Chapter 56
WILDER
I’m still shaking as I pull my truck onto the highway in the direction of where, I don’t even fucking know, hating myself that I left Maisie, that look of hurt and confusion etched onto her pretty face because I couldn’t…
I just… I had to get out.
It felt like the walls were closing in. My chest felt tight, my skin prickling with tension, my lungs constricting until I couldn’t breathe. Fucking suffocating.
I’ve done a lot of shit in my life. A lot of shit that I shouldn’t have. Some that I regret.
But I would never forgive myself if I raised my voice at her or if I lost my shit in front of her and did something irreparable, like scare her.
I was teetering on the edge, desperately trying to calm the storm of rage spiraling inside of me and failing.
Just like I always am.
Never in control when I need it most.
Fuck. Fuck. FUCK!
I hit the wheel once, and then again, roaring. The sound bounces around the cabin of my truck, and I sigh, pushing out exhale after shuddering exhale in an attempt to calm myself.
It took every ounce of restraint inside of me not to immediately call Tara and tell her to go fuck herself.
To tell her that if she ever comes near Maisie again, I’m not responsible for what happens to her.
To respond to her messages and tell her to do whatever the fuck she wanted with them because I didn’t give a shit if I lost my job.
Truthfully, I don’t.
The only thing on my mind isn’t what’s going to happen to me, but what’s going to happen to Maisie.
How is this going to affect her?
My fingers tighten around the steering wheel when my mind circles back to the fact that Tara had someone following us. Undoubtedly a criminal, probably someone as lowlife and dangerous as she is. Someone was this close to the person that I love more than my own fucking life.
My heart jerks inside my chest at the admission.
Fuck.
I… love her.
I love Maisie so goddamn much that I’d give my own life for hers.
I love her so much that the thought of losing her makes me want to find this motherfucker, whoever they are, and choke them with my bare hands. Fuck, if anything happens to her, if this fucker gets anywhere near her again, I’ll be the one doing the prison time.
I turn the wheel and pull off the highway into a parking lot because I’m shaking so badly I’m worried I might end up in a ditch somewhere.
Slamming the shifter into park, I suck in a harsh breath, squeezing my eyes so tightly shut that spots dance behind my eyelids.
Out of all of my mother’s transgressions… threatening the woman I love is the worst of them. One that I can never allow her to get away with.
But, fuck, how am I supposed to fix this?
How do I make sure this shit never touches Maisie? How do I protect her?
What the fuck am I going to do?
My phone vibrates beside me, but I ignore it, forcing myself to continue breathing, in and out.
Deep and slow.
Slow and deep.
I have to clear my head so I can fucking think straight and figure out what I need to do.
I can’t do that if I’m crashing out the way I am right now.
Maisie’s sweet smile flits into my head from just this morning when I pulled her into my arms, her eyes gleaming with affection as she burrowed into my chest.
I think about how happy she makes me. How often I find myself smiling around her, when before I met her… I can’t even remember the last time I truly smiled or laughed.
I think about how she has so easily given me so much of herself, even when I couldn’t give her anything in return.
She understood and loved me despite it.
And I just fucking ran out on her because I couldn’t handle my emotions. My anger.
I couldn’t control it. Again.
But goddamnit, she deserves more than that.
I drag my hand across my mouth and blow out a breath as my temper begins to settle and guilt and… shame set in.
I just fucking left her to deal with processing this all alone because I wasn’t thinking straight.
Because it’s easier to fall back into the same shit, the same patterns of not coping, not facing anything in my life head-on.
And Maisie deserves more than that.
If there is anything at all that I have learned from falling for her, it’s that everything is so much lighter with Maisie.
When I give her these pieces that feel too fucking heavy, she makes it easier to breathe.
She makes me believe in things that I never thought possible.
Things that I never allowed myself to have hope in.
She gives me the strength to face these demons head-on, to confront my past instead of hiding from it, knowing that she’s going to be there through it all. Even when it’s fucking brutal.
She’s taught me that love isn’t the weakness I believed it was. Not the real kind that you can feel beating in your chest alongside the beat of your heart.
That love is strength when it feels impossible.
My fingers still shake as I put my truck into drive and pull out of the parking lot and back onto the highway.
There’s only one place to start.
And that’s with the woman I love.