Chapter 26 Tourniquet #2
He really didn’t get it.
I wasn’t taking on something that wasn’t mine.
And I wouldn’t pretend to.
The blood drained from my face at the coming confrontation. “I don’t want Deacon to suffer,” I began.
Relief and triumph flickered over his face. “Then we have an understanding?”
I shook my head. “I’m not my mother, Mr. Raine. I don’t enjoy drama. If your truth comes out, it won’t have anything to do with me. It’s your responsibility to guard your relationship with your son. You might try honesty. Deacon abhors being kept in the dark.”
“I can’t imagine he’s going to be pleased you kept this from him. What else have you kept from him, I wonder?”
I smiled tightly. “He knows I’m keeping a secret. He also knows it’s not mine to tell.”
It was the last unknown standing between us.
The strength returned to my legs.
He stood with his head bowed.
I almost felt sorry for him, but I was too busy being proud of myself.
In the dining room, Deacon rose to his feet as soon as he saw me. Giving me a little nod, he stated, “We’re leaving.”
Maria blurted, “You’re not going to have dessert?”
“No thank you, Mom.” His voice hardened. “I couldn’t possibly swallow anything else.”
“But it’s my homemade apple pie,” she protested. “It’s your favourite.”
“It was. When I was a child. Now I’m a man and I have a new favourite,” he replied, his eyes were hard.
So, I was mashed potatoes, and she was apple pie?
If the whole situation wasn’t so sickening, I’d have laughed.
Taking my hand, Deacon led me down the hall and through the kitchen.
His father looked up, his eyes wide. “What’s going on?”
“We’re leaving,” Deacon stated. “I don’t know what Mom’s problem is, but until she sorts it out, we won’t be back.”
Looking past his father, he saw the box of cinnamon buns on the table. Scooping it up, he snapped, “These are mine.”
“Son—”
Deacon shook his head. “No, Dad. Just no.”
In the car, I said only three words, “Take me home.”
He pulled into his driveway, and it took me a moment to realize ‘home’ was now here.
By the time we got inside the house, I was incensed.
“I’m so angry,” I whispered, my voice shaking as I shed my coat and stalked through the kitchen to the family room.
“I don’t blame you,” he replied, coming up behind me and turning on the lamp. “I’m sorry—”
I turned on him, eyes blazing. “You have nothing to apologize for!”
“I know.” He grasped my upper arms and rubbed them up and down. “But I still am.”
“No, Deacon.” I pulled away and crossed my arms over my chest. “I’m sorry you’re in this position. Maybe you should have a relationship with your parents without including me.”
With every step we took forward, the fault lines in our foundation shifted. And Deacon was the one set to fall through the cracks. Turning his back on his parents would break his heart.
And it was too late for him to walk away from me without suffering the same.
“That’s not going to happen,” he growled, watching me closely. “They’ll come around. If they don’t, I won’t.”
Panic clutched at my throat. I didn’t deal in drama and lies.
This was not who I was.
Sitting across the table from his parents, I was a fraud.
Three of us in that room understood the undercurrents, while the best of us sat in the dark, his hopes for family reconciliation making him a na?ve fool.
It wasn’t fair, it wasn’t right, and despite what I told his father, I wasn’t sure how much longer I could keep it from him.
“There are things you don’t know,” I hedged, pacing back and forth in front of the couch.
Things I desperately wanted to tell him.
He crossed his arms over his chest, his eyes hard and determined. “I don’t care.”
I do.
I didn’t want to live my life defending my right to love their son.
I barked out a half-hysterical laugh. It wasn’t even my wrongdoing.
“You want to get it out in the open?” he snapped. “Fine. Is it about sleeping with other men? Is that your big secret?” He snorted and hitched his hands on his hips. “I don’t care.”
My mouth dropped open.
He didn’t believe me.
“That’s what you think this is about?” I hissed, my anger igniting. “Let me reiterate what I already told you. Zero. Nada. Zilch.”
I fumed as tears came to my eyes. They never believed me.
I scoffed and walked away from him. I stared out the window into the dark. Without the snow, the whole world was dark. “You’re just like everybody else.”
“Not true.” He huffed. “I just don’t understand how no man has managed to scoop you up. I don’t get it.”
“You left me,” I replied quietly.
“I know, but—”
Yesterday, I’d been all about him, but it stirred every bit of agony I’d buried.
Standing with my hands fisted at my sides, I fought to stem the tide.
My breath panted out of me; I breathed fire.
My lips twitched with the effort to hold back as I turned around and walked toward him.
I fought it, I did, but an ugliness I couldn’t control exploded out of me in a harsh, guttural, scream, each word punctuated by the agony of my loss.
“You. Left. Me!”
His lips parted in surprise.
“You think I wanted anybody else?” I stepped right into his space. Going up on my toes, I yelled in his face. “Of course you did! That’s all any of you thought!”
Slamming both of my palms on his chest, I tried to push him back.
He didn’t move an inch.
Disgusted with both of us, I backed away and spun on my heel.
He grasped my elbow. “Jenny—”
I snatched my arm away and glared at him, every ounce of volcanic fury I’d buried bursting from me in a geezer made of fire.
Panic welled up inside me as the anger took form.
And took hold.
Oh, God!
I didn’t want to know.
God, please, I don’t want to know.
“Tell me, Deacon,” I began, anguish rising like a tidal wave to douse the flames of my rage. “How long did it take?” I sobbed and pointed at him. “Whose thighs were you between when I was lying on the bathroom floor with our baby bleeding out of me?”
A rough cry threw my head back, and I screamed, “Who?”
I was spinning out of control, the pain of the past tearing me apart.
Leaving me bleeding out on the floor.
Then he was there.
Pulling me into his arms, he wrapped around me like a tourniquet. Bowing me back, he gathered me to his wide chest. “Nobody. God. Fuck. Nobody. I swear, baby. I went from you straight to training camp. There was nobody.”
Wrapped in his arms, his big body warm and solid and present, I cried now the way I never cried then, deep, guttural sobs that rose from the depths of my soul.
“I needed you,” I cried thickly, grief raking her long nails through my chest in her bid to escape. “And I wanted our baby.”
“I know,” he rasped, holding me tighter. “Jenny, baby, I’d do anything to change everything.”
He rocked me back and forth, his rough cheek pressed to mine, his big hands cradling the back of my head and splaying across my back as all the hurt and anger I’d buried broke away and shattered like glass.
There was no containing, hiding, or burying it.
It was messy, and ugly, and dark.
But this time, I had Deacon.
He took us down to the floor, folding me into his lap like a child, his arms bands of steel holding me together.
Giving me now, what I needed then.
It wasn’t too late.
I turned my face into his neck and exhaled the last of it with a deep shudder.
I wrapped my hand around the back of his strong neck.
And breathed deep, something deep inside beginning to heal.
Then I gave myself over. “I love you.”
“You’re going to live soft,” he chanted, his heart pounding under my ear as he rocked us back and forth. “I swear to God, baby, you’re going to live soft.”