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The only two people who have ever given half of a shit about me. I left without a trace. The guilt consumes me. I shouldn’t have done that. What I’ve done isn’t right. Lifting my hand to my forehead, I press my palm against it and close my eyes.
I’m trembling.
God. What have I done?
Standing, I drop my hand and start to move around the table. I need to go back home, return some calls, and regroup. But something catches my eye. It’s Hendrick. I watch as he steps out from his condo right as a car pulls up to the sidewalk in front of him.
Then there is blonde hair in my vision. The car pulls away. I can’t see the front of her because her back is to me. Her blonde hair is down her back. She’s about the same height as I am, though she’s a bit slimmer.
He dips his chin, looking down at her, and pain slices through my stomach at the smile he flashes her. That smile is mine. Not hers. Then I wonder if this is who he is going to marry. Is this his virgin?
My heart slams against my chest, and I think about rushing them and asking questions, about pulling her hair as I take her down to the ground and fight for my man. I don’t. Instead, I stay where I am, standing in the middle of the outdoor seating area of the coffee shop, and stare at them.
That is until he places his hand against the small of her back before guiding her toward his parking garage, likely straight for his car. A date, then.
My knees threaten to give out and send me to the ground, but I reach for the table, placing my palm against it to stabilize my body so I don’t make an even bigger fool of myself and fall to the concrete.
Once they’ve disappeared, I gather myself and decide to walk away. I don’t go home. I go to the motel on the other side of town to regroup. I wish I could stay on this side of town, closer to Hendrick’s place, but even with all of the cash I have, I could only afford a night or two. I need this money to last for a little while, at least until I figure out what I’m going to do next.
Or maybe I won’t figure anything out. Maybe I’ll just feel sorry for myself and cry all night long. Honestly, that sounds like a much better plan to me. I make sure to stop for a pint of ice cream on my way to the motel room.
Chapter
Four
HENDRICK
“I appreciate you being willing to see me like this,” Harlow says, her voice soft and sweet. “I know you’re busy, that you don’t have time for something like this.”
Opening the passenger door, I gently press my fingers against her back and watch as she climbs into the seat before I close the door behind her. I stand at the door for a moment, looking over my shoulder.
Someone is watching me.
Shaking off the sensation, I jog around the front of the car and climb inside, starting the engine before I shift the car into Reverse and head toward the restaurant. I’m not exactly sure what she wants from me, but considering she’s asking me about her sister, a girl I clearly remember fucking at that house, a sex slave, I’m sure it has something to do with that.
I feel so fucking guilty that I have to hear her out. I hurt her sister. She’s a fucking person, and I did what I did. I watched them take her away, and I didn’t feel a fucking shred of anything when they did.
Not until now.
I feel it now.
It consumes every inch of me.
As I drive us toward the restaurant, I am silent the entire short ride. I’m still trying to figure out exactly what I’m going to say. I don’t want to get into any of this yet, or at all. I should have made some excuse to get out of talking to her.
Once I tell her the truth, she’ll hate me. This shouldn’t bother me, because I don’t know anything about her, but the fact that I was probably the last person to see her sister alive consumes me and fills me with guilt.
So much goddamn fucking guilt.
I’m not the same man I was last year. Fuck, I’m not even the same man I was just a few months ago. I feel like a completely different person. I’ve changed, at least I feel like I have. I just hope she will see that, although if I were her and the tables were turned, I wouldn’t see any of that and would kill me.
I’m kind of a dick, though.
When I sit across from her at the restaurant, a whiskey on ice in front of me, I figure the least I can do is buy her a nice meal when I tell her how I can’t fucking help her. But then I remember fucking her sister against her will.
Goddamn, I’m a fucking asshole.
I’m going to have to talk to my mother again about all of this. There is no way I’m coming out of any of this unscathed.
