The Bind

30. Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty

Annaliese

T he sleet falls in thick, angry blobs, stinging my skin as they land. It isn’t enough to stop me, though. I force my feet to pound further down the sidewalk, heels sliding along the slick pavement. I don’t stop when my hands are burning from the cold or when the circulation in my face is nonexistent and I’m numb.

It feels good to finally have my body match how my heart has felt.

I manage to hold it together on the street, through the apartment lobby, and past my neighbors. I punch the elevator button repeatedly, pursing my lips together and forcing the tears to halt until I’m alone. Once the elevator doors close behind me and the heavy chains tug the steel trap upwards toward my floor, I let myself collapse.

I fall to my knees, holding my head in my hands and sob.

I sob because I should have known better. I should have trusted my gut and known my dad would find a way to ruin this for me. I cry for the little girl who still foolishly wants to win the approval of her dad, who so desperately wants to make him happy that she believes the lies he spews.

I cry as I say goodbye to my dream. To the friends who will continue on to the next location without me.

I cry for the fact that I didn’t renew my residency with Grace General, which means that at the end of next week I will no longer have a job. And without a job, I can’t afford this piece of shit apartment. I won’t have health insurance to afford my insulin.

I cry because as much as I’m hurting right now, what I want the most out of everything is to run to Colt and beg him to love me through all of this. And I can’t.

And then I cry for the fact that I’m crying over a stupid boy.

And finally, I cry because the realization hits me that with no one to turn to, I am painfully, and utterly alone.

I’m transported back to a time when I was a kid in a cold, sterile hospital in the dead of the night, wishing someone loved me enough to hold me through the pain, swallowing thickly to acknowledge the fact that it simply won’t happen.

I cry so hard that I barely register when the elevator doors open, and I force myself onto numb legs as I stumble down the hall to my apartment.

My vision is so blurred from wet, hot tears that I don’t register the body standing outside my door, and it isn’t until that gravelly voice whispers my name that I gasp, dropping my keys.

They fall to the floor with a rattle, and I go to squat down the same time he does, and we nearly knock heads, much like the moment we first met.

“Go away,” I mumble, refusing to even look up at him.

“Annie,” he whispers as his arm reaches out for me, but I pull out of his grasp and fumble with my keys, failing twice to jam it into the lock. On the third try it works, and I shove open the door and slam it behind me. But instead of hearing the wood rattle against the old frame, I hear the shuffle of steps follow me into my apartment.

“Just leave me alone, please, Colt.” I can barely say his name without the feeling of acid scraping against my throat.

I make it as far as my pitiful couch before I collapse to my knees on the floor beside it. I drop my head into my hands, and let it out.

I’m oblivious to most anything until I feel the warmth of a blanket against my skin. Colt shuffles until he’s kneeling behind me, broad hands roughly rubbing up and down my arms to bring circulation back to my body.

“Annie, please,” he begs. “Tell me what happened.”

I scoff at his audacity, as if he isn’t one of the many reasons I’m a mess right now. I lean forward, pulling my body out of his grasp and I reach for the sides of the blanket, pulling it tighter against me. “Just go.”

“Annie, I—”

I whip around to face him, my wet hair nearly slapping him in the face. “Go!” I bellow. “It makes me sick to even look at you.” My lower lip quivers as I continue, “Please,” I say again, a little softer this time. “I want so badly to crawl into your lap right now and have you tell me that it will be okay. But I don’t trust you anymore, Colt. You’ve broken my trust, and it’s not something that can be given back just because you want it…” A fresh set of tears fills my eyes as I stare into his face for the first time tonight. “You didn't choose me, and maybe someday I'll understand why, but right now I don’t have anything left for you to take, so go.”

“You can trust me,” he whispers into the space between us.

I scoff at that, loudly. “Like hell I can.” I turn to fully face him, pulling my knees up to my chest. His eyes meet mine, lids lined red. He looks nearly as shitty as I feel, but he doesn’t get to be the one that’s hurting.

He hands me a manilla envelope that I hadn’t seen him carrying before, and I keep my arms wrapped tightly around myself, not reaching for it.

“This is for you.” He gestures for me to take it, and I don’t budge.

He sighs heavily, setting it on the floor next to me before running a hand through his disheveled hair. He stands and pauses for a minute as he waits, hoping that I’ll say something, do something, that would indicate I want him to stay.

And as much as I want to, I refuse to play the part of the helpless woman.

He turns to leave, and with a hand on the doorknob, he turns back toward me. He pauses at the doorway and I feel his gaze on me as he whispers, “Ask me why I became a surgeon.”

I sniffle, pausing for a minute to let his words sink in. “What?”

“Ask me why I became a surgeon,” he says again, this time a little louder, his voice wavering as if it’s going to break.

“Colt…” I swallow thickly, exhaustion weighing heavy on me as I use the side of the blanket I’m wrapped in to wipe my tear-streaked face.

I pull the fabric around me tighter, slowly running the creased corner between my thumb and pointer finger. After a few moments of silence, when he still hasn’t left and curiosity gets the best of me, I give in.

“Why did you become a surgeon?”

I don’t know what I expected him to say. Maybe a joke about the money again, or the power. That he thought he could sell organs on the black market. I would have expected him to say anything but the truth.

“I wanted to fix something I didn’t break,” he says, pausing as he works his jaw back and forth. “I wanted to be able to remove the bad parts from someone. The pain, the disease– whatever it was–I wanted to be able to fix someone. I know what it’s like to feel like you’re dying inside, Annie.” He exhales roughly, pausing to swipe a hand through his messy hair. “I know what it's like to beg and plead with the world to let you go. And while I can’t heal someone’s mind, I thought if I could remove the physical pain, maybe I could give people a second chance at the world.

“I grew up thinking that it was a weakness to be good, to love, to have hope and to assume the best in someone. I decided I wanted to heal, but then lost myself along the way and ended up surrounding myself with people who have just as much evil in them that I started out trying to rid.” He takes a tentative step closer to me, and when I don’t break eye contact, he drops to one knee and grabs the envelope still lying on the floor in front of me. He hands it to me again, and this time I take it. “ You are good, Annie. You give everything to those around you. You’re strong and resilient as hell. I think you have that same motive in you. You said you wanted to help people who didn’t have anywhere else to go.”

He shuffles around me until he reaches the couch and he sits down, the old springs creak under his weight. He nods to the envelope in my hands. “You need to be out there, helping people. I want you to spread your happiness wherever you go. Let me make this right for you.”

Confusion knits my brow, and I look at the envelope in my hand, turning it over and back again, searching for writing or a name, but it’s blank.

I tear open the seal and pull out the stack of documents inside. My mind whirrs as I rifle through them, seeing everything from applications to bank statements, from letters of recommendations to copies of emails.

“Colt,” I croak out. “What is all this?”

“It’s everything you need to go back to Africa. Go finish your residency the way you want to.”

My hands tremble, a few of the smaller slips of paper falling loose and floating through the air to land at his feet. “But what, what do you mean? What is this?”

“You have a dream that’s so beautiful, and I want you to chase it so badly I’d sell every possession I have to give it to you. I’d live on the street in a flimsy cardboard box if it meant you’d be happy.” He reaches an arm out to me, fingers curling in just before they touch the tip of my hair, but he pulls back abruptly, his hand falling to rest at his side.

I flip through the papers in my hands again, seeing a copy of an email chain from Colt to the director at Compassion Cruises, confirming my delayed start date in two weeks. There’s a one-way plane ticket tucked between letters of recommendations from nearly every surgeon at Grace General. I study one set of documents that look like a retainer to a fancy defense lawyer, and on the bottom, a copy of a bank transfer of funds in my name that has so many zeros my eyes cross.

“I… I can’t.” I gather the pile of papers in my hands and reach out to give them back to Colt. “I can’t accept this. It’s too much.”

He leans back on the couch, crossing his arms to stay out of reach from the papers I’m desperately trying to thrust into his hands. “It’s already done, Annie. All you need to do is pack your things, get on the plane, and finish out your residency doing exactly what you want to do.”

“But… but…” I reach a hand up to squeeze my bottom lip, running my tongue over my front teeth to try to stifle the tears. “This is an insane amount of money. What about your plan to buy the condo upstairs? What about everything you want? How did you do this? And why? I won’t be able to repay this amount of money for years, Colt.”

He laughs quietly, running a hand through the side of his hair, and it’s now that I finally soak him in. The dark circles under his eyes, the exaggerated creases that line them. His hair is disheveled, his normal scruff thicker from days of not shaving. His pullover sweater is so wrinkled it looks like the man hasn’t slept or eaten for days, and my heart breaks all over again.

“I don’t need the condo upstairs,” he says softly. “I don’t need a wine wall. I don’t need the latest surround sound, or beer on tap. I don’t need an espresso machine that’s handmade in Italy that I don’t even know how to use.”

I chuckle at the mention of his ridiculous espresso machine, my tears beginning to dry with the act. I scoot toward him, rising to my knees to reach for him.

He raises a hand, running his calloused fingers across my temple to swipe the damp hair off of my face. “All that time and money was spent trying to figure out why I never felt like the home I finally earned for myself didn’t feel like a home. I felt restless, empty. I thought the more I bought, the more that the ache deep inside my chest would subside, but it didn’t work.”

He reaches for my hands, taking both of my frozen ones into his warm palms. Folding them in between his, he brings them to his mouth to blow warm air into the small space.

“You want to know the first time I felt like I was truly home?”

I nod.

He smiles a sad smile. “It started the weekend you stayed with me after getting sick. I woke up on the couch next to you and felt such a sense of comfort, I didn’t even recognize it for what it was. There have been many nights since then where I stay awake once you fall asleep, just to have more time with you. Dancing with you in the darkness of my living room, all of it. Those quiet moments will be etched in my mind for the rest of my life, because when I look at you, I see my home.”

My head falls forward and I move my body closer to him until my forehead rests against his legs.

“You are my home, Annie,” he says again. He tucks a hand under my chin to usher my head up and my eyes on his. “You are my home, the woman I love, and I can’t let you leave without telling you that.”

I reach my arms up, hands grasping his forearms and he leans forward, pulling me until I’m nestled in his lap. The damp, frozen skirt of my dress bunches around my thighs as I straddle him, wrapping my arms tighter around his waist, desperately needing to have him near me. “I thought you gave up on us.” I cry, choking on a sob. I truly thought that he chickened out, that his relationship with my dad meant too much to him, or that his career meant more to him than what we had.

“I’m so sorry, sweetheart.” He moves to kiss the top of my head, then digs his arms between us to pull me back so he can look me in the face. “I never doubted us. You. I had to let you believe that I chose me, because he had to believe that I chose any option but you. I never doubted you, or us. My feelings for you are the only thing I’ve been certain about in my whole life.” His eyes go soft, a look of sadness, or maybe understanding, filling them. “Your dad isn’t the man I thought he was.”

Colt inhales a heavy breath before launching into a story that has my head spinning. He tells me everything, from my dad’s initial plans and empty promises, to the threats and ultimatum that left Colt stunned. He tells me about the last three days and everything he’s done to ensure that my dad can’t ever hurt me. Even though my dad has proved countless times in the past that he’s a liar, that he can’t be trusted, I still held out foolish hope that this time he meant it. Only to find out about his plans to sabotage me from the start.

I pull back to look at Colt. “And at first you went along with it?”

His head falls with embarrassment. “I tried to, initially. That’s why I was such a dick to you from the start. I thought it’d be easy to ignore you, to play along with whatever Richard wanted even if it didn’t feel quite right.”

“How long did you go along with it?”

His head falls back to rest on the couch, tear-lined eyes staring at the ceiling. “I didn’t even make it one day. That first day when you basically told me to shove it, I think I fell for you then.”

That day in the elevator feels like it was forever ago. I remember facing off with Colt, wondering why he was being so hard on me, and I get it now.

“And the shitty schedule?”

His gaze still won’t meet mine, but he nods. The questions that have plagued me since my first day at Grace General finally become clear. It was all my dad’s doing, my dad’s plan to cripple me, simply because of the evil that lives inside of him.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I’m a weak man. I wanted to do whatever Richard asked of me because I wanted to please him. I hope you believe me when I say I will forever hate myself for what I’ve done to you.”

My chest aches for Colt. For the years he spent worshiping my dad, answering his every beck and call under the guise that he finally had the father figure he wished for as a kid. Only for my dad to toss him away like he does everyone else. I bring my hands to his cheeks, gently tilting his head up to meet my gaze. “He’s manipulative, but he’s so good at letting people believe otherwise. I’ve seen it so many times and I continue to fall for it. It doesn’t mean anything bad about you that you built him up to be something he wasn’t.” In a way, I hurt more for Colt than I do for myself. There was a tiny voice inside me that continually whispered, cautioning me to watch out for dad. Even though I wanted to believe he’d change and that he’d hold up his end of the bargain, I can’t say I am completely surprised that he let me down.

But I am surprised at how he’s used Colt. My dad even let me believe that he cared about him, that he trusted him as a friend and colleague. And maybe he really had. But some people are just so dark, so toxic inside, that they have no problem turning on those they love the most if it means getting what they want.

“I’m going to miss you, baby,” he whispers against the shell of my ear. “It’s going to physically gut me to see you move halfway across the world, but at the same time, it’s going to heal me to know that you are where you’re meant to be. You have a dream that’s so beautiful, so honest, and I can’t wait to see you live it. So go, please. Let me make this right. Go live your dream and help those people. Just know that when you’re ready to come back to the city, I’ll be here waiting for you.”

I crash my lips to his, tasting the salty mix of our tears as my hands move to rake my fingers through his hair. He groans into my mouth as his hands slide from my back down to my ass, pushing me into him.

“I love you,” he whispers, and my chest seizes at his confession. “I almost told you that I loved you right before we walked into your dad’s office, but it didn’t feel right. But I can’t let you go without telling you that I am madly in love with you. You are the best thing to ever happen to me in my forty-some years on this earth.”

My eyes begin to water, and I inhale sharply through my nose to prevent the tears from falling. “I love you, Colter,” I croak out. I open my mouth to say more, but the words are lodged in my throat, held back by my emotions.

But Colt doesn’t mind. Hearing the words repeated back to him must be enough, because he smiles that broad, hearty smile that I’ve come to learn is only for me, and he leans in to kiss me. “Good.” His hands move behind me to find my zipper, pulling my cold, wet dress off my shoulders. Gathering it all in my hands, I whip it up and over my head, letting it fall to the floor behind me with a wet thud. I reach behind me to unclasp my bra, letting it drop somewhere in between us. My nipples pebble, skin covered in goosebumps as his hands massage my aching breasts. His mouth finds my neck; he kisses down my throat and to my chest as his broad palm comes out to smack my ass. I squeal with delight, my body ablaze with the newfound adrenaline.

“Now fuck me like you love me.”