CHAPTER 51
maverick
Ithrew all of my energy into fixing what I could at the Lowell house to avoid thinking too heavily about Harley.
Granted, it was hard not to think about him when he was everywhere.
I became acutely aware of his presence and little movements—the grunt he let out every time he lifted a box, the quiet string of swears he let out every time he dropped something, the sighs he tried to hide.
Everything he did resonated with me in a way I didn’t want it to.
We spent hours down in the basement, working silently in tandem.
I wrestled with clearing out the standing water while he dug through the wreckage.
I didn’t envy him. Outside of the waterlogged boxes that needed sorting, there was just so much stuff.
Towers and piles of boxes leaned against one another like they were one bad day away from collapsing.
Their house hadn’t looked like this six years ago.
Mrs. Lowell had always kept a pristine and suffocating household.
This was something else entirely, and I couldn’t help but wonder what the hell had happened to her.
The thought brought a familiar chill. Memory and warning wove together in the back of my mind—a voice promising me exactly what she would’ve done to me if I hadn’t disappeared from Harley’s life.
I couldn’t help but wonder what had happened to that woman, but I knew I’d never get the answers to that.
And if I was being honest, I didn’t want them.
Some doors were better kept shut.
It didn’t matter that she wasn’t around anymore. It didn’t matter that she wasn’t a threat to me anymore. I’d learned the hard way that might wasn’t something you gambled on when it came to Elizabeth Lowell.
Unfortunately, none of that made me any less on edge when I was finally done for the night. Especially knowing I’d have to be back. All week.
Going home felt dangerous. It was too quiet with too much room for memories to take over. I desperately needed to burn off the nervous energy coursing through my bloodstream before I made a decision I couldn’t take back.
There was only one person I could trust indefinitely: my sponsor.
When I pulled up the gravel driveway, my hands were still trembling on the steering wheel. The little cottage sat on the outskirts of Wilde Bay. The houses out this way were widespread, and most of them were tiny farms with porch lights glowing faintly in the distance.
The sigh of relief I let out as I turned off the truck was audible.
This place always felt safe. It felt like home.
Bobby was a retired firefighter from some-nowhere-town in Oregon, and Wilde Bay was his grand adventure of a retirement plan.
I wasn’t sure why, but he loved this place.
Some part of me hoped to see it through his eyes one day, but I had a feeling I was too jaded for that.
He was the best sponsor I could hope for. His patience and kindness were unrivaled, and he never pushed me harder than I could take. He met me where I needed him to. Sometimes it was the diner so we could chat over pie, and sometimes, he opened up his workshop to me.
The fresh smell of wood wrapped around me as I took up my usual spot on the stool, bent over the piece of driftwood I’d been carving for weeks. The slow scrape of the engraving pen gave my hands something to do—something careful and controlled—while the rest of me tried not to come apart.
“So,” Bobby began when I paused. “Do you want to talk about it, or should I just leave you out here to have at it while I go to bed?”
We both knew he wouldn’t. It was his subtle way of giving me permission to talk about what was bothering me enough to have me sitting here at two in the morning.
“Harley’s back,” I whispered.
Just saying the words felt like confessing to a relapse in and of itself.
Bobby knew everything about Aidan, about Mrs. Lowell, about the frame job, about the ultimatum, about how cruel I’d been to Harley. He never once made me feel insane for believing her threat. He just let me talk and listened.
“My boss has me working a repair job at his mother’s house, and I just…” I trailed off because what was I supposed to say? How the hell did I explain all the convoluted things I was feeling right now?
“Are you safe working there?” he asked. A ghost of a smile turned my lips at Bobby’s concern for my well-being.
“Yeah, she’s not there anymore,” I told him.
“I guess she’s in some kind of assisted living center, and Harley’s back trying to deal with the house.
The house was a disaster. There were boxes everywhere, it smells awful, it’s just…
I don’t know what happened to her over the last few years, but it sure as fuck wasn’t good. ”
And I hated that some small, treacherous part of me actually felt sorry for the woman who had ruined my life. I struggled with whether I really felt sorry for her or if I just felt bad that Harley had to deal with the aftermath.
“That has to be hard on Harley.”
“I don’t know.” I shrugged, my gaze falling back on the wood in my hands because that was easier than the alternative. “I didn’t ask.”
I couldn’t afford to ask.
“How come?”
“Because being with him broke me,” I said bitterly. “Look at how my life turned out? I’m a goddamn felon. I just got off parole. I’ve been stuck in this town with this job with people who… most of them won’t even look my way because of everything. Not unless they have to.”
I sighed, my mind running faster than I could keep up with.
“Besides, I’m over him. I’m better off without him.”
The words sounded practiced, and they should have. I’d recited them to myself for years. Distance from Harley was the smart decision. Distance kept me safe. Distance meant I couldn’t get hurt.
“How’s that dating life been, kid?” Bobby asked.
I shot him a look. He had to be kidding, right?
“I’ve been in prison, Bobby.”
“Not for the last eighteen months you haven’t.”
“Yeah, but that’s…”
“Different?” he finished for me. “Is it really all that different, or are you just using that as an excuse because you’re not ready to admit you’re still in love with him?”
The truth rose up so fast that it scared me, a knee-jerk response fueled by vulnerability and trust in Bobby’s presence.
I crushed it before I could say the words out loud.
My scowl deepened, and I focused on my breathing.
In. Out. In. Out. I focused on the vibration of the pen in my hand and the scent of the wood in the shop to ground me.
Really, I focused on anything that wasn’t Harley and his permanent place in my chest like he paid rent there.
“I’m not saying you have to get back together with him,” he continued, “and I’m not saying you have to trust him again, but I think after everything, it’s important that you properly frame things.”
“And what’s that look like?” I demanded.
“That you did the wrong thing for the right reason, and you’re still mad at yourself for it,” Bobby said.
I froze at the raw honesty of his words. Every nerve in my body buzzed uncomfortably with the spike of anxiety inside me.
“Harley’s only fault in everything was that he wanted to be with you.
I’m not saying what you did was wrong, Maverick.
You were faced with an impossible decision at the hands of a bad person.
But I am saying that I think you’re mad at yourself for hurting him the way you did, and now you’re forced to face that decision because he’s here. ”
I swallowed hard. He was right. Not surprising. Bobby was always right.
“I’m not a big fan of you right now,” I muttered.
“You don’t have to be,” he replied calmly. “But we all need someone to keep us honest sometimes.”
I nodded slowly, lips pressed together tight enough to hurt. The workshop fell quiet except for the hum of the engraver in my hand as our conversation played on repeat in my head.
Honest.
If I was being honest, I was scared of facing Harley—of seeing the aftermath of what I’d done to him.
Was his sadness my fault?
Had I broken him in a way he’d never truly recover from?
What was I supposed to say to him?
Did I apologize for everything?
Did I explain?
What the fuck was I supposed to do?
The questions were endless, and I wasn’t sure I was strong enough to deal with all of this.
My grip slipped as my resolve fractured. The pen skid hard across the wood, carving a line too deep to fix. It cut sharp across the intricate design I’d spent weeks creating. The piece was ruined. There was no fixing it.
Somewhere deep inside, I hoped that wouldn’t be me if I went down this road with Harley: ruined beyond repair.