,” I go on, voice hoarse. “And I believed you.”
She flinches. “Connor, I was scared. Shocked.”
“I’ve killed for less than what that did to me,” I murmur, my forehead tipping to hers. “If throwing away a pack of cigarettes means maybe you’ll stay, then I’ll never light one again.”
Her breath hitches.
And for a few seconds, neither of us speaks. Then I pull her hand to my chest, right over the part of me she’s already ruined.
“Let’s go home, so I can prove again and again how much you mean to me.”