CHAPTER 52
harley
Ipretended not to notice that Maverick was almost half an hour late. I should’ve called Frank and complained, or even fired him. Hell, it’d be faster to bring in a demolition team than try to save this place.
After he left around one-thirty in the morning, I tried to sleep, but I was too wired to relax.
I dozed on and off for a few hours, my body buzzing and restless, before just getting up to continue working.
The problem was that I got nothing done other than renting out a dumpster and setting up the drop-off.
I couldn’t make myself touch the boxes. I didn’t know where to start.
There was just so much stuff everywhere, and it was overwhelming.
My chest perpetually ached, and my mind raced with jumbled thoughts I couldn’t organize.
Between my mother, the house, and Maverick, I was drowning in a way I wasn’t prepared for.
Maybe coming here was the wrong thing, even if I needed a break from Vivienne.
At least with Vivienne, I knew what to expect.
I knew how to handle her. I’d grown accustomed to her aggressive nature, biting remarks, and social expectations.
The dull throb of anxiety was a constant thing around her, but at least I knew what to expect and how to handle it.
This? I didn’t know what the hell I was doing.
By the time there was a knock on the door, my foul mood was in full force as wave after wave of anxiety threatened to take me out by the knees.
“Here,” Maverick said when I answered the door.
He held out an obscenely large cup of coffee.
The bright red caffeine warning label on it unnerved me almost as much as the sight of him did.
“Eduardo introduced mega-sized coffee two years ago with more caffeine than most energy drinks. Great for us locals surviving on minimal sleep, not so great for teenagers. A few of the local kids took his free refill policy seriously. One time, one of them thought he was having a heart attack because of the huge amount of caffeine he’d consumed.
It turned out to be the other drugs in his system, but Eduardo slapped a warning label on these and got rid of the free refill policy.
And all that’s to say, drink this but then drink a fuck ton of water, okay? ”
His mouth was moving, but there were so many words coming out that my already frazzled mind struggled to process. Still, I accepted the cup from him.
“You still hang out with Eduardo?” I asked. I wasn’t sure why that was what my mind decided to focus on.
“Yeah, he’s practically adopted me at this point,” he replied. “You should hear about the first and only family function I went to.”
When he paused, I waited for him to say more, but he didn’t. Okay, then.
“So, look,” he cleared his throat, shifting his weight, “I owe you an apology.”
The anxious response was visceral. My chest constricted painfully tight, forcing the air out of my lungs.
This was one conversation I didn’t want to have.
One I couldn’t have. I couldn’t relive the words he’d said or my breakdown after.
It hadn’t been pretty then, and it wouldn’t be pretty now. I could guarantee that much.
“Don’t—”
“No, I owe you—”
“I said don’t,” I snapped. I refused to unravel in front of him.
“Okay,” he conceded. “But if you’re ever open to it, I’d like to talk about it.”
He didn’t look like he wanted to talk about it any more than I wanted to.
“I’ve got a dumpster being delivered in a few hours,” I told him, desperate to change the conversation before I passed out from the tightness in my chest. “Just… do whatever you need to do.”
“Do you know Dave?” Maverick asked, and I shook my head. “He’s the plumber. I’ve got him coming by this morning to look at the pipes and get you an estimate on fixing it.”
“Okay.”
“And what do you need me working on?”
“I don’t… everything?” I gestured at the insanity of the house around us. “I plan on working through boxes… can you just get me an estimate of everything that needs to be fixed?”
The assessment that was supposed to happen yesterday never did. The flooding took priority.
“Surface value or more?”
“I need the house to pass an inspection, Maverick,” I said. “I need to be able to sell it.”
I had no doubt the property would sell. I just didn’t want to jump through hoops to do it.
It was smarter to fix up the house first than to try to sell it as is.
Truthfully, I didn’t know how much damage my mother had done to the house—something I needed to figure out, no matter how much I didn’t want to know.
“All right,” he replied. “I might have to move boxes around. Is that all right?”
“You can throw them out for all I fucking care.” So far, the only valuable things I’d found had been damaged by the flooding in the basement. I had no intention of repurposing or reselling everything. Whatever got it out of the house the fastest took priority.
“Whatever you want,” Maverick said.
That was a tall order to fill, considering the circumstances, but I kept my mouth shut. Some things didn’t need to be shared with him. Most things, in fact.
About an hour after Maverick arrived, Dave showed up, and the dumpster was delivered.
We worked for hours and straight into the early afternoon.
I dragged out box after box until I was covered in sweat and my muscles screamed at me for a break.
Only after Dave gave me a full estimate on repairs needed—thankfully, it wasn’t a huge issue—and Maverick left for lunch, did I stop.
I collapsed on the front steps, sagging against the rail with a heavy sigh. Progress was progress, but fuck. I’d spent hours lugging boxes all over the place, and it felt like I hadn’t made a dent. It left me frustrated and angry.
It didn’t help that Vivienne was blowing up my phone. I stopped reading after her fifth text. I just couldn’t do it. Her passive-aggressive nature over my absence was more than I could handle.
And God forbid if she found out I wasn’t wearing my wedding ring.
I’d taken it off to keep it from getting damaged while working on the kitchen.
I’d had every intention of putting it back on within a few hours, but then Maverick showed up.
I couldn’t explain my marriage to him. I didn’t want to explain how miserable I was to him—not when he seemed so at peace with the world.
It was easier to hide that part of my life than put it on display for him to pick apart and judge.
When his truck pulled back into my drive and he hopped out, I sat up and tried not to look so pathetically worn out. However, his expression told me that he wasn’t buying it. I watched as he put on his tool belt and grabbed a bag from the front seat.
“When was the last time you ate?” Maverick asked as he walked toward me.
“Does coffee count?” I replied. Admittedly, I wasn’t the best at taking care of myself overall. Continuous anxiety made my stomach nauseous or cramp. Food hadn’t been my friend in a long time. I lived on over-the-counter stomach medicine, throwing it back like shots, just to survive.
“My sponsor says it doesn’t,” he said. My gaze flicked in his direction at the mention of a sponsor. He added, “A.A.”
So he was sober. Good for him.
“Here.” Reaching into the bag, he pulled out a sandwich and handed it to me. The irony of the moment wasn’t lost on me. It seemed like forever ago that I’d been trying to feed him. “Eat.”
“I’m not taking your lunch,” I replied and tried to hand it back to him.
“And that’s why I have two.” He produced another sandwich and sat down with me.
He put a considerable amount of distance between us—I wasn’t sure if that was for his sake or mine.
I just stared at him while he got comfortable with his legs stretched out.
He looked so damn relaxed. I envied it. I had no idea how to be that relaxed.
He unwrapped his sandwich, and I followed suit, taking out the simple turkey and cheese sandwich. I picked at it while his gaze sat heavy on me. The scrutiny only made my heart pound harder.
“You know,” Maverick began quietly, and I welcomed the distraction of his voice, “it might just be smarter to tear the house down and start over.”
“Yeah, probably,” I muttered.
“But you’re not going to, are you?”
“No.” Not a chance.
“What are you clinging to, Harley?”
“I don’t…” I didn’t have an answer for that. I didn’t know how to explain all the conflicting feelings I had about this place, or why I was so driven to fix it. “I just don’t want to tear it down, okay?”
“That’s fine,” he said, his tone casual. “It’s your house.”
We fell into a silence thick with discomfort and awkwardness. Or maybe it was just me. Maybe only I felt uncomfortable by this thing brewing between us.
“How have you been?” he asked. I stared at him. The question came so easily to him, matching the unfazed expression on his face. Was he crazy? “Besides the thing with your mother—”
“What are we doing here, Maverick?” I demanded, cutting him off. I dropped my sandwich back in the wrapper. Whatever small desire I had to eat was gone. “We haven’t seen each other in six years—”
“I know—”
“—and now you’re just… nothing is fine, Maverick.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t,” I snapped. My voice rose a notch while the world grew fuzzy in my ears. The tightness in my chest increased, turning painful with the surge of panic. Fuck. “You can’t just walk in here as if nothing happened. It doesn’t work that way.”
“I know—”
“Stop saying you know!” I exclaimed. The breath stuck in my throat as the world spun sideways with panic.
Inhale…
Exhale…
In—oh, fucking shit.
This wasn’t happening. I couldn’t lose it now.
Inhale…
Exhale…
“Harley, are you okay there?” Maverick’s voice floated in my ears, fuzzy and uneven with the rush of blood to my ears.
Inhale…
Ex—fuck, fuck, fuck.
I surged to my feet and stumbled, my knees giving out. Strong hands grabbed me by the rib cage and hauled me upward to keep me upright.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!”
Inhale
Exhale
In—
“Okay, come on, let’s sit down,” Maverick ordered. He manhandled me back onto the steps, and I went without a fight. I folded over, unable to get control of my body.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
I tried to push him away, but he didn’t budge. I didn’t need him. I didn’t need his help.
“Breathe, Harley,” he instructed.
Inhale…
Easy for him to say.
Inhale…
I was trying.
“I need you to breathe with me, Harley,” Maverick said. “Come on… deep breath in…”
Inhale…
I shook my head violently. I was trying. Why couldn’t he see that?
Exhale…
“Stop fighting me, please,” he continued softly. Fingers threaded through my hair and anchored there, firm and unmoving. I desperately clung to the touch. “Come on, Harley. Deep breath in…”
Inhale…
“… and deep breath out, nice and slow…”
Exhale…
“That’s good. Keep going… deep breath in…”
I did my best to follow his lead, stumbling through the breathing exercises while my lungs seized with panic.
How long we sat there was beyond me. I lost sight of things over and over while Maverick’s voice was steady in my ears with quiet instruction. Eventually, the lightheadedness subsided as breathing came easier. Panic ebbed away, replaced with the familiar edge of anxiety.
I became all too aware of how he touched me, one hand in my hair and the other lightly on my knee. It was far too intimate for our history and sent conflicting feelings rushing through my body.
I shouldn’t have found him comforting, and he certainly shouldn’t have wanted to comfort me. Not with the way we left things. Not after all the things he’d said.
“Why are you helping me?” I asked a little pathetically, my voice small.
“Because everyone needs someone sometimes,” Maverick whispered, “and it sure as hell seems like you need someone right now, Harley.”
If only he knew how true those words were.