KEPT: A Second Chance Fairy Tale (30 page)

“You
would
think that,” he agrees. “You didn’t grow up with her, though. If I wasn’t chasing errant boys away from the house, I was lecturing her on reasons to stay away from them.”

“Bet that went over well.”

He sighs, running his hand through his still damp hair. The muscles in his chest work in sync as his bicep flexes. I admire them both as he stops moving and catches me staring. Smiling smugly, he leaves his hand to rest on the back of his neck.

“It’s not fair,” I murmur to myself.

Rather than ignore my thought said aloud, as I frequently do him, he asks, “What’s not fair?”

“Nothing,” I deny.

He pushes, “Say what’s on your mind.”

“I’m good.” I play innocent first, then tell him, as though it’s an afterthought, “It’s not fair to women like me. You’re hot, even beautiful. And you look how you look. But then look at
me
and with you still looking like
that
… Well, the thought is a little depressing.”

He blinks once, shakes his head as though clearing it, then blinks again. Obviously I’ve confused him. No more than he’s confused me all this time.

“What the fuck did you just say?”

I meant to say, if you keep looking at me the way you do, I’ll fall in love…if I haven’t already.

“I said nothing. Go away so I can finish fitting everything in my suitcase.”

“How long do you think it’s going to take to do that?”

“Fifteen or twenty minutes?”

He nods. “Are you hungry?” he offers. “I can order room service.”

“I’m okay.”

“Wine?”

I check the clock near the bed. It’s only eight-thirty. “Wine would be nice.”

Smiling obnoxiously, most likely remembering my behavior the last time I drank too much of what I now consider truth serum, he assures, “I’ll see you have as much as you need.”

Oh, I bet.

If I had any self-preservation at all, I’d stay quiet, but I don’t. The comment he made in his office weeks ago just entered my thoughts. Now that our relationship has evolved, I’m curious. “So, about the spanking…”

My face grows red as Michael’s laughter fills the entire room.

“What spanking?”

“I was just saying…” I mumble out.

“Saying what, exactly?”

“You told me you wanted to spank me. I’m thinking now, after being…”

God, his laugh…

He doesn’t try to hide it. Even his eyes are alight with humor at my expense. I don’t care. I made him sound like that.

Young.

Carefree.

Happy.

He pulls me close, his hands at my waist. My arms are trapped between us and, since I’m partially offended, I don’t return his embrace.

“Lucy, when I said that, I didn’t mean it
literally
.”

With mild disappointment, I counter, “You didn’t?”

“No. Jesus, you’re a nut.”

“I’m not!”

He squeezes me, then kisses my temple. Being that he has me wrapped in his arms, I’m forced to strain my neck to look up.

“When I said I’d like to spank you, I really meant I wanted to beat your ass. If you would have been anyone else, I’d have fired you for the shit you pulled with the Lehmans. I was pissed.”

“You also said gag. That you wanted to gag me,” I remind him.

Michael sighs and looks down. His dark blue eyes are soft, but still full of laughter. His chest is bare, and I feel the warmth of his skin beneath my fingertips. His two-day beard is dark against his bronzed skin. Looking at him now, he’s not only beautiful, he’s exquisite.

“Lucy, I still think about doing both. A lot. But that’s because you don’t ever shut up.”

“You’re not very nice.” I mean to insult him because, as always, he’s making fun of me. “I was thinking…”

“You want me to spank you, I’ll spank you,” he offers, and my body tingles envisioning this. “Although I’m not into hurting women to get me or them off.”

“And I’m not into this conversation anymore,” I inform, struggling to move out of his arms. I’m certain my face is bright red. I feel the line of fire rushing through my neck, cheeks, and forehead. It’s also hot as hell in here.

Finally, he relents. Backing away, still grinning at my expense, he adds, “I just got out of the shower. Now I need to consider a cold one.”

Oh, dear god.

An hour later, I’m sitting next to Michael on his bed, watching television. He’s flipping through the sports channels and studying the scores at the bottom of the screen. A few times, I hear him
tsk
quietly to himself. He must keep track of team progress. To me, the stats just look awkward and confusing.

“Had a thought,” he mindlessly announces. “Wasn’t sure how you’d feel about the idea.”

“So far, I’ve loved all your ideas.” He turns his focus from the television to me. He grins when he finds me smirking.

“One thing at a time,” he jokes. “Corbin and I have a couple tickets to see the Yankees play this season. I could take Dillon, if you’d be okay with that.”

“Um.” I don’t know what to say. The offer to give me a break from taking him everywhere a man should sounds so tempting. “He doesn’t really know you. I mean–”

“That’s the beauty of baseball,” he argues. “You don’t have to really know anyone there. If you’re a fan of the game, it makes you friends.”

Men have such a simple way of thinking. Women aren’t so easy.

“You said Corbin had a ticket. Will he be okay with you taking Dillon instead?”

“Yeah,” he replies quickly. “Corbin likes kids. He has a soft heart, and if Dillon has a chance to see a game from the seats we have, he’ll give it up for him.”

“That sounds like Corbin.”

Michael nods. “There’s a game this week. I can take him to that one.”

On the topic of kids, I hesitate briefly, wanting to bring up what Denise filled me in on last night. It’s what initially triggered my reaction in throwing myself at Michael. After this trip, especially last night, he’s important enough to me now that I hope to understand him better.

“Tell me about your son,” I blurt without warning, ripping the box of tragic secrets open.

Michael takes his eyes from the television and turns them to me as his fingers wrap tightly around his glass of red wine.

“Deni,” he realizes. “She told you.”

“She did. Don’t be mad. She just–”

“Fucking meddles,” he tersely finishes.

Surprisingly, he appears somewhat calmer than I’d thought he’d be at the mention of his son. I wait and watch as he takes a large drink. The cords of his throat work as he swallows, and when he finally turns his gaze to mine, he says nothing.

“You don’t have to tell me. I understand if you don’t want to.”

“I can tell you about him if you want to know.”

“I do.”

I draw my knees up to my chest and wrap my arms around them. Resting my cheek on top of them, I study Michael fidgeting in place. I can empathize with what he must be feeling in remembrance, although I can hardly bear the thought of having personal experience with such a sad circumstance.

“My son was four. His name was Caleb.” Once he starts really talking, his voice resonates with sorrow. It’s hollow with pain and what I can only imagine to be unrelenting grief. “And, until his death, he was my entire life.”

“I’m so sorry,” I reply.

I had hoped to stay quiet, to let him talk his way through this, but I realize I’ve ruined this opportunity once he puts his hand between us, one finger pointing to the ceiling, gesturing for me to give him a moment.

I stay quiet, if only to get his jaw to stop ticking.

“Victoria wasn’t the love of my life.”

Victoria
.

Her name is beautiful. The way he says it sounds so formal and dignified. I’m jealous of a woman I’ve never met, but who, at one time, had his heart.

My name is fitting, being that it’s more like me—simple and understated.

Without further pause, he continues. “I’m not sure if having just one love all your life exists for people, but if it does, we weren’t that to each other. We both cared for our family, and I did love her, but only because she was the mother of my son.” He takes another drink and doesn’t look at me. The muted television holds his focus. “It was a car accident. It wasn’t the driver’s fault, but shit happens, and when it does…”

Clearing my throat, I scoot closer, but still ensure I avoid physical contact. We’re sitting shoulder to shoulder, both leaning against the headboard. I want to hold him, wrap my arms around him to help him through this, but I can only hope being here is enough.

“When I heard what happened that night, my reaction wasn’t what I expected it to be. I didn’t deny my family was lost. I didn’t try to process what had happened. I’ve never been a person who needed time to come to terms with anything, good or bad. I was just so angry.” He rubs his face with both hands and inhales.

My heart weeps as I sit next to him, imagining Michael all alone when he heard his entire family had perished. It didn’t matter if he wasn’t in love with his wife. He loved his son, loving her by extension. They were witnesses to his life. Then they were gone, taking all his accomplishments and memories with them. There was nothing he could’ve done to stop it.

He exhales heavily and sinks his back into the headboard, holding the wine in both hands. “Fuck, I don’t know.”

“You do. Keep going. I want to know,” I encourage.

“I haven’t talked about this to anyone, except Corbin and Lillie. Not even Deni or my mom have heard most of this.”

There’s more.

“It wasn’t for me how it was for you. I didn’t feel like death had touched my life right away,” he starts, sighing. “I was home at the time. I had just finished making Caleb’s favorite dinner when there was a knock at the door. Figuring it was one of the neighborhood kids coming to see if Caleb could play, I opened it and wasn’t prepared to see the look on the police officer’s face.”

My breath hitches silently as I picture Michael, dressed in casual clothes at home, cleaning up from making dinner, and waiting for his son to walk through the door any minute. I close my eyes tightly and wait for him to continue.

“They explained what happened, but I didn’t believe it until they told me they needed me to call someone to take me downtown. I didn’t want to. I remember thinking that if I didn’t make a call or leave the house, it didn’t really happen.” He stops only to push the palm of his hand against his eyes, one at a time. “Once we got to where they told me to be, Corbin had to identify Caleb because I couldn’t bring myself to do it. After he dropped me back at the house, he tried to stay. I sent him away. I wanted to be alone. I was so fucking angry, Lucy.”

His eyes come to mine and a look of absolute understanding crosses his face because he knows, at one time, I felt the same angry confusion he did.

“To deal with how I felt, I drank. One turned into two. Then more. And more. After I’d drunk enough to numb the pain, I visualized the wreck. So much so, I swore I was seeing it happen in front of me. I visualized Caleb’s small face, bruised and beaten from the wreckage. I imagined Victoria’s long, dark hair soaking in her own blood. I saw the lights of the paramedics, the fire trucks… Everything was in slow motion.”

I gasp, and he grabs my hand. He squeezes quickly, then lets go to hold his glass steady.

“I was in the bathroom. I had planned to shower so I could try to clear my head.” He flips his arm over, the scar I’d noticed on his finger so much more visible now that I know why it’s there. The length of it stretches from the tip of his finger, moving up his wrist, then widening before it ends three inches from his elbow. “I was desperate and tried to shatter an image I couldn’t erase. The mirror splintered into pieces, and I was cut when I fell into it.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“It was a long time ago.”

“The pain doesn’t go away.”

“It doesn’t,” he quickly agrees. “And those people who say it gets better with time are liars. Those who say you learn to accept it—liars.”

Once he’s quiet, I watch as he swallows hard and looks down at his hands. My eyes brim with tears for how much Michael’s missed over these last five years. There were no toys from Santa laid out on Christmas morning for Caleb to wake up and find. No candles lit in celebration of another birthday. There was no one to welcome Michael home after a bad day at the office.

Nothing.

In the blink of an eye, life as he knew it was taken away. For five years, he’s lived this life. I start to ask, but stop myself, wondering if Michael’s ever tried to move on. It doesn’t appear his life has moved at all. Not from his anger or grief.

Reaching over his body, I grab his glass and set both mine and his on the table beside the bed. Then I move to straddle his lap. When my hands settle on his jaw, those deep blue eyes, filled with so much agony and despair, stare back at me with a coupled expression of loss and confusion.

I lean in to kiss him chastely, and he doesn’t pull away. Instead, he grabs the back of my neck roughly, fueled by the force and power of his anguish. My mouth opens and his tongue urgently surges inside. He sits up from the headboard and reaches for the hem of my t-shirt, pulling it over my head with quick and fluid determination. Michael’s mouth captures my nipple as I sit quietly on top of him, running my hands through his hair. When he lets go, I look down to find him resting his forehead against my chest.