Fighting Lust: A Deadly Sins Novel (30 page)

“Gina let me in, I was waiting for you to wake up. I’d like to talk to you.”

“Well I don’t want to talk to you.” I cross my arms over my chest, “Please leave.”

He rises from the chair he’s sitting in, “No.”

“Excuse me?”

“I said no. I’m not leaving until I talk to you.”

Pointing at the door, I say firmer; louder, “Leave now.”

“Tessa,” he whispers my name like a solemn prayer, “I said no.”

Angry, I walk up to him and push him hard on the shoulder, “I want you to leave!” I yell.

“No, Tessa,” he says again with so much emotion that all it manages to do is make me feel worse and in reaction to that, I push him again. “Leave!” I say again. This time, he wraps his arms around me and holds on, once again telling me, “No.”

I struggle in his arms, “Leave. Just leave. You already left once. I told you the truth and you couldn’t deal – so just go again. Go.” I begin to cry along with my struggles, but Ryder simply holds on. My heart feels like it’s breaking and I want to kick, hit and punch him in retaliation for the hurt he’s caused. I feel exposed and vulnerable and my heart aches in my chest so hard that I can barely breathe from the pain.

“Tessa, listen to me. My girlfriend was Carrie Mann.”

I immediately freeze.

Pinpricks run from my scalp all the way to my toes. My stomach immediately rolls and it makes me gag. “Oh god,” I murmur, and the tears flow even harder. “Oh God.”

Ryder holds on to me as I sink to the floor, he follows me down, and I proceed to sob uncontrollably. He rocks me back and forth, whispering words of comfort, but I barely hear them. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” I continue to repeat like a mantra. I can’t stop. I know who Carrie is. I’ll never ever forget her face. Or her story. Her death is all my fault. And Ryder, oh my god Ryder. No wonder why he left me. How he is still here and holding onto me, is beyond my comprehension.

Once I calm down, I realize I’ve saturated the front of his shirt. Pulling back in embarrassment, I wipe my nose with the back of my hand – very lady like. Tentatively, my eyes meet his, and I find he’s already looking at me.

Before I can say a word, he speaks. “Please, just hear me out. I know you don’t owe me anything, but I’m begging you.” Staring into his eyes and seeing the yearning and intensity there, I nod. “First,” he begins, “I want to apologize for leaving.”

“You don’t have to,” I interrupt understanding his actions. “Now that I know Carrie was your girlfriend,” I pause as a couple more tears escape at my words. “I can understand why you left.”

He nods and sighs, “Yes, it’s why I left. It was more than I could process and I needed to get away. I felt like the walls were closing in on me and…” he stops and looks at me. “I’m sorry.” He hesitates and my brows furrow as I watch and wait. “But, you also expected that I would leave. Why?”

Shrugging, I try to display a lack of feeling, even though that couldn’t be further from the truth. My self-preservation walls are raising again, brick by brick, “You did exactly what I was expecting you to do,” I shrug. “It’s why I set up what I did with Ronnie at the fire station. I needed to push you away, to make the decision for you. I never intended to tell you the truth, in all honesty. But I guess that’s because a part of me doubted that this thing between us would ever go anywhere.”

“What changed?”

Staring at him, tears fill my eyes again at the truth. “Because I never expected to fall in love with you,” I whisper. “And when I realized the truth, all I could think about was needing to protect you.”

“Protect me? How is breaking my heart protecting me?”

“Because a broken heart can be healed in time. What happened to me? How you will look at me because of it… that will never go away.” I look down feeling ashamed.

His large hands cup my face and he waits for my eyes to find his again, “If I could do things over, I would have reacted differently. I’m sorry that I can’t, but what happened to you, what happened to Carrie,” he drifts off and swallows hard, “it isn’t your fault. That, I know and nothing you can say will ever make me think differently.”

“But, you don’t know…”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“But, I didn’t tell anyone until it was too late.”

“It doesn’t matter.”

I pull away from him roughly, “How can you say that? What happened to Carrie, what happened to others, if I had come forward and told someone, maybe he would have been caught much sooner and never would have had a chance to hurt anyone else.”

“Tessa, you were a child – and more than that, he was your father. You can’t blame yourself for what he did. There’s no one to blame other than him. Don’t you dare take that burden from him – he doesn’t deserve it – and neither do you.”

“You’re wrong, Ryder. And it doesn’t matter now, I can’t change it, no matter how much I wish that I could. I would gladly give my own life in exchange if it meant saving others.”

“Don’t you dare say that!” he says angrily. “Never again say that.” I flinch at the anger and despair in his tone. His breaths are rapid and he drops his hands from my face and takes my hands. Once he calms himself, he states, “You know who Carrie is.”

“Yes. I know what happened to her. I know the names and stories of every single person my father hurt. Every. Single. One. They are all burned into my mind like a tattoo.”

“When Carrie died,” he swallows heavily again and sniffs. He takes a deep breath and begins again, “When Carrie died, I was the one that found her.” My horror must show on my face and a single tear falls down his cheek. I reach up and catch it with my fingertips, clutching it in my hand. “She called me and said goodbye. The article had just come out naming her as a victim and whispers and looks had started at school. She said she was fine – said all the right things actually – but in reality she was anything but. Want to talk about feelings of guilt and feeling like I should have known or could have prevented it? I lived them for a long time. My life was destroyed the moment I found her – I was completely shaken. I blamed myself for a very long time, and while I now know that what happened to her wasn’t my fault, I still chose to live my life in a way that would prevent me from ever getting close enough to another person again. I chose to live a lustful life because it’s dangerous entwining your life with someone else’s. You hurt when they hurt, you laugh when they laugh, you find yourself living for every one of their smiles. I never wanted that again – I wanted to stay safe. But then, one encounter with you and my life was flipped on its head. For the first time I found myself wanting again, and living for those special moments. I don’t want to lose you, Tessa. And I refuse to let that man take another person from me. I left because I have never been so scared in my life.”

“You were scared of me?”

“No!” he cups my face again, “Hell, no, I could never be scared of you,” his thumb runs across my cheek in what has become my favorite gesture of his and I close my eyes at the feeling. “But, I am scared of losing you.”

His words don’t make any sense. “I don’t understand.”

He leans forward and softly kisses me on the mouth as if reassuring me first, then he begins to tell me more about Carrie. I may know of her story, but I don’t know her. He begins to explain as a man who loved her. He tells me about her battle with depression, how hard it was for her to come forward and admit what my father had done, but how proud she was too. He tells me that she was horrified when the article came out, and how there were those at school that were supportive and those that were mean and hateful. How she lied and said she was doing okay even when she wasn’t. How he found her. How he lost part of himself when she died. How he blamed himself immediately after her death for not being more aware, more in tune, for perhaps only hearing what he wanted, what he needed to hear. He thought he could have made her get help - saved her. Even though he went through therapy, he decided to never love again. “I really felt like loving –really loving someone so genuinely, so totally, so deeply could only result in pain and loss. But, you taught me that love is worth the chance.”

“Me?”

He smiles and it’s beautiful - a bright beacon in the middle of such darkness. “I already told you once that I didn’t expect you, and that’s true. You rocked my world in that bathroom, not only physically, but mentally and emotionally. I felt in that moment that I met my match. And while I pursued you, got to know you, spoke to you,” he strokes my face, “kissed you. I began to love you. And I do, I love you.”

I look down, immediately not understanding how he could say this to me. “But, Ryder-”

“No. Tessa, hear me.” His eyes hold my own, “What your father did to you, and the fact that you didn’t come forward immediately is not your fault. And the hurts and pains inflicted on others are not your fault. And how others chose to or were able to heal - or not - is not your fault. You do not own any of that. And furthermore, it has absolutely no bearing what so ever on how I feel about you. None. I love you.”

“But Ryder,” I begin again, “how can you not look at me and be horrified? How can you not see him and what he did to your life when you look at me? I’m just broken.”

“You’re only broken if you allow yourself to be. If you let him continue to win. I told you what you aren’t responsible for. But you are responsible for letting him continue to win. When I look at you, I see someone that’s a little bruised and battered, but has managed to come out of the dark a beautiful, strong, woman. One that I love. One that I want to be with. One that I refuse to let walk away from me. There are no shadows of your past covering you, Tessa. All I see is the beautiful person that you’ve become. And I want all of it – every piece – because there’s even beauty in the darkness. Out of all of the things that have happened in my life because of the actions of a sick man – this is the best part. You’re my bright star in the middle of the darkness. And I’m not letting go.”

Tears fall down my face unashamedly, “I love you, Ryder. Every single broken piece and those few whole pieces too – they love you. I love you.”

“I love you too,” he says and then he smiles. “But you’re not broken. You’re perfect, and you’re beautiful. Every. Piece.”

And as he looks at me, I can see in his eyes that he means every word. Shining in his eyes, I see love. So much love. And it takes my breath away. Leaning forward, I place my lips on his. And while I know what he said is not true, for the first time, I have hope that is ready to take wings. We remain connected for a few moments, just reveling in the meaning of our kiss, and then slowly we open, and our tongues come together, finding a rhythm of their own. It’s sweet and it’s meaningful. It fills my heart and my soul and all I see is this man.

Somehow, here on the floor, in the middle of devastation, he’s managed to start the process of putting me back together piece by piece and all I want, all I see, is him.

Pulling back to look at him, my hands move to his shirt and I pull it up and over his head. He looks at me with a question of uncertainty in his eyes. “Show me how much you love me. Make the stars shine for me – even if it’s during the day.”

He smiles softly and kisses me on the forehead – if I didn’t already love him, I would have started in that moment. My heart fills to overflowing at the loving gesture and I stand, and quickly undress. I’m naked and ready before he’s even risen to his feet. I look down at him with what I’m sure is an anxious look, and he laughs. “Wow. That was something to see.”

“Shut up,” I tease, “stop making me wait.”

“You know,” he says as he rises to his feet and unpops the button of his jeans. I can’t remove my eyes from the front of his pants. I’m waiting with bated breath for him to pull them down. “We should probably wait-“

Rolling my eyes, I put my hands on my hips, “Seriously?”

“Well your roommate is here...”

Walking to him, I unzip his jeans for him, reach in and take him in my hand. His eyes roll back in his head and I smile triumphantly, “What do you say now?” I ask huskily? And then I laugh as he rips his jeans and briefs down so fast, his timing rivals mine. I laugh when he picks me up in a cradle and places me down on the bed.

He stares down at me for a moment, before he lowers his body on top of mine and kisses me once again. “Tessa?”

“Hmm?” words aren’t easily formed at the moment.

“You’re beautiful,” I look at his face and see him peering down at me. When his eyes meet mine again, I lean up and kiss him softly. As we break away, his lips move to under my jaw, down my neck and to my chest. When his lips surround my nipple and suck, I arch my back in ecstasy. “Yes,” I hiss and run my fingers through his short and soft hair.

As he kisses down my stomach, I squirm. He places a kiss on each of my hip bones, and then pushes my legs apart. “Open,” he instructs. He kisses the inside of each thigh and runs his fingertips down the inside of my leg, all the way to my ankle. His touch evokes goosebumps and I barely refrain from scolding him for being a tease. He raises his head and smiles at me just before his lips meet the most sensitive part of me. “Oh,” I say in a long sigh as I enjoy the feeling of his mouth loving the most sensitive part of me.

He swirls his tongue around my clit and just when I think I’m going to fall off the edge, he moves and slides his tongue away. It’s a seductive dance of give and take until finally I can’t take it anymore. “Ryder. Now.” I tell him. He looks up at me and I tell him honestly, “I want you inside of me. Now. No more foreplay. We’ve had enough of that since we had sex the first time, don’t you think?”