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He had no idea…
I shook my head. “What do they say? There’s a fine line between love and hate?” I covered the tattoo with my fingers. “This isn’t about that; not really. See, my cousin, Nolan, was in a play in Grand Rapids. Somehow, he’d gotten a minor part in one of the off Broadway shows. He’s that talented. He asked me to come see him, so I did. Anyway…” I redirected myself again, not wanting to talk about this but knowing I had to. “He said, ‘You’re sad. The play is funny.’” I shrugged. “At the time, it seemed like the thing to do. But millions of times since then, I’ve thought, maybe, I shouldn’t have. Thing is, I can second guess the past all I want. It won’t change it.”
Axel moved to lean against the headboard and pulled me in to him. I cuddled into his chest, burrowing my face into his neck, craving his warmth. I needed his strength even though he didn’t know it. I prayed he wouldn’t be furious with me, blame me.
I breathed him in and tried to hide from the memory and at the same time, steady myself for what was to come. In my soul, I knew it would destroy him. Whether he pushed me away in his grief remained to be seen. For now, I let his scent strengthened me, and I tried to savor our proximity for just a moment while I could, just a moment before I delivered yet another blow to the man who’d been ripped up over and over the past few days.
I sighed. “Axel…”
He was so hard beneath me—tense and ready to pounce, prepared for a mythical attack. Maybe, even ready to fight my monsters.
“Tell me,” he demanded, his voice low and lethal.
“I… I was on my way back here after seeing my cousin in the play and having dinner with him and some of the other actors after the show. It was late. Someone…” I knew the man’s name, but I wouldn’t speak it. I had been there in court when he’d been sentenced. I’d stared at him while he’d been hauled away, sobbing, to start his prison term. “He was…drunk. Way over the limit. He got on the highway going the wrong way. I couldn’t… I tried to avoid him, but he hit me.”
Axel’s arms tightened.
“Fuck,” he swore, shaking beneath me. “You could have been killed.”
“Yeah. He did kill the couple in the other car he hit.”
His hand covered the tattoo. “And it was on this date? March fifth?”
“No,” I rasped, the ice I’d kept around this memory cracking. I trembled as if surrounded by a glacial bath of it. Submerged and drowning. Tears streamed down my cheeks.
“I don’t understand,” he whispered.
“I was hurt. I was injured bad enough I ended up in the hospital for a couple days. On the night of March third.”
His finger traced over the stark black ink. His brow furrowed, but he didn’t speak, waiting, his muscles like vibrating steel beneath me.
“I was pregnant, Axel,” I breathed, barely able to speak the truth I hadn’t spoken to anyone. Ever. No one except my doctors knew.
“What?” he gasped, his body starting to shake. His breathing chopped from him as he realized what I was telling him.
“No one knew. I didn’t know I was pregnant when you left, and when I did realize… I didn’t tell anyone, because I didn’t know what to do. My parents were out of the country again. The rest of my family was already confused and angry about what happened between us. And yours… Your mom was battling cancer. You’re whole family was struggling to get through it while they gathered around her. And…” I shook my head, tears burning in my eyes. “No one knew. No one knew that there was this little life, but I didn’t want to forget. I didn’t ever want to forget.”
Axel’s arms tightened, his face pressed into my neck. His body shook harder while his tears singed my bare shoulder. “No wonder you hate me. No wonder.Ihate me. I left you alone in this.”
I shook my head. “I don’t hate you. Idon’t, Axel.”
“I should have been there. I should have held your hand through it. I should have…known…” His voice broke on a sob, while my man broke. “Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he rasped.
His pain seeped into me while he held me and rocked, his anguish reopening my poorly healed wounds. He didn’t let go of me, leaving me to handle his pain, to break something, to scream into the night. He just held me tighter while somehow, our bound drew us even closer.
Twenty-Seven
Axel
Banging on the front door dragged me from the warm bubble of sleep that had enveloped me, my arms around Bristol, our naked bodies twined. When I opened my eyes to find I wasn’t dreaming, mixed feelings of euphoria and sorrow filled me. I was glad to be back with Bristol and have everything out in the open, but the one revelation I hadn’t expected tore me apart—for the life lost, for what Bristol had endured, and for our mutual loss, the opportunity to be parents together ripped from us.
We would have children someday, though, especially if we kept on as we had last night. After Bristol’s divulgence, we’d talked then we’d made love slow and reverently. I hadn’t known such sex was possible, but we’d connected, proving to ourselves we were still alive. We hadn’t used a condom any of the times we’d come together. So yeah, we’d likely be a family someday, perhaps sooner rather than later, but our first child would always be in our hearts.
The thought of that loss made me ache, and knowing I could have lost Bristol without her knowing the truth of why I’d left her, without her knowing how much I loved her and how she was my everything, terrified me. I fought back the sudden need to enclose her in bubble wrap. It hammered home the truth that I needed her with me no matter what, no matter what battles I had to fight.
The rapping on the door came again to urge me from the warm cocoon I was in with Bristol. I pressed my lips to her temple, breathing in her floral scent mixed with the redolent, musky smell from our sex, then climbed out of bed. I stumbled across the apartment while dragging on my jeans, barely doing more than zipping them before yanking open the door.
“What?” I growled, ready to take off the head of the person who’d dragged me away from my woman only a couple hours after we’d finally gone to sleep.
