Shattered (32 page)

"Dallis…" Colby murmured, bringing my attention back to him. I looked back at him through tear streaked eyes. He pulled me closer, rubbing his hand over my cheek as I sat at his side, still feeling the effects of his words.

"After everything that’s happened, Colby…."

"I know… I know," he said. "And I can't apologize enough for everything that's happened, but I have to believe that through all of this pain and suffering, something good will come of this." Colby swallowed hard again. "I wasn't sure if it was okay to reach out to you, and Hailey told me it was a bad idea, but I didn't care. I felt it. I felt it in my heart that you needed to be here and that I needed to say what I should have said a long time ago. I wasn't sure if you would actually come. I mean, I held out hope, but I wasn't sure. And now that you're here, I feel like I made the right choice…like it's meant to be."

Closing my eyes and shaking my head slowly I muttered, "Did Hailey fill you in…?"

"Yes. Look, Dallis, I know you're seeing that coffee guy and that's fine." My eyes widened and my head snapped over to look at him. "When I went back to the townhouse that night to get my stuff and I had that girl with me," he looked deep into my eyes as a tear rolled over his yellowing face, "I was just being a spiteful, childish asshole to try and make you see that I could easily move on from you. The only problem is, I couldn't move on from you… I
can't
move on from you. No one will ever be you, Dallis. I just let my pride get in the way when I should have walked back into that house, got down my knees, and apologized a million and one ways. I should have made you feel like the queen that you are--I should have handed my heart over to you on a silver platter."

My breath caught as the tears poured down my face again. I tried hard to wipe them away, but it seemed the more I wiped, the faster they came. Colby didn't stop the tears that fell from his eyes, either.

"Dallis, we both have larger than life personalities with matching egos to go along with them. Our egos got in the way and that's why we're where we are now. I know you're seeing that coffee guy, but I also know that we love each other. We love each other deeply and rebounds will fill a hole, but they can't replace the real thing." He smiled at me as a few more tears rolled down his cheeks. "You and me, Dallis. Together--we're the real thing."

It hurt to look at Colby, but it hurt even more so to look away. Here, he had just poured his heart out to me--made himself completely vulnerable to me--and all I wanted to do was lash out and let him know just what type of rotten individual I had him pegged for. But I couldn't. I couldn't bring myself to say such harsh things to him. Thought after thought came to me, but just before opening my mouth to verbalize them, my subconscious would swipe them away. I was at a loss, rendered speechless, and it hurt--it burned with the fire of ten thousand suns.

It was killing me.

"Say something," Colby said, squeezing my hand with longing in his eyes. "I know you love me, Dallis. I know you do. Why else would you be here?"

His words sparked me, sending the forgotten ability to speak back to me. I looked down at Colby's hand as it sat, hovering over mine, and then back into his sad, yet hopeful eyes. "I do love you, Colby. I've loved you for a long time and I will always love you,"

A gleam went off in his crystal blues.

"But, Colby, I'm not in love with you, and I haven't been for a while now." My words emptied his soul. I watched as hope gave way to despair with every second that passed. The confident man lying before me was no more. Now lay a man who looked as if the air had been taken away from him. Here lay a man who looked utterly defeated. "You've been a rock and what I needed at the time that I needed you, but we've grown and unfortunately, that growth has carried us in opposite directions."

Colby's eyes begged for me to reverse my words, but I couldn't. For the first time since I'd heard about his accident, something other than wrath had come to me. With every word, I felt myself beginning to heal.

"Even if you would have done all of those things, we would have ultimately ended up right where we are because life happened and it had different plans for us." I sniffled, trying to keep a fresh set of tears from crashing down my face. "The things you said to me that night, while hurtful, were true. I had become devoid of emotion. Losing my mom caused me to become a shell of my former self. I didn't know how to handle it. I didn't
want
to handle it. And it wasn't because I wanted to be a miserable old bitch, but because I wasn't in a good place with where my life stood. I wasn't happy with me--I wasn't happy with us."

Shifting his weight in the bed, Colby sat up a little straighter. His empty expression normally would have been cause for concern, but right now, in this moment, it fueled me. There was so much that I wanted to say, but I also didn't want to come across as kicking Colby while he was down.

"So you led me on?" Colby asked somberly.

"No… and if I did, it was unintentional. I was just comfortable."

It hurt a little exposing the rawness of my emotional state because it was tearing Colby apart. But I had come all this way, and I had to say what I felt. "We got comfortable in a rhythm, Colby. We knew one another, so it just made things convenient. It made it easy to stay. That night," I shook my head, recalling the absurdity of our fateful night at Ada's and then back at the townhouse, "that night was just the icing on the cake. If it hadn't happened then, it would have happened at some point."

Tears rolled down my cheeks as I spoke, but I did nothing to keep them at bay. These weren't tears of sadness. No, these were finally tears of joy. It felt good to finally release--to no longer be beholden to feelings that occupied a very small, yet, significant part of my heart.

Colby let go of my hand as he wiped his tears away. "I don't even know what to say," he awkwardly chuckled. "I just poured my heart out to you and now I feel like a jackass."

"Don't," I said, drying my now moist cheeks. "Don't feel like a jackass for being honest with one another, which is what we should have done a long time ago."

Colby lay staring at me, shaking his head ever so slightly. "I feel like I missed my chance. Like there was something that I could have done, or should have done, sooner."

"But there wasn't. There was nothing that could have been done, Colby. We'd been together for three years and I still wasn't imagining spending the rest of my life with you. Don't you think that's a problem?"

He didn't respond. He just shut his eyes and sniffed away loose tears.

"I had these grand plans about what I would say to you if I ever got the chance and none of it was good. I was angry, I felt abandoned, and I blamed you for a lot of it." Colby opened his eyes and looked over to me. "I feel like I'd lost a part of me after being with you for a while. Like I had somehow morphed into the girl that you wanted me to be…only, I wasn't what you wanted me to be. I was only small traces of the Dallis that you wanted." I stopped for a second and took Colby's hand in mine. "I love you, Colby. I will always love you, but it isn't the type of love that you need it to be."

"Do you love him?" Colby asked, catching me off guard.

I dropped his hand and swallowed hard. Did I love Grayson that way? He'd confessed his love to me, but I had yet to do the same for him. "Yes," I said with a smile on my face. "Yes, I do love, Grayson."

Colby winced as I said the words that finally set my heart free. No longer was there any restriction over me. No longer did I feel the need to guard my heart and desperately shield myself from any further hurt. I had finally and successfully closed one door and I was beyond ready to walk through another.

"Then there's nothing more I can do," Colby said flatly, his eyes lacking any real expression. "It kills me to look at you and know that your heart belongs to another man, but I want you to be happy. You deserve it."

"I am happy. I just didn't fully realize it until coming here." Colby's eyes shot up. "I didn't want to give my heart to Grayson. Hell, after us, I didn't want anyone. But when your heart craves something, it’s a real son of a bitch to try and keep it from getting what it wants." I turned in my seat and sat directly facing Colby. He had a hard time looking at me, but after pausing long enough, he focused back on me. "I do not want you to think that I came here to gloat or wanting to throw Grayson in your face. That was never my intent--"

"I know, Dallis," Colby interrupted. "I would never think that of you."

"Good. Because truthfully, I didn't want to come here. I didn't want to face you. I didn’t want…this," I said, waving my hand around to acknowledge the situation before us.

"Then what brought you here?"

"Honestly? Grayson." I watched as Colby softly nodded his head. "He knew there was a wound that hadn't closed where you were concerned. I didn't want to admit it, but he was right, it was definitely there."

"He's one lucky bastard," Colby whispered, sniffling again. "I just hope he realizes what he has."

"He does," I replied smiling at him. "He definitely does."  I stood and leaned over and planted a soft kiss on his forehead. "Good bye, Colby," I said, leaving my lips firm against his head.

Colby wrapped his arm around my neck and held on to me for a few, elongated seconds more. When I removed my lips from his head, he finally let me go. "I love you, Dallis O'Brien. I will always love you."

I smiled as I stood and walked away from Colby and towards the door. Reaching for the door handle, I turned and looked back at him with a smile on my face. "You take care of yourself, okay?"

"Will do. Drive safely," he said, attempting to return my smile.

With those words, I walked out of the room and out of Colby's life.

On my way out of the hospital, I stopped by the waiting room that had successfully taken my breath away earlier. I walked in and a few people sat inside, looking at me curiously. After a minute of looking around the room, and after mentally removing the people that were staring at me, I smiled as I turned to exit and walked out of the hospital, feeling like I had just removed the weight of the world from my shoulders and ready to finally be happy.

Walking outside the hospital doors, a newfound feeling of rejuvenation filled me as the fresh scent of rain infiltrated my nostrils. The rain had finally stopped as the hovering clouds gave way to specks of intermittent sunlight. After opening the door to my Jeep and taking my place in the driver's seat, I let out a long, deep breath, and smiled as I thought about Grayson and his beautiful blue eyes and his artwork adorned body, awaiting me back home in Seattle. Reaching over and grabbing my phone, I pressed the button to call him, but didn't get an answer, so I left a text instead.

*Me*

On my way! Can't wait to see you.

I tossed the phone into the passenger seat and started up the Jeep. Letting the top down and programming my radio, I let Adam Levine croon in my ears as the crisp air blew through my hair all the way home on my highly anticipated return trip back to Seattle.

Pulling up to Grayson's house, I jumped out of the Jeep and made my way up to the front door. I used my key to unlock it and walked in, only to find that he wasn't home. After quickly shutting and locking the door, I jumped back into my Jeep and drove over to Ada's, where I was sure I would find him.

I parked and jumped out, not even bothering to close up the top, even though the threatening clouds looming overhead looked as if they would open their floodgates at any second. I didn't care. My only concern was getting to Grayson and feeling his warm, loving arms wrapped around my body. I wanted to see him, to smell him, to touch him. I just wanted to be in his presence.

Pushing the door open forcefully, I caught the attention of the patrons casually seated inside. A young hostess that I had never seen before asked, "How may I help you?" as I brushed past her and over to the coffee bar.

"Dallis," Emily said, looking over the bar.

"Yeah," I managed to say through deep breaths. "Where's Grayson?"

She smiled warmly. "He's back in his office. Go on in."