She swallows hard, her throat bobbing with the movement, and I’m glad. I want her to be uncomfortable. I don’t want this to be easy for her. I want it to be hard. I want her to sweat. I don’t want her to sit there looking so goddamn perfect when on the inside, I’m a fucking train wreck.
Because of her.
I slam my hands onto my knees so hard that she nearly jumps. Her eyes flick back up to my face, but I don’t let a shred of emotion slip past the mask I’ve pasted on. She doesn’t deserve it. She doesn’t get to look inside and find what’s there below it.
“Why don’t you just tell me why you’re here? We can start with that. It’s probably easier than wading through all the bullshit we don’t need to hear or say.”
The overhead lighting isn’t great, and it highlights Ami’s cheekbones and the other delicate angles of her face, her flawless beauty. I grind my teeth.
“I’m here because I thought we should talk. Get it all out, whatever we need to say, so that we can get on with our lives and put this behind us. I don’t mean that in a bad way. I just mean that we obviously should move on. That’s all I want. I don’t want to hurt you.”
Her words are soft and silky, and so at odds with the jarring, bitter laugh that I let pour out of my throat, out of thedark depths of my heart, and spill into the room like an ominous cloud of toxic gas.
“That’s fucking rich, Ami. If you actually cared about that, you’re about one year too late. When you said that I beat you on our wedding night because I was a drunk asshole, Steel knew it was bullshit. He knew I wouldn’t have done it. My knuckles didn’t have a mark on them. My hands. He knew. I couldn’t remember a thing after the dinner, since I drank too fucking much because I was nervous as hell about it all. So, to atone for my apparent sins, to prevent a war and make things right with your father, Steel asked me to give the go-ahead to your family to punish me, since you were incapable. It’s club justice. Brutal. Barbaric. Straight and to the point. When one brother wrongs another, that brother can choose his method of punishment. It turns out that your family is just as sadistic as you. Your brother chose to use knuckles. You know what those are, Ami?”
Her eyes are wide when I glance over at her. I expected to feel some amount of satisfaction at finally being able to tell her, face to face, what her lies cost me. The words ring hollow, though, through the room. All I feel is horror and anger. Neither fills up the empty pit inside of me.
“I’ll tell you. They’re just what they sound like. Metal that fits over our knuckles so that when your hand strikes flesh or bone, or whatever the fuck else, your skin doesn’t split. The other guy’s does. That was your brother’s weapon of choice. I’m not complaining. It could have been much worse. Your brother might look like a fucking dump truck, but he hits like a bitch. Still. He managed to break my jaw, my right cheekbone, and my nose. Still. Could have been worse. I mean, he could have really fucked up some shit beyond any kind of repair. As it was, it all healed up. The club has a good doctor on the payroll. Hewas able to put everything back together. It’s not like he fucked up any internal organs, which I know he could have. I should really thank him, though I never have, even though we’ve seen each other at club meetings and whatnot over the years. We both knew it was club business. I don’t hold it against him. You know who I do hold it against? You know how it could have been better?”
I hate the silence that permeates the air between us. The absolutely static bullshit. Ami can’t even look me in the eye. She’s studying her hands, which are clasped in her lap like she has a right to be horrified about any of this.
She fucking doesn’t.
“I’ll tell you that too,” I fill her in, my voice so frigid I’m surprised her bent head doesn’t sprout icicles. “I hold it against you. If you hadn’t lied, it would have been better, because none of that would have happened. I paid for your lies with my blood and you have the nerve to sit there and act like you’re entitled to come back here. Like I fucking owe you something. I don’t owe you a fucking thing. You want those papers signed? You raise your head and look me in the eye and fucking tell me why you acted like a spoiled fucking brat. Tracker got to your sisters too, but they didn’t make up shit about their husbands. Did you want out so badly that you had to ruin my life in the process? You hated me that much, yet you never knew me?”
A second passes. Two. Countless more.
My words hang like knives between us. Neither of us moves. We barely even breathe. Finally she lifts her head, her pride intact, her hair shining all around her face like a gossamer curtain. Her eyes shimmer with unshed tears, which only fuel my rage. She has no right to cry. She has no right to feel remorseor pain now. I’m sure that any emotion displayed on her face is manufactured to get her what she wants. She’s always seemed like a consummate actress.
She slowly tips her chin and her eyes, black and swimming with moisture, track to mine. I have to grind my teeth to keep from balling my hands into fists and driving one of them into the wall behind me. Beside me. In front of me. Anywhere.
Then I remember I asked her to look me in the eye and tell me. Tell me why she did it. Why she ruined us both so easily with her lies. Why she betrayed me when I’d done absolutely nothing to her.
Her lips part and it’s like time itself stops.
I don’t want to look at her. I don’t want to lean forward, so eager to hear her words, likely more lies.
I don’t want to wait for her any longer.
One year was enough wasted time out of my life.
Her pink tongue darts out to wet her lips. Her hands flex in her lap, over and over again, opening and closing. Grasping at air. Hanging onto the shreds of nothing.
Finally. Finally, after a year of silence, of waiting, of living in agony, she opens her mouth and forms tangible words. Something I can cling to and try and understand.
“I lied because I had to.” The tears pour freely down her cheeks and choke out her voice, but she still churns out her next words. “Because he told me that if I didn’t, he would kill you.”
Chapter 7
Ami
My heart doesn’t just beat the underside of my ribs, it pulverizes them. My chest feels like a cage collapsing in on itself. It’s impossible to breathe in that confined space. My entire body feels numb. My hands tremble and I tuck them tightly between my thighs, but they vibrate too, along with my feet. I wish I could hide. That I could disappear. That I could find a place where Gage’s burning gaze wouldn’t find me.
We both know whoheis, but he asks it anyway.
“Who? Who threatened you?”
“Tracker. We made it too easy for him. Snake drove us home the night of the wedding. You were drunk. Took two steps into the house and passed out on the couch. I walked around aimlessly for a few minutes, then went outside to sit on the steps for some fresh air. He came out of nowhere. Wrapped a hand around my mouth and dragged me to the van he had hidden a few blocks away. He drove me to some piece of shit motel, tied my wrists and ankles, and sat me down on the disgusting bed. I remember the room was so horrible I hardly dared to breathe. The air in there was foul. Everything was stained and old and smelled like mildew.
