Now sitting in this car with them is doing the same thing.
I didn’t want to go to her. I need to cut the ties because I feel her in my chest and it’s not right to have anyone there. Not when I can’t do right by them.
“Why the fuck are you so quiet up there, Westfall?” some guy in the backseat says.
I don’t even know who he is. “Why the fuck do you care?”
Oscar laughs from the driver’s seat. “He’s always got that quiet thing going on. No one ever knows what he’s thinking.”
I don’t know what it is about those words, but they make me want to hit something. They make me want to bleed because they’re true and I’ve always wanted them to be true, but Christ is it lonely. I want to be alone…
And I do. I did. But I haven’t felt it lately. Not when I’m with her.
Suddenly every fucking nerve ending in my body needs to be with her. To really feel something. I never, ever let myself feel. Yes, I loved my sister, but only her. And then Ashton. Jesus, I fucking loved him, but Delaney makes me feel.
And it’s an ache building inside me, a need tearing me apart, wrecked by this tornado of what it felt like to be touched by her. Inside and out.
“I need you to bring me somewhere,” I tell Oscar.
“What? Where?”
I tell him and he looks at me like he gets it, but he doesn’t. He thinks I’m going to get laid, but what he doesn’t understand is sitting in that diner, watching her work, writing in my book would be better than this shit.
I’m over it. So fucking over it.
I know it won’t last and I know I can’t really keep her, but while she’s willing, I want to keep this going.
Oscar pulls into the parking lot and I get out. When I don’t see her car I tell him, “Hold up for a minute.”
“Hey.” Jamie, the hostess, smiles at me when I walk inside.
“What’s up?” I nod at her, but my eyes are scanning for Delaney, for her gray eyes and sexy smile.
“She’s not here. She called in again. Between you and me, boss is pissed. Three days in a row. I wouldn’t be surprised if she loses her job.”
“It’s not her fault,” I tell Jamie before walking out. I check my phone and she hasn’t called and then I wonder what the hell I’m doing, tripping out because I haven’t heard from her and she didn’t go to work. She’s an adult. She can do what she wants and doesn’t owe me a damn thing.
I get back in the car. “Take me home, man,” I tell him.
He curses and says something about being a taxi.
“I’ll remember that next time you want to party at my house.”
He drives and they go back to listening to music and talking about shit that really doesn’t matter, but the whole time I’m letting my ghost haunt me. Fuck if I didn’t plan on trying to walk away, but then I went to the diner and she’s not there. I can’t stop trying to figure out why she wasn’t there.
It was too much… I was too fucking much.
I shouldn’t care.
But I do and I don’t know what to think about that.
Which is why it’s good she wasn’t there. To cut the ties now…
When we pull up in front of my house, Oscar moves to turn off the car. The thought of sitting in my house with them all night makes me sick. Makes me want to get out of the car and just keep fucking going.
“Not tonight, man. I have some shit to deal with.”
The light in his car is broken, so it doesn’t come on when I open the door. Without giving him time to reply, I get out and close the door behind me. I don’t know what time it is but know it has to be after ten when my ghost goes to work. It’s dark out when I walk up to my house. The closer I get, I realize there’s someone sitting by the door.
The second I see her, I know I’m in deep. Any thought of why I wanted to walk away from her seems crazy. The fact that I considered not going to the diner to see her tonight, fucking nuts.
She’s the rapid pulse in my neck and the welcomed ache in my chest and I want to talk to her and make love to her until there’s nothing else there but us.
I want to protect her. I don’t want to fail her.
Bending down next to her, I touch her hair. She looks up at me, only shadows in the dark of my porch. “What’s wrong, baby?” I ask her.
“How do you know something’s wrong?” Her voice is soft… too soft.
“Because you’re here sitting on my porch in the dark and the freezing cold instead of being at work. Because I can tell you’ve been crying.” Red rings the gray of her eyes. They’re swollen and sad.
Her chin starts to quiver, setting off a storm of worry raining down on me. Her tears rival my rain, so I pick her up and her arms go around my neck.
“I messed up, Adrian. I screwed everything up,” she says into my chest as I push into the house.
“Shhh… it’s okay. We’ll figure it out.” I can’t even explain how incredible it feels to hold her up. To be strong enough for both of us or to be here when she needs me. To be the one she comes to because she trusts me even though I’ve done nothing in my life to deserve anyone’s trust.
Without turning on the lights, I head straight to my room. Once we’re there, I lay her on the bed, switching the button on the small lamp on the table. The Count is sitting there, but it doesn’t matter and I don’t hide it.
“Is it your brother? Was he pissed you left with me? I’ll talk to him—”
“No.” She shakes her head. “I mean, Maddox and I got into it, but it’s not your fault. He told me about Mom getting out of the hospital, and at first he didn’t know where she was… that brought up some other stuff. He left right after that and I haven’t seen him.”
“Shit.” I stroke her hair as she lies on my pillow. All I can think is it’s the first time she’s been in my bed, but it feels like it should be hers too. Or that she has a place there. I like the fact that her head is on Ashton’s shirt. That’s she’s close to him even though she doesn’t know anything about him. “So let’s go find them.” I know this has to be killing her. I’m surprised she’s here now instead of out looking for them. She protects and takes care of the people she loves. It’s what she does and I suddenly feel like shit for being gone all night and keeping her from what she needs to do.
She shakes her head and starts crying harder. Her hands move up, trying to wipe the tears way.
“It’s okay. You don’t have to be strong. Break if you need to. Let me help you the way you did with me.”
My words seem to be the wrong thing to say because they upset her more. Finally the tears are slowing and she’s trying to sit up.
“Do you want to go look for them? Need me to help?”
Another shake of her head. “Mom’s at home, last we knew. Maddox told me later. Plus, I need to be here with you. I need to fix things with you. They… I’m where I need to be right now.”
Her words don’t make any sense, but I know it’s big. Know it’s part of whatever brings those ghosts to her eyes. But I can’t figure out what I have to do with any of it. What she thinks she needs to fix with me… Ice crystalizes my spine, giving me this weird feeling where I don’t know if I want to let her speak or kiss her until there’s no room for words between us.
“Adrian.” She reaches forward and puts a hand on my cheek. That ice is spreading. “I wish there was a way for you to see how wonderful you are. You’re smart and you have a poet’s heart and soul and I never expected to fall…” Her voice breaks off, but she pushes through. “To fall in love with you. No matter what, you need to know I truly did. That I do love you.”
My muscles start to spasm. Tighten, cement encasing them. I pull back, letting her hand fall. Wanting to grab it again but unwilling to let myself. I have no clue what the hell’s going on here, but it’s wrong. I feel it. I need her to talk and hold the words back at the same time.
“What are you talking about, Delaney?”
She tries to grab for my hand, but I shake her off.
“No games. What’s going on?”
Delaney takes a deep breath. Her hands shake, but nothing like the earthquake that goes off inside me at the sound of her next whispered words. “I know… I know about Ashton.”
I push off the bed. My heart thunders. My hands fist.
“Find! me! Find me! I hiding!”
Ashton, Ashton, Ashton.
How does she know about him? What does she know?
“You really need to start talking fast.” I’m pacing the room. Suffocating. The walls are getting closer and closer to me. Delaney. My ghost. She knows about Ash.
“I went to see your sister… to see Angel. Maddox told me not to, but I just… It was close to the anniversary and…”
Her words start fading out, but I man the fuck up and find a way to keep listening to her. She knows my sister.
“It was something I wanted to do for a long time. I just didn’t know how to do it. Just to say I’m sorry. Just to try and, shit, I don’t know what I wanted to do.”
She’s talking fast. Questions are rapid firing in my brain. Why would she need to apologize?
“I couldn’t believe it when she forgave me. That we were okay and I thought… after that I thought things would somehow be better. And then Mom tried to kill herself again and it suddenly didn’t feel like enough anymore.” Fear darkens her voice. “I had to do something to help make it right. I don’t know. I guess if I thought I earned your forgiveness, everything would start to be better.”
Forgiveness, forgiveness, forgiveness.
“Forgiveness for what?” The words struggle to squeeze past my lips through my tensed jaw.
“Play! Play with me!”
“Just a minute, Ash. I’m making a phone call. We have to celebrate.”
“Cel-bate!”
“When we first came here, I thought… I thought I could try to find you and we could talk and I would tell you everything that happened and how much I hate that my—”
My insides shatter at that. No, not even shatter, they turn to dust, blow away, lonely and lost. “When you first came here you thought you would talk to me? You fucking came here looking for me! Looking for me and you didn’t say anything? Was this all some kind of fucking game to you?”
“What? No.” She pushes off the bed and tries to step toward me. She’s shaking all over, but I’m still so confused. How the hell does she know about Ash, and why is she acting like it has anything to do with her?
“Don’t. Finish talking.”
“I’m going to tell you everything now, Adrian. I promise. But I need to explain something first. I thought maybe we could help each other. Maybe… it would bring us some kind of closure to talk to each other, but then I wasn’t sure if I should tell you and the longer I waited the harder it was because you turned into more than just the guy whose life was tied to mine in tragedy. You became… everything.”
I stop. My feet won’t move. I can’t walk as I turn my head to look at her. I feel nothing right now. Empty. Hollow. “How are we tied together? What the fuck ties us together that has to do with Ashton?”
Her eyes are soft and pleading, but it doesn’t matter anymore. I don’t trust them.
“Don’t fucking play games with me. Tell me.”
Her eyes water again and there’s a part of me that wants to go to her. That wants to try and fix it, but I can’t. Not after this. Not when I know it’s somehow about to get a whole lot worse.
“My dad was supposed to be working out of town… but he wasn’t working. He was with his girlfriend.”