19. Lila
CHAPTER 19
Lila
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I groaned as I watched the life quite literally drain from my laptop. I brought it with me to work today, hoping I’d be able to get something done on my break only to have my MacBook die on me. It was an older model I bought off another student when I was in college, and it had survived since then. Until now.
I tried to turn it back on, re-plugged the charger, and watched as it rebooted only to turn on for a second before the screen went black again.
I slammed the laptop shut and blew out a deep breath. Tears pricked my eyes and I fought to keep them at bay. After the morning I’d had, I was really hitting my limit of how much I could handle in a day.
My phone rung all night which meant I hadn’t slept at all. It didn’t matter how many times I blocked the number, because another one would pop up and do the same thing.
I was exhausted and frustrated so I answered only to tell my mother to stop calling me.
That turned into a screaming match—on her end—followed by me hanging up on her. You’d think the calls would have stopped after that. My mother, when angry, liked to hurt others. It was a fact I learned the hard way. Last night, she felt like hurting me and it worked.
I hated that it had worked.
When I couldn’t take it anymore, I shut my phone off and curled up on bed feeling sick with exhaustion and stress. It wasn’t long before River came into the room to sleep in bed with me. Try as I did to glue a smile to my face this morning, I found myself constantly fighting the tears whenever I thought about the things Irene had said to me.
I stared at the smiley face sticker River had put on the cover of my laptop a long time ago. I shook my head as I smoothed out a corner that had started to curl upward with my finger. The application I’d started to fill out was 50 percent of the way completed when my computer stopped working, and I had no way of knowing if anything saved or if I’d have to start all over again.
Maybe it was for the best.
Maybe this was a sign that it wasn’t meant to be and this whole thing was a mistake.
After years of struggling to keep a job that barely paid enough, I’d considered going back to college. Take a few courses online and see if I could do it. If I could get scholarships or financial aid like I did last time, I could probably get by without having to take out a huge loan.
I was looking at a nursing program I thought I’d apply for once I got all my prerequisites done in college.
Only now, looking at the program—and the tuition—was overwhelming, and I always second guessed myself, putting it off for another day.
I did the math and if I didn’t get some financial help, there was no way I’d be able to afford the textbooks let alone the tuition .
Still…I wanted to try.
Why couldn’t I just try without being so damn scared?
I wiped my face, hating that the tears were still fighting me. I needed to get out of the break room and behind the bar. I had to keep my mind from reeling any more than it already was.
Shoving my laptop into my tote bag, I didn’t realize it was already on the edge of the chair. Before I could catch it, my tote bag toppled off the chair and all of my belongings spilled out. If my computer wasn’t already broken, I would have to say it crashing to the floor would have done it.
I let out a humorless laugh. “Damn it.” I let out a deep breath and dropped to my knees to start picking up the mess I’d made. A lump formed in my throat and this time I couldn’t stop the tears from coming.
I was glad there wasn’t anyone in here since things had started to pick up in the bar. Saul and his band of buddies had been keeping Desi and Jake busy right as the band came in to play for the crowd that would trickle in later.
Once I gathered my things and shoved them back into my bag, I tossed it onto the chair and sat down.
I tried to take deep breaths like I used to when I was a teenager to stop myself from crying, because once the crying started there was no stopping. However, doing that only made tears roll down my cheeks. The crying led to me getting angry at myself for losing control.
I leaned forward and covered my face with my hands. I don’t know how long I stayed there, crying in silence, before a strong hand gently touched my back. “Delilah?”
Travis. I hadn’t heard him come in. He was the last person I wanted to see right now.
“Talk to me, darlin’. What’s going on?” I heard him say as he came around the chair I was sitting in .
I shook my head but that didn’t seem to convince him to leave me alone.
“Delilah, you’re scaring me.” He curled his fingers under my chin, forcing me to look at the worry etched across his face. His deep voice shouldn’t have been so gentle, as comforting as it was in this moment. But it was. “Did someone upset you?”
The fact that his mind immediately went into protector mode at the thought of someone upsetting me would have made me laugh if I weren’t such a mess right now.
“No…”
He reached up and wiped away another tear that rolled down my cheek.
“I just need a second,” I said through my tears before a small sob escaped me.
“Okay, take all the time you need.” His hand started to rub my back, and he remained crouched in front of me the whole time. Letting me cry it out. It took a few minutes, but eventually my shaky hands stopped trembling in his. I must not have noticed when he’d started holding my hands.
“I hate seeing you cry. Always have,” he murmured.
“I’m not a fan of it either.” I tried to make a joke, but he didn’t smile. Just watched me, keeping his hold on my hands gentle. “Travis?”
“Yes?”
We were leaning toward each other, so close we could share a breath.
“Can you…can you hold me?” I almost started crying again when, without a moment’s hesitation, he pulled me to him. His arms wrapped around me, letting me melt into him completely. I pressed my cheek against his broad chest, listening to his heart beating with heavy thumps .
After a beat of silence, he asked, “Do you want to talk about it?”
I thought about saying no. Not wanting to unload my baggage that was practically overflowing at this point. Continue to carry it all on my own like I always had.
Except, I didn’t want to carry it anymore. I was tired of feeling like my head was constantly being pushed under water, slowly drowning in my own loneliness and sadness. For once, I wanted to take the hand desperately trying to reach out from the surface.
I said against his chest, “I’m just…tired.”
He took a deep breath, chest rising and falling. “Of what?”
“Failing. Trying. All of it. I don’t know…” My voice cracked and his hold on me tightened. “I’m trying so hard, and it doesn’t feel like it’s enough.”
“Hey.” Travis made me lean back so he could look at me. His entire expression looked helpless when he noticed there were more tears.
“You’re not failing, Delilah.”
I forced out a dry laugh. “I have so much I have to do, and I can barely get it together on a good day. What do you call that?”
He ran the back of his knuckles across my cheek. “Your mother called you again, didn’t she?”
“How did you?—”
“River overheard you last night.”
My shoulders dropped, mortified that my brother heard any part of my conversation with Irene. I tried to put some distance between us, but Travis said, “You’re not failing. But you are running yourself down. I don’t want to imagine what you would have done if my parents hadn’t insisted on babysitting River for you. I don’t know how you managed to do everything on your own up until this point. You do so much for that little boy but nothing for yourself.”
I tried to deny it, but he leveled me with a look that challenged me to try it.
Damn him for knowing me so well.
My fingers played with the button of his white shirt. “I wanted to apply for college again. At least try, but with River and the lack of money…I don’t see a point. I can’t be everywhere at once without failing somewhere. Ever since she’s started calling again, all I can hear is her saying that I’m just like her. What if that’s true? What if by failing, I give up and lose everything that matters? I can’t risk that.”
He was quiet, letting me talk it all out more for myself than for him. Still, he waited until I was done before asking, “Do you want to go to college?”
“I just said?—”
“Forget the fears. Forget about your mother. What do you want right now, in this moment? Because there isn’t anyone stopping you right now, and if there is tell me who they are, and I’ll set them straight. What do you want, Delilah?”
What do you want?
Did he know what that question meant to me? That someone was finally asking me what I wanted for a change? It was a seemingly insignificant question, but to me it meant the world.
“I want to go back to school. I don’t want to be scared anymore.” I meant it. There was no fear this time when I said it even if I had my doubts. The fear came with admitting that what I wanted was purely selfish. It had nothing to do with protecting anyone or doing the right thing. Now that I said it out loud to him, it felt a little less scary. Because he wasn’t judging me for wanting more than being just River’s guardian— something I would always be grateful for—but I wanted more for myself.
“There she is.” A smile touched his lips, and he tilted his head. “What else do you want?”
“I want to be able to sleep through the night without having my mother calling me constantly. Maybe change my phone number. I don’t know.” I tried to play that last part off as a joke, but Travis merely nodded.
“We can do that, how about we go tomorrow morning?” When I nodded, he leaned in and kissed the top of my head again. “Then that’s what we’ll do.”
We.
I realized he’d been on his knees in front of me while I sat on the chair all this time. But having him so close and allowing myself to take comfort in him even if for a few minutes, felt good. Better than good.
We stood together and once he was sure I was okay, he said he’d be out on the main floor until I felt comfortable going back out there.
“Thank you, Travis.”
“Anything for you, Delilah,” he said, meaning every word.
He turned and made to head for the door. I watched him, and something screamed at me in the back of my mind. So desperate and powerful that I couldn’t ignore it.
What do you want?
What I wanted was simple yet terrifying. It felt terrifying even as I reached for his hand to stop him from leaving.
“What’s wrong?” he asked me when he turned to face me.
I licked my lips, feeling my blood heat when his eyes went to my mouth.
“I thought of something else that I want.” He could easily reject me. God knows I did the same to him in the past. Still, I said, “I want you to kiss me.”
His face became an unreadable mask and the second the words left my mouth I knew I’d made a huge mistake. Oh god, I was such an idiot. I tried to fix what I just said quickly and started to walk around him. “Forget I said anything. You know what, let’s just forget we even know each other, how about that? I should really get back to work.”
His hand slammed on the door before I could open it, startling me. I grimaced, slowly looking up at him. His face was still void of any emotion but his eyes were sharp, focused solely on me. “Forget. You think I can ever forget what you just said?” My breath caught in my throat as he slowly captured my face in his hands. “I couldn’t forget it even if I tried.”
Before I could say another word, he closed the space between us and leaned down to kiss me. The moment our lips brushed, I felt my whole world shift. My heart start back to life. As if I hadn’t been living up until this very moment.
His lips were soft against mine as we kissed, slow and short at first. Gentle pecks that gave me time to relish in the fact that Travis Adler was kissing me again. I lost all track of time. Kissing him was like having a first sip of hot coffee in the morning, rich and strong. Addicting. When we stopped for a brief second, we stared into each other’s eyes. Searching and curious, both in awe of each other. As if neither of us could believe this was happening. I felt him smile against my lips as he kissed me again.
Our short kisses turned longer when I went up on my tiptoes and wound my arms behind his neck. He took that as an invitation to deepen the kiss as his hand dug into my hair, tugging me back just enough .
I sighed when his tongue traced my lips. A silent request I was more than happy to grant.
The sound of the band starting to play reverberated through the walls. The music might as well have been a breeze because neither of us reacted to it as we consumed every sigh and whisper shared between each other.
Travis pushed us away from the door. He walked me backward, never once letting me come up to catch my breath. When my back hit another surface, I pulled my lips away from his to see that he’d backed me up against the counter along the wall which was home to an old coffee machine and a stainless-steel sink on the far left.
He lifted me off the ground and placed me onto the counter, making me gasp.
“Travis—”
“No, not yet,” he said against my cheek before placing a kiss there, then nipped at my jaw. I gasped at the sensations he was reawakening in me, lighting my skin on fire with a desire for him that I couldn’t ignore anymore, once-buried memories of him rushing to the surface. It felt too good. Too important not to give into this moment with him. He left open-mouthed kisses down the column of my neck before he murmured, “You starved me for four years, Delilah. And now that I’ve finally gotten a taste of you, I’m just getting started.”
A dull ache started between my thighs, making me lose what little control I had when it came to him. My legs came around his hips, needing him closer, and he groaned as if this was the best thing that could have happened to him.
I seconded that sentiment.
My hand fisted his shirt, ready to pull him back up to my lips when suddenly we heard the door fling open.
“Whoa!” The sound of Finn’s voice whooping made me nearly jump out of my skin. My eyes widened, and Travis shifted so that his broad back shielded me completely from view. “Ever heard of getting a room, you two?”
“We were in a room. Get out.” He blew out a harsh breath of frustration. His annoyance only grew when Wren’s voice joined Finn’s. Adding to my humiliation.
“Is she in there? Why are you making that face— ohhhh. I see.” Wren sounded a little too happy. I chanced a peek over Travis’s arm and spotted the twins standing in the doorway, both sporting grins as they looked to one another.
“Oh my god.” I tried to shimmy off the counter, but Travis wouldn’t budge. I’d take that as a good thing because the face he was currently making was murderous as he leveled his siblings with a glare.
Wren continued. “I was just coming in to see Lila. Desi told me she was in here, but I see you already found her. Please hide any bits that may be hanging out, I’d like to not have to wash my eyes out today.”
“Wren,” Travis practically barked over his shoulder.
“Right, sorry. Uh, have fun. Make sure to disinfect the counters if you…you know.”
“What she meant to say was use protection and lock the door this time!” Finn grunted in pain, and I imagined Wren punching him in the gut before the door was slammed shut behind them. Their laughter echoing down the hall.
I covered my flushed face with my hands, muffling my laugh.
“They’re dead to me.” Travis blew out a breath, still keeping me caged in against the counter. It took him a few seconds but eventually he chuckled despite his terse words when he noticed I was giggling to myself, resting my head against his chest.
“I can never look them in the eyes again. ”
“They won’t mention it, don’t worry. They like to make jokes, but they like you.”
I smiled. “They still like me, after all these years?”
Travis rolled his eyes, but he was smiling too. “I think they like you more than they like me.”
“That’s not that impressive then.” He poked my side and I laughed. My hands smoothed over his now wrinkled shirt from where I’d gripped it earlier.
I wanted him to know that kissing him wasn’t just some fleeting, impulsive thing between us. I wanted more, I just wasn’t sure what that meant for us.
Before I could say anything however, he kissed me one last time. Then he said, “You finally admitted it.”
“What?”
“That you haven’t stopped thinking about us.”
If only he knew just how long he’d been on my mind in the past four years. Throughout my whole life. I wasn’t sure if I’d ever be able to tell him.
Because how do you tell someone that they became an irreplaceable piece of your heart? That they left behind a unique imprint that only they could fill with their very existence. Were there even words to describe such a thing?
Probably not.