Chapter 22Luke
CHAPTER 22
LUKE
Nothing. Damn it. Damn it.
“Damn it,” I shout into the emptiness of my Jeep, slamming my hand down on the steering wheel. “Fuck.”
Hailey’s driveway is empty. Having the confirmation she isn’t here has the anger that’s been building for the last twenty hours coming to the surface.
I don’t know how I managed to make it through shift. Quinn had to take my phone at one point because I was obsessively checking it to see if I’d missed a call or text. No one has heard from her since she left the firehouse, other than we know she made it to her appointment, which I found out from Nate was with the department’s psychologist. We also know she stopped by her mom’s house. Debra called the station yesterday afternoon trying to track her down. By then everyone was trying to reach Hailey. Her phone was going straight to voicemail, and she wasn’t answering anyone’s texts.
Quinn’s car reappeared later that afternoon while we were out on a call, the keys back in her locker. Nate and Captain Bernard reviewed the security footage and confirmed Hailey dropped it off minutes after we’d all left the station, which told me she was watching and waiting for us to go.
Avoiding me.
Scrubbing a hand over my face as I head further up the mountain to my place, I sag in my seat. I should have told her about Priscylla. In retrospect, that would have been the best thing, but thinking about telling her made me freeze. For the better part of the last year, that woman screwed my life up so horribly that it made me panic to tell Hailey about her. We were wrapped so safely in a little cocoon, having a good time, avoiding all the other terrible things going on, that I didn’t want to taint what we had. I didn’t want to freak Hailey out, or add to her plate.
At least that’s what I’m telling myself.
Truly, I’m just a fucking coward, terrified that Hailey wouldn’t believe me, just like everyone else.
All day yesterday I had flashbacks of how people in my life slowly turned against me when I told them I wasn’t the father of that baby. No one believed me besides a couple of my brothers at the firehouse. My own family didn’t believe me. My dad said until I smartened up and took responsibility for my actions, he wanted nothing to do with me.
I got a massive apology when the results of the paternity test came back, but things haven’t been the same between us since.
When my house comes into view at the end of the road, I sit up straighter, eyebrows furrowing. There’s a car parked out front that I don’t recognize, and my stomach churns with dread, thinking Priscylla found my place.
Until I see a head of red hair stand up from my porch.
Hailey.
The air in my lungs expels, relief taking the space of all my oxygen. My shoulders, which have been sitting near my ears since yesterday, relax to where they’re supposed to sit, and my jaw loosens. She’s okay. She’s here. She’s going to let me explain.
Pulling into the driveway, I don’t even shut the Jeep off before I’m jumping out, leaving the door wide open as I come around it. Hailey is right there, jacket on, hands clasped in front of her. Her hair looks a bit disheveled, and though her eyes aren’t puffy from crying, they look exhausted, like she hasn’t had a wink of sleep. I can relate.
“That woman is not my fiancée and that isn’t my kid. She’s?—”
“I know.”
Hailey’s knowledge of the situation freezes the next thing coming out of my mouth, and I stumble back a step, blinking in confusion. “You do?”
“Well, you just confirmed it for me,” she nods, her face neutral, not giving me a sense of how she’s feeling or what she’s thinking. “I realized sometime yesterday it couldn’t be true.”
“Okay,” I say slowly, then glance at the house behind her.
Something isn’t right. Hailey knows the code to get into the house. She could have been waiting for me inside, but instead she was sitting on the steps. I half turn to look over my shoulder at the car on the street. Not in the driveway, where I could have blocked it with my Jeep.
“It’s a rental,” she explains quietly. “I needed something to get myself around.”
Something that wasn’t me.
Stuffing the fear growing inside me back into the pits of darkness in my heart, I face Hailey again and gesture towards the house. “Let’s go inside. I can tell you all about?—”
“Luke—”
“—how this woman has been a pain in my butt for the last?—”
“Luke—”
“—year and how she was never supposed to find out where I went?—”
“Luke,” Hailey shouts, throwing her hands up in the air.
It’s the first real emotion she’s shown since I pulled up, and it does what I think she intended; shuts me up.
Swallowing thickly, I take a step towards her. “Hailey, please. Let me explain.”
She takes a step backwards, keeping the distance between us. “You had every opportunity to explain.”
“I know,” I breathe, taking another step forward because I can’t stand the distance between us. Physically or emotionally. Every wall that I worked so hard to break down feels like it’s been rebuilt, and I want nothing more than to smash them all back down. “I’m sorry. I should have told you everything, but no one ever believed me, and I couldn’t stand the thought of you not believing me either.”
Another step back, then another, and my heart thrashes in my chest, agony ripping through me as Hailey puts more space between us.
“You didn’t even give me the chance,” she whispers, her eyes shining with unshed tears. “I can’t be with someone who can’t be honest with me.”
“I was going to tell you,” I say in a rush, forcing myself to stay rooted in place. “I planned on it, I swear. But you’d been through so much, and everything with your mom?—”
“Exactly why you should have told me,” she exclaims, tossing her arms in the air again. “You saw what finding out about that secret did to me. The one person in my life who I thought always had my back, who had always supposedly been there for me, turns out to be the biggest secret keeper in my life. And then you follow in her fucking footsteps?—”
“That’s not fair,” I explode, waving a hand around because I need to expel some of the pent up energy building inside of me. “I was going through shit too. It wasn’t just your life those secrets destroyed. It was mine too. You wanna know about secrets, Hailey? Fine, I’ll give them all to you.”
“Luke—”
“There was never anyone but you. I told you I fucked my way through college and then half of Waco, but what I didn’t explicitly tell you is that no one ever lived up to you, either,” I confess. “You set the bar so damn high that the day I got home from Santa Rosé is the day I bought you a ring.”
Hailey inhales sharply. “What?”
“It wasn’t a real engagement ring, it couldn’t be—I was eighteen, I didn’t have that much money after the necklace, but it was going to be a promise to you. Because you were it for me, Hailey. I knew almost instantly that you were all I was ever going to want in my life?—”
“Stop,” she whispers, a tear slipping down her cheek.
“—I got off the plane and made my dad stop on the way home. Even though you had the necklace, I regretted not buying a ring while I was still in Santa Rosé so I could give it to you before I left. The way you looked at me at the airport sat with me the whole way home, and I knew?—”
She puts a hand up, taking a step closer to me, agony twisting her pretty features. “Stop. Please. I can’t.”
“Hailey—” I plead, taking a step to close more of the distance. I freeze when she puts both hands up, as if it’ll create a forcefield that will physically stop me from coming closer.
“I can’t take anymore right now,” she says, and the way it comes out sounds as broken as I feel inside. “My head and my heart are so screwed up, Luke. I need to sort myself out, and I can’t do that around you.”
My legs give out from under me, and my knees hit the concrete. My hands are in front of me, begging her. “Please don’t do this.”
She stifles a sob with a hand over her mouth, her other at her heart. One more step towards me, and then she stops, her chest rising with a deep breath she sucks in as tears roll down her cheeks.
Her hand slides down her face, joining her other at her chest. Then I realize she’s actually grasping the necklace still draped around her neck. “You’ve always been so good at knowing exactly what I need. This time I’m telling you.”
A lump larger than my throat has wedged itself in there, making it impossible for me to say a word. Maybe this is what she needs, but it’s the last thing I want. What about what I need? Because I need her. I need her like I need air to survive. I need her because without her I only go through the motions of living. I need her because I don’t feel complete without her.
I’m not the best version of myself without her. Without her flame, my fire goes out.
Hailey slowly closes the distance between us, stopping when she’s close enough she can reach one hand out to cover mine still balled up together in front of me. The warmth of her hands seeps into my suddenly cold ones, spreading up my arms and into my heart like it’s a little seed of hope.
“Sometimes you truly can’t go backwards. No matter how much you wish you could, you can’t.” The saddest smile I’ve ever seen tugs at the corner of her lips as another tear rolls down each of her freckle covered cheeks. “Let me go.”
As her hand slips from mine, my eyes close, unable to watch her walk away with every piece of my shattered heart.