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The guilt I’ll carry with me for the rest of my life is suffocating. How is it fair that I get to live, and she doesn’t? That shouldn’t be allowed. I have had twenty-nine years. She didn’t get to have any. It just doesn’t make sense.
A noise to my right has me wiping the tears off my face and looking over. Rage is walking towards me from the clubhouse.
He stops a few feet away. “Mind if I join you?”
“Sure.”
He smiles. “Good, ‘cause it’s my porch.”
“Oh! I’m sorry. I just didn’t want to wander too far, but I wasn’t ready to go back yet,” I ramble.
He waves me off. “It’s alright, Pres.”
We sit in silence for a few minutes. I fidget and find myself pinching my palm, so I quickly sit on my hands, and luckily Rage finally speaks.
“How are you doing? For real. Don’t bullshit me by saying you’re fine.”
I smile as I stare out at the trees. I love how real Rage is. What you see is what you get. He makes a good president.
“I’m not okay. But I don’t think I can expect to be after all of this. I feel like I have some sort of mental block up that is stopping me from fully feeling the weight of the loss, because Ben is still out there somewhere and I’m terrified.”
I look over at him and see he is resting his elbows on his knees, his fists clenching. “We’ll get him. He’ll pay for what he did to you. You’ll get justice in whatever form you want.”
I study him before realizing he understands my pain. It’s why he was always close by after the attack. Why he has asked me how I am every day since I woke up in the hospital. If Jackson isn’t with me, Rage is somewhere close by.
“You understand,” I say softly.
He nods before dropping his head in his hands and staring at the step his feet are on. “I do. I thought I had something. Something that came out of the blue and from an awful situation. But it was ripped away from me just as fast. I was eighteen, and things were hard around here. My father, he was a terrible man. The club has come a long way since he died. But he did a lot of bad things and tried to mold me into a version of himself. Only it didn’t work.” He chuckles darkly. “He didn’t count on me being like my mom. A lovesick puppy who craves falling in love and living happily ever after.”
He says it like he’s joking, but I can hear the hurt in his voice. I don’t say anything, letting him finish on his own. My heart already hurting for him.
“My father took her from me. I went through a lot of shit as a kid. But when she came into my life, it was under the worst possible circumstances. We came out of it together, but then my father broke it. He wanted to break me, and he did. Just not how he thought. I didn’t break and become a cold-hearted bastard like him. I broke and became cold towards him. I knew I would do whatever it took to destroy him.”
Silent tears fall. He doesn’t give me all the details, but he talks more about what happened. The time he had with her. The circumstances they were under. My heart breaks for him, and I realize how much he understands my pain in so many ways.
“Thank you for sharing with me. I think feeling like I’m drowning alone is the worst part of this. I know I have people, but yet I feel as if I don’t.”
He nudges my shoulder with his own. “Of course. You’re not drowning alone, Presley. We all have our own pain and heartache. It may be different, but every person here understands in their own way. No one person’s pain is lesser or greater than another’s.”
I smile softly and nod. Rage opening up to me actually has helped me a little. I see how he is still hurt. A piece of him will always be missing. But I also see how much he has taken what happened to him and used it to change and be better. Do better.
I want to do that for my sweetling. Do better. Be better. For her.
There’s just one piece of garbage that needs to be taken out first.
Chapter Eighteen
Axe (Jackson)
Istormoutthemain doors, trying not to bang them into the wall as I head towards my bike. I need a fucking ride, but I have to go deal with this shit at the shop first, and the shop is only about eight minutes from the club. Not enough time for a ride.
A hand lands on my shoulder, and I whirl around, ready to tell them to fuck off, but when I see it’s Stone, my shoulders relax.
He raises a brow at me. “You good?” he grumbles.
I nod and turn to mount my bike. After Stone is on his and gives me a head tilt, letting me know he is ready, I take off with him right next to me.
My anger isn’t directed at Presley. I am mad at that piece of shit husband of hers. I want to remove him from her brain. Which I can’t fucking do, so removing him from earth will have to suffice when we find the bastard.
