Chapter 21
Rex
I lean back in my seat as the music vibrates through the old building.
Lifting my beer to my lips, I take in the sight before me as a grin spreads across my face.
Gwen is on the dance floor, shaking her hips and grinding in a way that makes me think about how hot it was taking her in the back room of the club a few hours ago.
The act didn’t go completely unnoticed, though, as we exited the building twenty minutes later, still trying to straighten our clothes and look innocent.
Noah and Eva saw right through it. They didn’t say much, but gave us both looks that we couldn’t ignore, hinting at the fact that they knew something was up.
Eva and Gwen took off to the bathroom for almost half an hour when we got to the bar. I’m sure Eva knows everything by now, and I would be lying if it didn’t feel good knowing that we are out in the open to at least one person.
Noah sits beside me, and I catch him winking at his wife on the dance floor.
She is dancing with Gwen, and I’ll even admit it is cute as hell seeing the two best friends back together again.
The song ends, and the girls motion like they are going to the bar to grab a drink.
I nod in understanding and watch Gwen disappear into the crowd.
“How long has that been going on?” Noah asks.
I keep my eyes trained on where the girls disappeared and try to decide how to respond. “Almost a month,” I admit, figuring the truth is always best because I know he will find out sooner than later once he and Eva get the chance to talk alone.
“You think you can keep her this time?” he asks, making the pit of my stomach churn with the thought of our past.
I shake my head and turn to look at him. “I sure as hell hope so. But there is something I need to tell her if we are ever going to have a real shot at this thing between us, and the right time just never shows up.”
“What is it?” he asks, sipping his beer.
I swallow hard, and debate if I should tell Noah before I ever admit anything to Gwen. Needing to release it somehow, I offer up information for the first time to anyone about that night over ten years ago that still haunts me in my sleep.
“Remember I told you I took ROP in high school, right?” I begin nervously, “Work studies. That’s how I got us into the station in Northern California because me and the chief took classes together?
” Noah nods his head, and I continue, jumping in head first and hopeful I’m making the right decision.
“What do you know about the night Gwen’s sister died? ” I ask.
“Not much,” Noah admits, straightening up in his seat. “Eva doesn’t even really know. Says it’s something Gwen won’t talk about.”
“It’s something no one really talks about, including myself.”
“What does that mean?”
I close my eyes, remembering that night.
Flashes of the accident come hurling back to memory.
The crash. The blood. The screams. The moment I knew it was Belle and the seconds, minutes, and hours that followed when we tried everything we could to save her.
I open my eyes and look at Noah, noticing his face sobers as he takes in my expression.
“I was on shift the night of her sister’s wreck,” I whisper, unsure if he can even hear me over the music.
“I was just getting ready to leave when the station got the call. There was an accident up the canyon. It was really bad. I told the crew I would ride along with them to help, even though I was supposed to leave to meet Gwen. By the time we got there, Belle had lost so much blood. I still remember the look in her eyes when she saw me. The frantic way she cried for help, asking if she was going to be alright. If she was going to die. I held her and told her I would do everything I could to save her, free her, and get her home. She kept saying she didn’t mean it.
That she was sorry and she didn’t mean to crash.
She didn’t want to die, not like that. When she was taking her last breath, she told me something she made me promise never to tell Gwen. ”
“What was it?”
I fight with my conscience. I know I shouldn’t say it, but damn it - after all these years, I need to get it off my chest.
“She told me her cancer was back,” my hushed voice finally admits a confession I’ve held for ten years. I know Noah hears because his eyes grow wide.
“She had just come from the doctors, and there was no saving her this time.” I look over Noah’s shoulder to make sure the girls are not on their way back to the table, and continue only when I know I am in the clear.
“She said she crashed the car on purpose, Noah. She couldn’t face her family.
Not when they had hoped for so long that her chemo was working.
She made me promise to love Gwen and never stop.
That was fucking easy. But then she told me something I never expected. She told me Gwen was pregnant.
“She told me she had seen the test in the trash and noticed her getting sick. She made me promise not to tell her sister about her cancer, her suicide attempt, or the fact that she told me Gwen’s secret.
Fuck, I was stunned, man. I mean, what do you say when you are hit with all that information at once?
Not only that, but the girl I loved sister was dying in my arms. Fuck, before that night, I had never seen anyone die before, and there was Gwen’s sister, lying in my arms, taking her last breath and making me swear never to tell a soul some crazy shit she just told me.
“I couldn’t stay at the hospital after we got her there.
I sat in darkness for over an hour when I returned to the station.
The guys kept checking on me, but I wasn’t ready to talk.
It was summer, and I was leaving for college in a little over a month.
I didn’t see Gwen again until the funeral.
I tried calling. I even showed up at her house twice, but she wouldn’t talk to me.
When she finally would, she gave me the cold shoulder.
She told me I was dead to her, just like her dead sister.
I tried to reason with her. I tried to get her to talk.
To say what, I don’t know. Maybe just admit about the baby, if it was true. But she wouldn’t budge.”
I take a deep breath before I continue. Noah is stunned to silence.
I sit with my thoughts, remembering how much I knew I had messed up.
How much I realized I had pushed her away instead of letting her in for months.
If I hadn’t done that, she would have come to me earlier about the baby instead of hiding it.
Shit, I was scared to death realizing the way I felt about her, but I truly believe I would have been ready to face it if she had.
“About a week after the funeral, I tried again,” I say, Noah sits back in his seat, and I turn my eyes to the table, picking away at the label on my beer bottle.
“But her mom answered the door when I showed up and told me she had gone away for the summer to live with her aunt somewhere out of state, and wouldn’t tell me where.
That was it. Nothing more. I tried to track her down, but I couldn’t.
This was before cell phones, and social media.
So, I left for Mississippi. Two damn years went by until I saw her again.
I finally bumped into her with Eva in L.A.
Shit, I was so happy to see her…” I trail off, remembering the hurt I felt when she rejected me once again.
Rejected me, just like I feared she always would.
“But she wouldn’t budge, and wouldn’t talk to me. To tell you the truth, she hasn’t really talked to me since. Not until about a month ago, and fuck, it was tough as shit breaking down that damn wall. But well fucking worth it.”
I glance up and can tell Noah has no clue how to respond. He slowly takes a sip of beer. Finally, he says, “Well, are you going to tell her?”
“Fuck, I have to,” I sigh. “Not just because if we are going to move forward, there can’t be these kinds of secrets in our past. But I have to know.
Was she really pregnant? Do I have a son or daughter somewhere in the world, and she gave them up for adoption without telling me?
Or did she get rid of it? Just like she got rid of us.
Fuck, I’ll admit the thought has made me hate her some days and nights over the last decade, but I honestly don’t think she’d be that shallow.
Plus, she deserves to know the truth about her sister. ”
“When are you planning on telling her?” Noah asks as our eyes drift to the left, and we find the girls walking through the crowd towards us. Both of them are carrying two drinks and giggling with each other.
“Soon,” I whisper as they approach the table. “Very soon.”
Eva drops her drink and takes Noah his. She slides onto his lap, and he kisses her cheek.
Gwen eyes me with a smile and hands me another beer.
I give her a wink and pull on her hand. For the first time in front of company, she doesn’t fight me.
She leans down and places her lips against mine, shocking the hell out of me, and sure as shit shocking the company at our table.
I’m even more surprised when she slips her tongue between my lips and deepens the kiss. Pulling away, she winks at me, and I hope to God what I have to tell her doesn’t ruin our future before it even has a chance to get started.