Empathy (18 page)

“He has been in my life a long time. We were high school sweethearts.” His rigid posture makes me squirm. “But that was high school and I’m learning that what we had doesn’t compare to what I’m supposed to feel when I’m with the right person.”

He had risked opening up so it was my turn, and I needed to lighten the tense tic in his jaw. “And for the record, you win in the bigger cock department.” I wink.

He charges me, tackling me to the bed, grinding his bigger cock into me. “Damn straight, B.A.B.Y. I’m all man, that’s why. He’s still a boy.”

I giggle. “Does that make me still a girl?”

He growls, tugging open my wrap and exposing my body to him. “You’re all woman. My woman.”

A million lightning bugs ignite my insides and travel to my heart. It’s such an overwhelming feeling to know that in my lost despair, when I fell, I wasn’t met with the ground this time. This time I was caught by him.

IT HAS BEEN THREE HOURS since he lifted her up and carried her away. I underestimated how well they’re entwined. He became someone new in the moment she broke, just like all those years ago with me, he changed in a moment. Why aren’t I programed like him, or him like me? How can he change like that? There was no impulse from me to go to her. Well, one to get a closer look at her completely destroyed. Nothing powered inside me to go rescue her. I relished in her destruction, watched and claimed it as a token.

She was stunning in her heartbreak, and then he waltzed in and stole it from me.

Rain eases into a cool mist before evaporating, leaving dew in the thick air. Storm clouds move across the sky, leaving a grey tint ever dispersing to the cool blue of the summer.

There she is, bounding out like a whole new person. It’s literally as if she’s Mother Nature, beckoning the weather with her emotions. A blond guy flanked by two red-headed girls look up at her as she goes to him. Blake appears next, wrapping her up in a display of possession. Kissing her, slapping her ass before leaving her with the other guy.

Have I fallen into a black hole? What the hell is happening? None of this is right. How dare they find comfort in each other? They each belong to me. I need to feel control. Everything is slipping between my fingers.

I pull out my phone and dial Sean, telling him I need to see him at my place.

ZANE SMILES AT ME OVER the table. “So, Cherry and Red,” is all he says, his expression saying everything his words don’t, making me chuckle.

“Yeah, they’re intense.” The steam from the coffee in front of me swirls on the surface in a warning I don’t heed, burning the tip of my tongue.

“Always were impatient.”

It’s good to see him, he’s exactly the same but everything is so different. The world has shifted, altering me from the girl who once lay in his arms and dreamed of nothing but being with him. Everything was so simple then.

We live in a moment that’s so quickly taken, it’s like it was never even ours. Time is borrowed; you need to capture everything you can before it’s just a fleeting memory of someone you used to be. You say you’ll never change, you promise nothing will change what you have but those aren’t our choices. The world changes, circumstances change.

“I called your house.” Zane pulls me from my musings; a shift in my stomach brings the unsettling void to widen. “Markus answered. What is he doing there, Mel?” He knows Markus and I have never been close and that my parents’ relationship with him wasn’t all roses and family dinners.

“He wants me to sell the house. I can’t do that, so he’s there waiting for me to decide what to do.”

The tension stiffens both our postures. Zane always hated the way Markus treated me. His eyes wandered too much on me for a brother, especially when he held distaste for me most of the time.

“You don’t need to sell the house. There’s enough money. Why would he even care about the sale of the house?”

I hate that this is what my parents have come down to. How much money they left. I don’t care about any of it. I would gladly give it all away if it meant just one more day with them.

“Greed, Zane. You know what he’s like. The will is being read tomorrow so I will just buy his half of the house from him and he can be on his way.”

Sipping his iced tea, his eyes collide with mine over the rim of the mug. “You think he’ll really get half?”

This makes me uncomfortable. I can’t help but fidget which is a tell of mine when I don’t like the direction of conversation. If I didn’t need to be there I would just ignore it all so it didn’t cement the fact they were really never coming back. This is it. I’m on my own with everything they built. Money will never be something I need to earn on my own. I can retire before even starting. It’s all wrong. I’m twenty years old and life is forcing me to accept I’m now an adult and have tough decisions ahead, with only me to make them.

“Do they have any suspects? Who would do something like this?”

Wasn’t that the million dollar question? It doesn’t make sense and the detectives trying to imply it was about me is cruel and untrue. Blake told me there was no evidence to back up that theory and I just need to accept it was the act of a heartless, reckless individual.

“Someone hateful and sick.” Pushing back the emotions threatening to drown me again I look him over. “You look good, Z. How is college treating you?”

His smile is natural, lighting up his entire face. “It’s really good. They think I could go pro. I have scouts interested already.”

Of course he does. Zane is a doer. He’s one of those people who is destined to be something big. The sports world will gain a real talent, but not just that, he’s honest and has the good morals to become a spokesperson for kids to really look up to. He’s the full package and I’m honoured to know him, and to share such a treasured past with him. He owns a piece of my heart. He was my first love, and although my racing heartbeat whenever Blake is near tells me that my first powerful love will decimate any love that came before it, he still owns that part of me, it was his to keep, locked away safe in memories and milestones of our youth.

“I love you, Z. Thank you for coming here, it means more than I can say.”

Zane’s chair scrapes backwards and his warm arms wrap around me. He lets me crash into him, he accepts the collision head on and will try to fix the mess and all the lonely empty days I spent feeling invisible in my pain. I hadn’t tried to call him to give him a chance to know I’m suffering. This morning I was disintegrating into the storm and now I have not one, but two men enforcing the truth that I’m not completely alone. If I let myself see that, I didn’t die that night with my parents. I left that house.

LEAVING HER TO SPEND TIME with her ex-boyfriend took strength. I thought the more distance I put between us, the more rational my brain would become, but no, she’s inside me. Embedded in the fibres and planting roots. She hit me with enough force to render me incapable of thinking of anything but her. My ghosts keep creeping from the shadows, telling me she doesn’t deserve my darkness to taint her light but it was my sins that led me to her in the first place. Fate has given me a glimmer of sunshine in a blackened sky, and after losing control of who I really am for so long, it makes me aware I’ve have been sleepwalking through my life, living out the nightmares of others. Life coated me in a sheen of anger and hate but it’s washing away bit by bit and she’s the water, cleansing me.

Questions bombard me, the choices I made, the impact of my cold front on Ryan. Had I done what was best for him? Had I been an acceptable kin to him? I know I messed us both up; he was so calm at times it was almost unnatural. He completely checks out, leaving just a warm body. I tried to ignore the unnerving atmosphere he can emanate. I’m not sure how he’ll react to the idea of me and Melody. She’s different for him, a friend. I don’t think he has ever really had one before her, but she’s different to me too. She’s saving me and I want to save her. She’s waking me up to a life I thought lost to me. I’m tired and lonely. I hate admitting that to myself. I don’t want to feel all this, it would be easier if I didn’t, but it’s too strong to fight and too incredible to want to. Being inside her and actually wanting to make her fly, wanting to drive pleasure through her, bring her to the edge, make her live in a moment of pure bliss was a need more powerful than finding my own release. Making her feel safety in my arms rather than fear ignited a craving in me to make sure she’s never afraid again.