Chapter 14
FOURTEEN
SIGN
Gabe
Iwas wrong.
I was so wrong about Adrienne and her being a brat. I shouldn’t have been listening to the interview with her dad, I should have been watching her six. It’s what I’m being paid to do, but I got distracted and now I’ve fucked everything up.
She drew me into her web and I went happily, with a smile on my face and my body’s blood volume in my dick. I treated her like shit the last time I got caught up in her and I had sworn I’d never treat a woman like that. Ever.
Adrienne has come to mean something to me—or at least I think she could if we give in to this attraction and see what comes out of it. That is, if I stop getting in my own way, and tonight was that night… until I fucked it all up.
Tonight, I finally saw a glimpse of the real Adrienne.
Not the bad bitch in a man’s world and not the media darling or the sex pot, I saw the real woman behind the persona.
She loves her family and is proud of what she does.
She wants to carry on the legacy her grandfather built and that her father has carried on.
Honestly, I kind of wish I could have met her gramps, he sounds like he was a real bad ass.
But I saw through her hard shell to the soft and sweet inside, and I want it. Arguably, I want it more than I wanted her when I thought she was a cock tease. I want her in a way that I’ve never wanted anyone before. Not even…
But I can’t think about that, or the consequences, at the moment.
Before I caught my breath or our sweat even cooled, I realized that I’d fucked a woman who wasn’t my wife and it was more… almost better. And I fucking ran. Pulled out of her, one of the best women I’d ever met, pulled up my jeans and bolted—out of her bed, her room, her whole fucking house.
Now, I’m standing out in the yard, staring at the dark sky with my hands on my hips and my heart beating out of my chest when I thought the goddamned thing had died years ago.
Macy and I were just kids, and I loved her with my whole heart. It was the kind of love that should have lasted us the rest of our lives, and we didn’t even get a decade.
Adrienne’s had the adult me, the man I became in the years since I lost everything but my way of life. It feels like I’m on a precipice, like I can go one way or the other but not both.
I can only choose forward or backward. Then or now.
I wonder what Macy would think of the mess I’ve made of my life. Would she be happy that I’m suffering because I’ve betrayed her memory? I can barely get the thought out because that is so not who she was—wrong in comparison to the girl who loved everyone with everything she had to give.
Macy never had a mean or vengeful bone in her body.
I wonder if she’s watching me live this life without her. I hate feeling like I’m not connected to her anymore. It’s been seven years since we last talked.
With her dying breath, she told me she loved me, and I dropped my forehead to hers, knowing she’d left this life, and the body that failed her so spectacularly, behind. I’d whispered, “I love you too, Mace. Forever.” Then I’d kissed her lips one last time. And that was it.
Maybe it’s time for me to talk to her again.
So, I do the only thing I can; take a deep breath, filling my lungs with the briny scented air coming off of the beach just down the hill.
I haven’t smelled that air since we left Camp Pendleton, and even then, it’s different up there than it is here in Torrey Pines.
And these cool, ocean scented breezes don’t exist in Texas.
I love my home state, and it has a lot to offer but this isn’t one of them.
I’m procrastinating.
I’m nervous.
And neither of those things are like me, so I decide to embrace the way I was with her when she was alive, be myself, and just let it all fly.
“Hey Mace,” I start. “Long time, no see. Oh my God this is so fucked up. I hate this, and I miss you. Are you up there watching how I’m fucking everything up?
I take that back, don’t watch everything…
because if you are, you know that I haven’t been faithful to you.
I betrayed your memory with another woman and I am so fucking sorry.
That’s got to hurt you. It fucking guts me because it was supposed to be us.
I was supposed to die long before you and even if it wasn’t old age, you were still supposed to be happy and free on your farm.
“But I can’t bring myself to be sorry for what I did…
not with this woman. Adrienne, well, I think you’d like her if you met her.
She’s smart and tough, bold as brass. I think that you’d want me to be happy, live this life, and, well…
I think I could be happy here, with her. But it also feels wrong.”
My heart clenches in my chest and I take a big breath to try and shake it off, but it doesn’t work.
“I don’t think you’d be too thrilled with me right now, though.
I’ve hurt her more than once. The first time, I did it on purpose and I’m not proud of my behavior.
Tonight, well… tonight, I remembered. I remembered you and me and what we had, what we were supposed to have.
It slammed into me while I was with her and that wasn’t right to do to either of you.
“I’ve made a fucking mess, and I need to clean it up.
I have to atone for my sins… I’m just not sure what those are yet.
Do I apologize and try to be friends with her—because she’s funny and sweet and everyone loves her?
Do I go back to honoring our vows? Or do I move on to something…
different than what we had but still beautiful?
Or nothing at all because fuck knows I don’t deserve it.
“If you’re out there, mi paloma, I could use your help. Please give me a sign… anything.”