One Last Hold (8 page)

“You what?” He pushed back from the bar. His brows twitched, his jaw tightened and his chest, though covered by his shirt, appeared to be carved from steel.

She sometimes wondered if what he had underneath his chest, where his heart should be, was carved from steel.

“I have no intention of doing it without your permission.”

“You’ll never have it.”

“Why not?”

He flung his empty bottle in the trash and got another one. He used his foot to shut the refrigerator door and leaned against it.

“You just said you weren’t here to destroy my life.”

“Right.”

“So writing a biography would destroy me. My reputation. My career. It would destroy everything.”

“I don’t believe that.”

He twisted the top off. His muscles flexed as he brought the bottle to his lips. She watched his Adam’s apple as he drank and swallowed the longing to taste him. He held onto the neck of the bottle with his fingers, letting it dangle by his thigh.

She did
not
look at the bottle next to his thighs. Ignored the way his pants outlined his shapely ass, legs, groin.

She weaved her fingers through her hair and tightened her fingers on her strands. “I think your fans would love you even more for seeing you’re a human being with problems and mistakes.”

“No. My fans would hate me.”

“And I think it’d help you to talk about it.”

“No.”

A shadow crossed his face. She’d been wrong. He didn’t have steel under his chest, where his heart should be. Maybe it was just rubber, taut and unbending at times, vulnerable to fractures at other times.

She dropped the grip on her hair and let her fingers fall to the notebook, grabbed a page, and crinkled the corner. She’d said too much. He wasn’t ready for this. She wasn’t even sure she was ready for this.

“You’re using Blake as much as he’s using you, aren’t you?” Wesley drained his beer and tossed it in the trash. “You want to become a famous author and make a lot of money, possibly quit your job so you can write. Your boss merely wants information about the elusive race car driver.”

“It has nothing to do with becoming famous and making a lot of money. If I wanted to do that, I could have done exactly that. And technically, I’m not a reporter. I’m a journalist for a very popular magazine and one I’m proud of. I don’t report on the news, I write personality pieces. True ones.”

Wesley rolled his eyes and sidled next to her at the bar. He didn’t sit. She looked away. “As true as your subjects say they are.”

“What is your deal with news media anyway?” She whirled her chair around so her knees were even with his upper thighs.
Big
mistake. He stood in front of her, his already powerful body looming over her. Her legs parted, her feet rested against the bottom of the chair. And all she could think about was pulling him into her.

In between her legs, where she burned for him.

“News media?” he scoffed. “It’s all about sensationalism. Most of the ones I’ve met are corrupt. They’ll lie, cheat, probably even steal to get their story. They end up hurting people to get what they want and they just don’t care.”

“We’re not all like that. I don’t mean to hurt people, but there are some stories out there people deserve to know about.”

“Like mine, for instance.”

“Your fans care about you. They want to know more about you.”

Wesley didn’t reply. He didn’t need to. The intensity of his gaze made his opinions on the subject clear.

Wesley closed the gap between them, leaned forward, and stopped just shy of her lips. His strong arms caged her in. Her back pressed against the bar. His breath, warm against her check, incited chills along her nape.

“I’ve always wanted to write a book,” Caitlyn blabbed. At least if she was talking, she wasn’t focusing on him, on the now. “Something fantastic, something startling, something everyone just
has
to read.”

“Yeah, like my biography,” he bit out.

“Unfortunately,” she continued, trying to ignore the essence of him and the sucker-punch of his scrutiny. Her pulse tripped so hard, she was sure he would hear it. “I have to have a full time job to support myself. You know, a house, food, clothing?”

“Well.” Wesley’s gaze dipped across her skin. “I don’t know about the clothing part.”

Her body flamed hot. Neither of them moved. What was he trying to do anyway?

She glanced down, but it didn’t help. Now his chest was in full view.

“And I do enjoy my job as a journalist.” She pushed against him but he didn’t budge. The sensation of his skin, though covered in that minuscule white tee, burned her hand. She gulped, trying to lengthen her shallow breath, and wondered if he’d worn it on purpose.

“There’s more you can do with your writing skills. Like write a book.”

“You could give me that opportunity.”

“No.” Wesley stepped away, taking her sanity with him. He rested his back against the fridge and propped one foot on the frame. Angry, jerky movements.

“I love my job,” she admitted. “I’ve learned so many things, grown into so many things, and I’ve seen so many things, good and bad. Inspiring. I needed that more than you’ll understand.”

“Why?”

Caitlyn snatched her pen and clicked it closed, then used the tip to doodle circles in the condensation on the bar. She didn’t want to answer, didn’t want him to know, but she longed to talk and besides, how would she have her closure if she didn’t tell him everything?

“There were a lot of things I needed to learn about life,” she murmured, remembering him as the friend she once had so she wouldn’t feel so uneasy. The friend she could tell anything to, the first person who knew when she started her period. The friend she felt comfortable with before sex and the friend she felt passionate about
after
sex. “I couldn’t deal with things for a while. I blamed myself for what happened because Samantha took her seatbelt off to comfort me. I thought I wasn’t good enough for you, I thought you blamed me, too.” Tears swam under her lids and her voice cracked, but she kept her head down.

“I went to college,” she continued, “not only to get an education but also to be with people.
Different
people. I took self-defense lessons, to protect myself if need be, but also to learn how to focus my body and my mind away from my troubles. I took piano lessons until I realized I wasn’t any good. And I worked hard while going to school. I even saw a therapist.”

He caught her chin in his hand and tilted her face to meet his. She hadn’t meant to tell him any of this, hadn’t meant to talk about the past at all. Her body grew heavy, fatigued, and she longed for him to wrap her in his arms. But that would never happen. In the end, he’d leave. Just like before.

It’d hurt when he left. She was young, naïve, and so much in love she thought she’d die.

His hand remained under her chin and she wanted to move her head so it cupped her face. She didn’t dare. What would be the point? No sense in dragging up old ghosts.

Wesley was no longer the person she grew up with. He was a stranger now.

“I’m sorry if I ever made you feel that way.” Wesley cradled her chin and thumbed a tear from her eye. “I never blamed you for what happened. I’ve always blamed myself, not you, so please understand that.”

She shrugged and his hand fell away from her chin but his gaze remained on hers. Eyes holding cavernous layers of green, allure and ambiguity. He’d found a way to hide behind those eyes, as if he always wore shades. She wished she could unveil him. Before that horrible night their lives changed, he had no bad memories. No reason to hide.

“It doesn’t matter anymore,” she said. Of course she didn’t mean it. It would always matter. The memories would always leave a gaping hole. “I will always blame myself, but I can’t let that keep me from living my life. You see, I’ve learned to accept myself for who I am, and I’ve learned to accept my circumstances for what they may be.”

“Then why couldn’t you accept me?”

Wesley drove Caitlyn to her car and fought back the emotions he’d censored long ago. Talking about it tore him apart inside, which is one of the reasons why he’d left in the first place. He never wanted to revisit the memory of that night, to dredge up memories. Talking didn’t help the memories or the guilt. He couldn’t dwell on what happened, couldn’t fall into that trap again.

Wesley chided himself on not being able to face accountability for his mother’s death head on like some people might, but four years of law school should have been ample punishment. He enrolled out of pure guilt. If his parents hadn’t been fighting about his future that night, his mother would still be alive. His dad wanted him to go to law school and when he sprung the news on them he was going to race with his uncle’s team instead, Johnson was livid.

His mom wasn’t as concerned and only wanted the best for her son. She always encouraged whatever made him happy, and he did not want to be an attorney.

Samantha had been in the backseat with Caitlyn, trying to console her because it was just as big a surprise to her, the girl he’d wanted to marry. All the while he argued with his dad in the front. He was driving, and driving fast because of the anger at his dad and his resentment towards Caitlyn for not supporting him.

He never blamed Caitlyn. He only blamed her for turning on him in his time of need. He blamed himself for that too, because if he was the kind of man he should have been, he would have told Caitlyn first, when they were alone. He wouldn’t have sprung it on her with his parents around. He had no intention of ending their relationship; he truly thought she would support him and go with him.

But Caitlyn blaming herself? He’d never known

He’d been too consumed by his own guilt. Remorse tightened his skin, rolling in his gut. She’d blamed herself. Never did he mean for her to blame herself.

His father had done everything he could to cover up what happened that night. Wesley wasn’t sure how he’d done it, but any research in his past only mentioned his mother dying in a car accident. The reports made it appear it was a one-vehicle, one-person accident, and Wesley never admitted the truth. The first officer on scene knew. He was
there
. But nothing was said…ever. However much it’d cost for his father to cover the accident up, thinking about it sickened him.

Wesley stopped his car beside Caitlyn’s and agonized over what to do next. The temptation to lean over and kiss her almost won, but she opened the door before he had the chance to move.

He snatched her arm before she could exit. He should do something, say something. He shouldn’t just let her leave.

She turned her head towards him. “Thank you for the ride.” His pulse dipped as she pulled away and climbed out.

He watched her leave, waiting a good five minutes afterward just sitting in his car and staring into the dark.

Caitlyn. How could he have treated her like that? How could he have left without looking back when she’d been the constant in his life? He’d been so young, so stupid. All these years she had blamed herself, and he’d done nothing to prevent it.

The past was the past. She had her life, he had his, and there was no rekindling what they once had.

Even if it had been the best thing that ever happened to him.

*

Wesley carried the last of the boxes into his house and placed it in the corridor along with the others. Movers had already come and gone, but he chose to bring these up himself.

The scent of construction tickled his nostrils, and he reveled in the clean fresh smell. His nerves throbbed in excitement at his first night in his brand new home.

Roaming the house, he stopped to admire the immense windows drawing the outside in. The windows offered such an amazing view that he could imagine he was stepping in the snow that laced through the mountains, could sense the cold on his cheek.

Stepping outside, he checked the pork searing on the grill. The air was crisp and tight, but the news cautioned a wintry weather mix for later this evening

He lumbered up the stairs that snaked the side of his house to the deck outside his bedroom. Although he didn’t need such a big house for himself, maybe one day he would. It’d be a great place to raise children, even though children never crossed his mind until now. Now, when he was about to hit the thirty-year mark, he wondered what it would be like to come home to a family of his own.

Opening the door to his bedroom, he jogged down the stairs, fetched a box, and proceeded up again. Back and forth, moving boxes from out of the corridor into their respective places and imagining ways to make his home cozier. He found his trophies, old and new and ones since high school. His mother had saved them, insisting he should always remember his accomplishments. He sat on the floor, lifting trophies out of the box, and stopped at one he’d received for track.

Earning that trophy had been a cornerstone for him. It’d been the day he’d finally decided running wasn’t for him, track and field wasn’t for him, and law school definitely wasn’t for him.

He was an auto racer, through and through.

A knock at the door startled him. He dropped the trophy into the box, stood, and jogged downstairs.

He opened the door and frowned when he recognized the officers, Sikes and Brew. “Can I help you?”

Sikes flashed his badge and a piece of paper.

Fuck.

“We have a warrant to search this house and the premises.”

Wesley swallowed the air that furled in his cheek. They hadn’t found a suspect. They were still looking at him. “What?” He clutched the door tighter and took the warrant from the detective. Words swam in front of him. The first time worried him but not too severely. This time had to mean he was a potential suspect, probably because they had no others.

“If you’ll move aside, Officer Brew and I will get started.”

Not knowing what else to do and having no other options, Wesley stepped aside. Dread fissured cold in his blood. “I just moved in today and I’m not all the way unpacked yet.”

“This won’t take long.”

“I’m calling my attorney,” Wesley said.