Page 24 of His to Love
I looked over his shoulder and licked my lips. “Do you remember that last night we were together?”
I worried my bottom lip between my teeth, biting down to keep my chin from trembling.
Tyson’s hand tightened on my hip. “Yeah, babe. I remember that night. I remember everything about you.”
I blinked rapidly several times. Sighing heavily, I rubbed the back of my neck. “I came home that night and my dad showed me photos. Told me he had proof that you were dating me to get info about my family to give to your dad.”
“The fuck?” His head jerked back like I’d slapped him.
A sudden chill covered my skin when he didn’t speak.
“You didn’t, did you?” I couldn’t hide the accusation in my tone.
I moved to step back but Tyson’s hand gripped my hip, keeping me firmly in place. The dark blue in his eyes went electric and his eyes narrowed.
“No, Blue. I didn’t fuck you, take your virginity, and fall in love with you all because my daddy asked me to. Jesus.” His hands slammed into his hair and he pushed them through before scrubbing them down his face.
He sucked in a breath that made my gut churn. All the fear, all the anger that I’d held on to for the last decade exploded into a ball of overly emotional womanly mess.
“Well, what’d you expect me to think?” I shouted, feeling my small hands ball into fists at my sides. “He showed me everything. Told me your dad was investigating him—”
“Yeah. My dad,” he snapped. Fury rolled off him so thick I could practically touch it. “We were kids, and my dad was a good man. You think he’d pull that crap? After he welcomed you into our home?”
“And maybe that was why he was so nice to me. Don’t you see how that could make sense to me at the time?”
He leaned forward, his breath hot and heavy on my cheeks. His mouth was inches from mine, so close I could see tiny stress lines dance out from the edges of his full, parted lips.
“No, Blue. I figured you knew I loved you. I figure you should have known I wouldn’t have ever done that crap to you in the first place. Hell.” He spun away from me and took several steps away, putting his back to me before he twisted and grabbed onto the handrail.
His shoulders heaved as he inhaled and exhaled rapidly for several moments before I noticed my own adrenaline pulsing through my blood, burning me from the inside out.
“Why’d you leave then? You just disappeared.” He shook his head, staring down at the tumultuous waves. I wondered if his insides felt like those waves. Mine did. “What happened?” he asked, twisting his head in my direction.
“Dad said I had to go, that he never should have allowed me out of the house and because he did, my actions brought a risk to the family…or some bullshit like that. It’s all…” I paused and waved a hand in the air. As if a magic wand could erase the last several minutes. “It’s all blurry now.”
“Right,” he smirked. “Just one easily forgettable night.”
A blush hit my cheeks at the thought. Lying in the back of Tyson’s pickup in a field outside the city limits. It was our spot, where we went the night I had given my virginity to him six months earlier. It hadn’t been romantic at first, but Tyson made it so with blankets and candles. Everything a girl could want. That last night we were together hadn’t been any different.
We had spent the night talking about heading off to our separate colleges. We talked about what we thought it’d be like, to finally be on our own, and how we could see each other as often as possible. Our time together was disappearing rapidly before Tyson had to report to football camp, but we tried not to dwell on it. Like we always did, we sealed our promise to stay together forever with a kiss, which unfailingly led to more.
“It wasn’t,” I whispered, my voice hoarse. “But I didn’t have a choice, either, Tyson. Dad sent me off that night.”
His gazed stayed fixed on my eyes before it slid to my lips and then down my body. It felt intrusive, and I fought the urge to hide myself. I hadn’t done anything wrong except trust the man responsible for bringing me into this world. The man who sheltered me and raised me.
Perhaps, after all, that had been wrong.
“You could have come to me.”
“Really?” I tilted my head to the side. “What would you have done? Even if you’re telling me the truth, it’s not like I could have done anything different. Your dad was still investigating mine.”
His eyes closed and pain lashed across his face. I saw it clearly in the way he jolted back and sucked in a breath. “Your dad had mine killed two years later, Blue.”
The words left his mouth in a whisper and were quickly forced into the air where they formed a ball that slammed into my chest with the speed of a bullet. It seared into my skin, and tears filled my eyes. “I didn’t know.”
“I’m not sure you’ve ever truly understood what he’s capable of.”
I shook my head again, as if the action could erase the words Tyson just spoke, or the truth in them. “How do you know?”
