Chapter 8
I’ve wastedcountless hours trying to think of the perfect thing to say to Tessa to win her back. Then I saw her with him today, and I realized it doesn’t matter what I say because words will never be enough.
The wariness in her eyes as she looks at me tells me she doesn’t trust me. I deserve that, and there aren’t any words I could say that will convince her otherwise, not when all of my actions have shown her she shouldn’t. There are a few words she does need to hear from me first though, and it’s time to get on my knees and lay my pride at her feet.
I move back and open the passenger door for her. She climbs in the cab and turns her body to stare out the window. It’s about a half-hour drive to Sin and Raven’s house, but with the way she is seated, Tessa has closed the possibility of conversation. It’s just further proof my words aren’t welcome with her.
The silence stretching between us is loud. I’d never understood when people said that before, but now it makes sense. The silence is like a living thing, pulsing and screaming in the space between us. Every second stretches out to a minute, and each minute lasts an hour until the thirty minutes we spend quietly existing side by side in the tension lasts a small eternity.
I sigh in relief when I finally turn my truck onto their street. I’m pretty much winging this as I go along, so I hope everyone is around when we get back. I had a plan the night the guys and I showed up at the restaurant, but I fucked that up. It seems that for me, it’s better if I don’t give myself time to overthink what I’m doing.
The driveway is full when I pull up to the house, which I take as a sign I’m on the right track. Tessa’s shoulders slump when she sees it, not even remotely as comforted by the sight of all of our friends as I am. I watch her pull on her invisible armor, and I wonder if she’s ever considered the people inside to be her friends, or if I’m the reason she’s uncomfortable around them now. Who am I kidding, I can’t let myself off the hook and let myself believe she never cared about them. Besides, I know her friendship with Jen was real, at least before I came in between them.
I jump out of the truck first and grab her bag. She still hasn’t moved to get out, so I open her door and hold out my hand. “Come on, Vixen. No one is going to bite.” I’m afraid of pushing her too far. I don’t know what her triggers are exactly, but I know what happens when she shuts down. I’m prepared to handle her cautiously, but as usual, Tessa surprises me.
She takes my hand, but only long enough to get down from the cab of my truck. She schools her face and transforms right before my eyes. It’s remarkable. All she does is shake out her hair and paste a smile on her face. If I hadn’t just seen the pain and longing on her face myself, I would believe she is the carefree, confident woman before me right now. It makes me wonder, when was the last time I had a real interaction with her?
We walk side by side up the porch and even with the fake expression on her face, I can feel the fear radiating off of her. I hold the door open for her, and she hesitantly takes a step inside. Everyone makes it worse by turning and gawking at us the moment we enter the room. The sunlight catches the gaudy rock on Tessa’s hand, casting rainbows around the room.
Raven’s eyes drop to Tessa’s hand then at me. Raven and Tessa have grown close recently, and I’m guessing Tessa has already told her about the almost proposal. Raven isn’t subtle about her focus on the ring either and soon gains the attention of Jen and Amber.
Jen rushes across the room and grabs Tessa’s hand to inspect the ring closer. “But, I thought you guys were going to talk,” she says, looking at me.
Tessa pulls her hand back. “By talk, do you mean he was going to show up at the restaurant where Benji was planning to propose with his brigade of idiots and interrupt my night? Because if that’s what you mean, then yeah we did that.”
Jen’s brow furrows. “But it looks like Bennett still got around to proposing, and you accepted. That’s the important thing, right?”
Tessa starts shaking her head halfway through Jen’s comment. “No, Benji is pretty much obsessed with creating the perfect proposal. He had to leave straight from his race today, so I’m sure the next time I see him he’ll come up with some kind of over-the-top gesture.”
My mouth is moving before my brain even registers what words are coming out. “Is that what you want? Grand gestures?”
“Because in your mind I’ll always be a spoiled little rich girl, won’t I? What is all of this?” She gestures back and forth between her and I. “You show up on my date last night, interrupt my goodbye with Benji today, then bring me back here to—I presume to remind everyone I don’t fit in with the group, right? I know I hurt you when we were teenagers, Ford, but you’ve paid me back for making the mistake of trying to protect you. Trust me it’s one I won’t make ever again.”
She turns to Sin and Raven without giving me a chance to respond. “Thank you so much for letting me stay with you since we left Chaos Village, but I’ve imposed on you long enough. I’ll get my stuff packed up and let you have your space back.”
Then she turns to everyone else. “I appreciate you all acting like we’re all friends again. It helped me cope while we were cooped up together, and unsure what the next day would bring. But we’re not in danger anymore. I am thankful for all the effort you’ve put into looking past the, well past, but you don”t have to try and force a relationship with me anymore. Sometimes things go too far and become too broken to fix.”
“Is that what we are? Too broken?” I interrupt before anyone has a chance to address what she’s said.
She holds her arms out to the sides. “Look at us, Ford. All we ever do is hurt each other. Don’t you think it’s time we let this go?”
How did I miss all the cracks in that tough exterior she shows the world? She’s gotten so good at hiding her emotions from me that I’ve failed to see how much I’ve affected her. Not this time though, now she’s letting me see the full impact I have had on her, and it’s staggering. Her eyes are begging me to agree and let her escape. I won’t let her run from me anymore, and I’m done pushing her away.
I face my friends. It’s time to sacrifice my pride and finally do right by her. “I’ve misled all of you.”
“Enough’s enough, man. If I’d stepped up years ago you wouldn’t be in this mess right now, so call it like it is for fuck’s sake,” Shane snaps.
Taking a deep breath, I exhale and reach for some inner strength to say what I’ve been too chickenshit to say until now. “He’s right, I lied. I was angry when Tessa left me the first time, and I lashed out. I needed her then so fucking much, and she just disappeared. The thing is, she had been trying to get me to help her, and I didn’t look hard enough to see what she’d been going through since our parents came back. All I paid attention to was how I felt when she pushed me away, that I never gave a second thought to what could force her to change her feelings overnight.”
God, laying all of this out, finally giving it voice after denying my feelings for two years makes all of my mistakes so obvious. “There she was begging me to let her go with her words and for help with her eyes, but I didn’t listen to either. I’ve always known how much she loved me. At least back then I did.”
I can’t help but turn to her now. For the first time in a long time, she’s looking up at me with the same open expression in her midnight eyes. There’s more pain there, but under all of that, I still see love. She might want to hide it, but some things cannot be denied.
I run my knuckles down her cheek. “I see you now, Vixen, and this time I’m going to let you see me too.”
It’s time to confess all the sins I’ve committed against Tessa, and it’s possible I’ll be the one pushed away by the end. I’d deserve it if they did. “When she came back from Seattle I never gave her a chance to explain. Shane begged me to, but I was hurt and made sure she hurt too. The lie I told myself was that if I opened myself up to her, even a little, I would end up right back where I was right after she first left. Maybe I wouldn’t be broken on the outside, but I’d take that beating again over losing her.”
Jen gasps. “You told me that she pushed you away over and over and flirted with other guys in front of you.”
I nod. “When you asked she’d only just come back to town. So I left out that I hadn’t seen or talked to her in ten months, or that I hadn’t made any effort to get in touch with her either.”
Jen gets in my face and slaps me. “Your half-truths made the rest of us tools you used to punish Tessa. I turned my back on my friend because I thought what she’d done was too unforgivable to ignore. You turned me into an asshole.”
Tessa starts shaking her head. “Really, I don’t want to come between you guys any more than I already have. It’s cool. You’ve chosen your sides, and it’s fine. You’ve known Ford longer, and I’m not sticking around here anyway. Let’s face it, any friendship we had was doomed from the start. When we met you were dating the man I?—”
Everything she says up until the last bit feels like a knife into my heart because every word is her saying goodbye, but then she gives me the opening I need. “Say it, Tess. She was dating the man you love. You might hate me, but you love me too. That’s okay. I know I don’t deserve your love, and I’ve more than earned your hate, but I want to show you it can be different this time. I am different.”
She scoffs. “Really? What could have possibly made you change so radically? It’s been years of us doing nothing but hurting each other, and you expect me to believe that in a matter of weeks you’ve magically reformed and are ready to love me?”
I reach out, take her left hand in mine, and twist her ring until the diamond isn’t in my face. “Before, even when you were gone, I don’t think I ever really believed it was forever.”
Tessa yanks her hand out of mine. “Seriously? Now that you see that someone else believes I’m good enough to be loved you thought you’d make sure to reel me back in? Gotta make sure your favorite toy doesn’t get too far away, right?”
She shoves past me and hurries to the guest room she’s been staying in. The moment she’s out of earshot, Sin huffs pulling my attention to him. “Well, that was an epic fucking disaster.”
I glare at him. “Thanks, man. Your commentary is making it all better. I appreciate it.”
“How did you see that going, really? You were going to come in here, tell everyone that you told a bunch of half-truths and made Tessa out to be the wicked bitch of the West for the last year and she’d agree to run off into the sunset with you? It didn’t occur to you, even a little, that she’d see the timing of your declarations of love as suspect considering the rock she’s sporting on a certain finger? C’mon, man, she doesn’t trust you, so why would she walk away from the one person who makes her feel safe?” Sin presses me.
I don’t know what to say, or what to do next. I keep fucking up when it comes to her, and I don’t know how I can ever make things right between us. Hell, I’m not sure that’s even possible. How can I make a relationship work with my stepsister? That’s not exactly something I’m likely to find answers for in my psych textbooks.
After a few minutes I hear the door open, but I don’t turn around to see who it is. There are only two people who would bother to follow me out here right now, and I doubt Raven wants anything to do with me at this exact moment. She may have declared herself my best friend, but I think this may be better left in the hands of my oldest best friend.
“I failed you,” Shane says, coming up beside me at the porch railing.
“How exactly do you think you failed me? I was the stubborn ass who refused to listen to you every time you demanded I try and talk to her. You knew where she was the whole time she was gone, and yet, I chose to be miserable and alone. All of this is my fault. I could have had her in my life if I could have just gotten over my ego and hurt feelings and gone after my girl. Instead, I’ve let both of us suffer for two years, and now I might lose her forever.”
“Do you really love her?” Shane asks me.
I turn on him and narrow my eyes. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean? Of course I love her. I always have.”
He takes a deep breath. “Then you are going to have to decide if you are really what is best for her. If you really love her, you might have to let her go so she can be happy.”
“Would you let Jen go if it would be the only way to make her happy?” I counter.
I can tell he wants to tell me he would, but I know he’s just as fucked up as I am. I love Tessa, but I’m a selfish bastard. If being with me won’t make her happy, then I’ll have to change into what will, because the only thing I won’t do is let her go.