50. Matteo #2
Evie’s sigh is full of sadness that I feel in my own heart. “I don’t think he’ll forgive me until I tell him what I’ve been holding back.”
“I wish I could say I don’t think so but…” I shake my head. “I wish he would. I wish you didn’t feel pressured to share anything you aren’t ready to.” Turning back to her, at the sadness in her eyes, my heart plummets. “Hey, why don’t we get out of here?”
She looks up at me. “You don’t want to celebrate?”
Peering down at her, my lip quirks as I drawl, “Being with you is my celebration.”
Her lips twitch before they blossom into a full smile, her happiness contagious. “Okay, where do you want to go?"
The plan I organized prior to the game has a small smile lifting the corners of my lips. “It’s a surprise.”
“Will I like it?” she asks.
“I wouldn’t have suggested it otherwise.”
We’ve been driving for forty minutes now, both of us sitting comfortably in silence as our intertwined hands rest on the middle console.
I’m glad I take my truck to games because the farther we go up the mountain, the rougher the road becomes.
My sedan would have popped a tire or scraped the underside by now.
Once I see the opening, I turn to Evie, slowing the car down.
I’m glad I have my eyes on her as I pull to a stop because I’m able to take in the way hers widen, lips parting with a surprised gasp. She shifts in her seat, leaning forward, the twinkling lights reflecting in her eyes.
“Oh my god.” Her smile is slow yet radiant as always. “It’s beautiful.”
“Yeah?”
She heaves out a laugh. “Matteo, I can’t believe you haven’t brought me here before!”
“I can make it better,” I whisper.
She turns to me, a dubious expression on her face. “How?”
Smirking, I point to the blankets in the backseat. She takes in everything I had organized prior to the game, just in case she did say yes.
Something akin to awe dances along her features. “You’re special, Valenti. So very special.”
With the darkness of the mountain cocooning us, I lean forward, gently kissing her with the sweetness she has always deserved. “Not as extraordinary as you.”
Her lashes flutter, my words sinking into the depths of her soul.
Brushing my thumb back and forth along her cheek I say, “Stay here while I set everything up and don’t touch that door.”
Chuckling with an eye roll she teases, “God forbid I open my own door.”
With all the seriousness I can muster, I say, “It would be the greatest travesty to ever happen.”
She playfully shoves me away. “Go on, get it all set up how you’d like.”
I quickly kiss her cheek before jumping out of my truck and getting to work.
Ten minutes later, I’ve moved the truck so the tailgate is facing the view of Denver, the city lights twinkling up at us as Evie sits nestled in my side. The pillows at our backs and the duvet keep us comfortable and warm.
“It’s beautiful,” she whispers.
“So very beautiful,” I agree, but my eyes are on her.
Always her.
My Dove.
She tips her chin up to me slowly. “Views the other way, Valenti.”
“The view I’m staring at is better.”
Even in the dark I can see the tint that blossoms on her cheeks. She lays her head down on my chest, wrapping her arm around my middle. “How’s the coding going?” she asks, switching subjects.
Following her lead I rest my chin atop her head, loving the way her scent envelopes me.
“It’s going,” I murmur.
She huffs out a laugh, poking my stomach with her nails. “You can give me a bit more than that.”
My lip twitches into a grin. “It’s going…really well actually. Kieran and I were talking in the locker room the other day. We’re thinking of doing an event with friends and family to celebrate the release.”
Evie squeezes my thigh. “You should. You both should be celebrating. What you two are doing…you’re going to change lives.”
Warmth makes its way up my chest at the compliment. “It wasn’t my idea. I just made it.”
Evie moves to sit up, facing me fully. “Matteo, you brought it to life. You’re saving children. You’re giving them a platform where they can safely report abuse and ask for police or an ambulance. You are the reason that negligent parents, foster parents, and abusers will be reported.”
If only there had been something like this when Evie needed help.
Swallowing thickly at her words, I whisper, “I hope it does good.”
“It will,” she says vehemently.
“Thank you for your support.”
She lifts her hand to my cheek, her thumb brushing back and forth across my stubble. I can’t help but close my eyes and soak up her touch. “I’ll always support you,” she murmurs.
“Well, thank you. It means a lot.” I huff out a laugh. “Means everything to me, actually.”
At Evie’s silence, I open my eyes to find her already watching me. I can tell a question is burning on her tongue, can see the war raging within her mind.
“Spit it out, Dove.”
She’s hesitant before I implore her with my gaze. Just that one look and suddenly she’s blurting out, “Have you told your parents?”
Now I know why she was reluctant.
My body stiffens, but at her worry, I quickly force myself to relax. “No, I haven’t, and I won’t. They don’t deserve to celebrate it with me. Not something like this.”
She nods, biting her bottom lip. Peering down at my fisted hands, she reaches forward and grabs them, forcing them to relax.
After a beat, she quietly confesses, “I hate them for hurting you so much.”
“Same could be said for you, my Dove, but I just don’t know who to send all my hatred toward.”
She sighs heavily. “I know you struggle with that.”
Immensely, more than she could ever imagine. I want to kill who did that to her.
I don’t think she even knows the half of it, how much it haunts me that I don’t know who hurt her, that she won’t tell me. But I’ll never force her.
I just nod because I don’t trust myself not to beg her to tell me. I begged a lot in those early weeks but all it did was make her shut down so I stopped.
Taking a steadying breath, she moves back to the topic of my parents. “I’ll never understand why they did what they did.”
“What, not love me or not care about me?”
“Both,” she answers honestly, not denying the fact we both know.
Shrugging, I look down at our joined hands and at the girl that’s been beside me for it all, the one I told everything to when it came to my parents. “You’ve always been able to soothe me when it came to them.”
“I don’t like your parents.”
Laughing at her declaration, I lean forward and give her a quick kiss on the cheek. “I know.”
“No, truly,” she says, anger swirling in her eyes. “I hate them for how they treated you…how they still treat you.”
“It is what it is.”
“Well, it’s not fair.”
Kissing our joined hands, I murmur against her skin, “I know, Dove. Neither is what happened to you.”
Sitting back down beside me, she’s quiet for a moment, lost in thought as she looks at the lights of Denver, the only sound the wind rustling through the mountain trees.
“I know you’ve never told me the worst of what they did to you,” she whispers suddenly.
Another truth spoken.
“How could I?” I say honestly.
“You can always tell me anything,” she murmurs.
“Some things are too dark to share.”
Arching a brow at me, she doesn’t even have to say it. Just one look and I know she’s trying to point out the hypocrisy of those words. Maybe she has a point. Here I am always asking her to share her deepest secret and I’ve barely scratched the surface with mine.
The words, the stories—it all bubbles up my throat, begging to be set free after twenty years.
“You really want to know?”
“Desperately.”
I lean deeper into the pillows, urging Evie to come with me. I can’t see her face while I talk, can’t look into the eyes of the girl I love while hurting her, because what I have to say will hurt her.
Same as how what she told me utterly obliterated my heart.
Focusing on the city lights, I ground myself by focusing on the feel of Evie tucked into my side, her warmth against my body, and the way everything I went through led me to her.
“Before we moved to Denver, we were in Banff. There was an incident where I went hiking by myself and there was a bear. I was far too young to be out there by myself and my parents never should have allowed me to go. I ran home once I was safe, but it absolutely terrified me. I was shaking like a leaf, had tears streaming down my face, and had cuts all up and down my arms and legs.”
Evie’s hand, still linked in mine, squeezes, urging me to go on despite her ragged breathing.
Blowing out all the air in my lungs, I force the next words out. “My parents for once saw their wrongdoing. To either satisfy their guilt or make me feel better, they took me to the local fair that was in town for the holidays.”
Evie stiffens at my side.
“I was on the merry-go-round, sitting on one of the horses. One moment, my parents were there with grim expressions and lackluster waves as I called out for their attention. On the next loop, they were on their phones with that look in their eyes they got when they were talking about something medical. By the next loop, they were gone.”
The swell of panic and sadness that I felt back then again emerges at the memory.
I try to tame it, try to swallow it down, but no matter how much I force it down, my voice cracks when I speak again, sounding like gravel.
“I got off the ride and couldn’t find them.
I sat on the bench where they were standing until closing time.
It wasn’t until a security guard came over and asked where they were that I knew it was different this time.
He tried to call them after I gave him their numbers but of course their phones were off. ”