Look After You (27 page)

Ignoring her question, I change the subject and ask her the question that can no longer be ignored. I already have a feeling I know the answer considering how determined she is to avoid all eye contact with me.
 “You feel it don’t you? What I feel for you, you feel it too, don’t you?” Even asking the question out loud has my heart pounding erratically inside my chest. She freezes on the spot when I lift her chin up with my thumb and forefinger, forcing her eyes onto mine. I can feel her begin to shake between my fingers and I know my question hits her in just the right place when she slams her eyes shut, pools of tears spilling from the corner of her eyes. I know I’m getting to her.

“Ava, look at me
, baby, please, look at me?” I ask with raw desperation to my voice. She shakes her head, clasping her eyes even tighter. My heart breaks as she continues to avoid my gaze and I desperately need her to open her eyes and look at me. The only way to get her to open her eyes is to shock her, and I decide there is only one way to do that. “Please look at me, so I can tell you that I love you.” My chin is trembling when I say the words out loud to her. Her eyes flutter open, with a look of shock that pales her complexion in an instant.

“
W-w-w-what?” she stutters incoherently, with a dumbstruck look upon her face.

I bring myself closer to her, clutching hold of her hand into mine, despite the agonizing pain it sends across my knuckles.
“I love you,” I repeat, desperately trying to convey my love for her in three simple words.

“When?” I can
’t keep the smile from my face, knowing I’m the one who has her all flustered as she struggles to string along a rational sentence.

I shake m
y head as I answer her question, “I don’t know, maybe since the first time I saw you in the NICU, in your wheel chair, looking at Lily. It may sound cheesy or cliché, but the moment I laid my eyes on you, I couldn’t breathe. You just blew me away, you still do,” I say wholeheartedly, stroking my thumb against the softness of her cheek. It’s amazing to tell her how I truly feel. I know there is a big fat chance that this might backfire on me, that she will reject me in an indescribable way, but I’m glad I can finally let it off my chest, to tell her that I love her.

“You love me?
” she asks in disbelief, and then quickly adds, “but why?”

And I love that uncertainty about her, that she has no idea how
incredible and perfect she is. “You don’t even realize how beautiful you are, do you?” I say on a smile while brushing my thumb over her beautiful plump lips. “Yes, I love you; I’m so in love with you.”

Her eyes widen even more as she shakes her head furiously at my words, and then almost like a knife to my chest, she brings Sebastian up again. “No, but you can’t, you can’t love me. Sebastian, we’re getting married, we’re engaged.” She begins to get herself in a panicked state again as she clutches desperately to her chest, usually where she keeps her engagement ring. I can see the look of panic cross her face when she realizes it isn’t there. I grasp hold of
 the hand that is sprawled across her chest, and gaze intently into her eyes. “Where is he, Ava? If he loves you, where is he? If he really loves you like he says he does, then he wouldn’t have left you to go to war, he wouldn’t have left you, alone and pregnant, leaving you to deal with Lily’s early arrival. He doesn’t deserve you and Lily. He should be here, but he isn’t.”

“But he has a contract, he couldn’t-” she starts to make excuses for him, but I cut her off, not wanting to hear them.

“If I were Sebastian, I would have done everything in my power to be with you, nothing would have gotten in my way; nothing else would have mattered except for my beautiful girl and daughter. He has everything I have ever wanted, but instead of cherishing his life and the people in it, he chooses to gamble it away. You deserve better and deep down you know it.” I can see the stunned expression on her face, but I keep going, needing to get it all off my chest, even if it leaves my heart wide open. “You’re amazing, so fucking beautiful. I would marry you in a heartbeat, I love you, and yes I might have only known you for nine weeks, but it feels as if I have known you my whole life. I’m here. He isn’t. You’ve opened up to me, in a way you haven’t ever opened up to him. How can he love you, when he doesn’t even know the real you, not like I do. I love you Ava, and I know you love me too.

“You feel guilty because it isn’t in your nature to be cruel. I said I wouldn’t kiss you, that I wouldn’t break up your family, that I couldn’t be
that
guy, but I’ve changed my mind. I will be that guy since your guy is doing a shit-ass job of protecting you, of loving you. I want you, and I’m not letting you go. I will cherish you. I promise you.” Breathlessly, I press my lips against hers gently, just once. Pulling just a fraction away, I leave my lips to hover over hers, leaving the ball entirely in her court to decide our next move. I notice how her breath hitches and her hands grip tightly against my biceps as she searches my eyes. Tracing my fingers down her neck, I can feel how fast her pulse is racing, and it’s thumping just as fast as mine.

After what seems like an eternity of searching, battling with her inner self, she closes the space between us and finally presses her lips to mine. Taking my time, I savor her mouth with my tongue, cherishing her with each sweep. She moans softly into my mouth when I suck against her bottom lip.

Sweeping the first aid bag, and towel with my blood-covered wipes onto the carpeted floor, I gently push Ava onto her back, covering her body with my own, my lips never straying from hers. Stripping her out of her robe once again, she eagerly complies by removing my clothes. Peeling my lips from hers for one moment, I take the opportunity to take in her nakedness as I search my wallet for a second condom. Her eyes do the same to me, tracing along my face, all the way down to my cock. Her eyes widen with lust, and she bites her bottom lip in anticipation as I harden even more. Eventually her eyes come full circle back to my face. I slip on the condom and slowly I slide inside her, taking my time with her sweet, sweet body, whispering how much I love her, over and over again.

Chapter 20

I wake up to the sound of distant voices, and when I sit up with the sheets wrapped securely around my naked body, I notice the door is slightly ajar, indicating Ashton must be speaking to somebody. I make a move to stand, but Ashton suddenly comes into view, walking back through the door, with a white letter in his hand. I almost stop breathing the moment my eyes come to a stop on him. He looks delicious with his messy ‘just got out of bed’ hair, and even more delectable in his slacks from yesterday and his open shirt that doesn’t leave much to the imagination. Whoever was at the door must have gotten more than they bargained for, especially if it was a woman. A slight rush of jealousy heats through me at the thought of another woman mauling him with her eyes, but noticing the hungry appreciative stare he has directed at me right now, I am able to push it away.

He loves me.

The words ‘I love you’ echo around my mind as I still struggle to come to terms with them.

He loves me.

He’s
in
love with me.

My heart begins to race as I think back to last night and how he opened up, pouring his entire heart out to me. He literally tore his heart wide open and handed it over to me, and the raw vulnerability I saw in his eyes, it just about broke my heart. Just to give over your heart to somebody like that, despite the consequences of being rejected and the possibility of your heart and soul being sliced up into a million little pieces, is probably the most courageous thing a person can do.
I
n that one moment, my entire world shifted, and all I could see was Ashton. Everything suddenly became very clear to me.

I love him too.

“Morning.” A tingle erupts through my body as his southern twang greets me. He walks towards me, and I can’t keep the smile from my face.

“
Morning,” I reply quietly, a little shy, sitting up onto my knees. Then I realize what a horror I must look like, having just woken up and I can’t resist brushing my fingers through my hair, desperately trying to smooth it out. His fingers grasp onto mine once he comes to stand directly in front of me. “Stop it, you look perfect.” He leans down and presses a single kiss against my lips. I feel dizzy with lust when he pulls away, his eyes smiling down at me with passion.

He loves me.

“How’d you sleep, baby?” he asks, sitting down beside me.

“
Yeah, okay, I think, did you sleep okay?”

The smile on his face isn
’t mistaken on me. He’s a like a child on Christmas morning.
“Like you wouldn’t believe.”

Unable to help myself, I lean over and kiss him on the lips. Wh
en I start to bring my hands up to his hair, I have to reel myself back in before I get too carried away. His eyes glaze over when I pull away, but then I make the mistake of looking down, noticing the constrained bulge against the crotch of his slacks, straining at the seams, desperate to escape. I have the impulsive urge to press my hand against him, to wrap my fingers around his thickness and bring him to the brink, like he did to me several times during the night, but I don’t.

“
Um, who was that at the door?” I decide to turn a full one-eighty on the conversation when I notice him adjusting uncomfortably at his hard on. He smirks at my obvious change of conversation, and then his face turns serious.

“
It was your sister’s friend, Darcie. She came to drop this off.” He hands me an envelope, and I have to swallow the bile back as I look down at the letter.

“
Oh.” I had almost forgotten about it. Yesterday was a whirlwind, from the funeral, to Ashton declaring his undying love for me, and not to mention everything else in-between. If at all possible, it was one of the worst, yet best days of my life. It was a mixture of good and bad but right now the hell of yesterday is staring me dead in the face. It is the last memory of my baby sister.

“
I’ll go and get a shower, leave you to read it alone.” He makes a move to get off the bed, but I reach for his hand, clamping my fingers tightly around his.
 
“No, don’t go. I don’t...” I have to swallow the lump I feel in my throat. “I can’t read this alone.
”

He grimaces slightly, and I realize I have my fingers wrapped around his red raw
hand, and I let go immediately. “Shit, I’m sorry...how bad are they?”

“
There a little sore but I’ll be okay.” He brushes it off like it isn’t a big deal and then changing the subject to the letter he says, “Are you sure, baby?”

I nod because I know if he doesn
’t stay with me, I am fairly confident that this envelope would stay sealed.
“Yes.”

I look down at the envelope with trembling hands, and as I go to rip it open, I chicken out at the last minute and hand it back to Ashton.
“I can’t do it. Can you read it to me?” He nods once and sits back on the bed, sitting up against the headboard. He pats at the space in-between his legs and I crawl over to him. With my back to his warm chest, I sink into him, nuzzling my head into the crook of his neck.

“
Together, okay?”

I nod against his neck.
“Together,” I whisper, and then I watch him open the envelope and take out a folded up letter. He unfolds it, and I have to hold back the tears when I look down at the pages, full of my sister’s beautiful handwriting. It makes it seem impossible that we were at her funeral only yesterday. Her written words make it feel like she’s still alive. I close my eyes as Ashton begins to read it out loud to me.

To Ava
,

I don’
t know if my letter will ever reach you, but I hope that someday you will get to read it.

When you first left home
I was really angry with you. I hated you. At twelve-years-old, I couldn’t understand how you could just up and leave like that without saying goodbye. You simply left a post-it note saying, ‘I’m sorry,’ and I spent a long time trying to work out exactly what you were sorry for. Sorry for leaving? Sorry for leaving me with a joke of a mother or sorry for just being a selfish bitch? I went with the latter and I spent a good four years of my life hating you for leaving. I missed you every single day. You were my big sister. You were my world.

It wasn’
t until after I just turned sixteen that I came to realize why you had left. Suddenly, I wasn’t very angry with you anymore. I understood. I really fucking understood.

The first time it happened, I had just come home from school and Avery was in the living room watching television. It was the first time that I had seen him in nearly
ten months. He had been working in Australia on some business development so it was safe to say I was pretty excited to see him. Mostly, to see what gift he had brought me, but also because I had missed him.

During those
ten months I had changed a lot, my breasts had filled out dramatically and I had already changed bra sizes twice within the space of six months, my developing curves were slowly making me look more womanly, and I was finally getting attention from the boys at school. I had even been on my first date and was dating a boy named Adam Kavanagh.

What I didn’
t expect was to receive the same attention from my own brother, our brother. He gave me a once over, lingering his eyes over my curves and even though it made me feel uncomfortable, I just thought he was being his usual overprotective self, like a normal brother, so I didn’t think anything of it. That was until he began to say really inappropriate things to me and began to touch me in places he had no business touching. I began to panic. I tried shouting for Rita, our maid, for help, but he just started laughing, saying that he had relieved her of her duties for the evening and that it was just me and him, alone in the house.

At that point, the blood had completely drained from my face, and for the first time in my life I was absolutely terrified of him. I even had the urge to shout for our mother but th
en I remembered that she wouldn’t be able to hear me from the fucking Caribbean, so instead I had to lie back and take his abuse. He raped me.

On
ce he’d finished, I remember how he leaned over me and said, “if I hear that you have told anybody about this, I will kill you.” Then placing a kiss against my cheek he walked out of the house, leaving me naked, covered in a pool of my own blood and my entire body wracked with self-loathing sobs in the middle of the living room floor. I had never felt so disgusting to be in my own skin until that moment, the moment he stole my virginity.

For the first time in the sixteen years of my life, I cried for
 Daddy because the man I had come to love as a father had just failed me in the worst possible way.

The next day, I had convinced myself that I must have dreamed it, that there was no way in hell that my brother would have done those things to me. So I continued with my life as normal, going to classes as normal, hanging out with my friends and boyfriend as normal, but two weeks later reality hit me in the face, and I realized that it was real
, that my brother really was a monster. After that realization, it became obvious to me why you had run away. It was to get away from him.

It went downhill from there. He would take advantage of me at any given opportunity and every single time I could feel another part of my existence just fade away.

For the next six years, his constant torment and abuse was the bane of my life. The only time I actually looked forward to was when he was away on business. During that time I prayed and prayed that somebody or something would kill him, just so he would disappear and I didn’t have to deal with his crap and wandering hands anymore, but it never happened. He’d always return, and I hated it. I hated him.

Last year, I even tried to take a leaf out of your book and run away, but I only made it as far as Georgia before he found me. I remember it so clearly.

It was a Friday afternoon, and I had been hitchhiking with this married couple, but they were only going as far as Georgia. I was actually grateful that was as far as they could take me because the smell that radiated from them was revolting and the man was a bit of creep. Deciding hitchhiking wasn’t going to work out for me, I walked to the nearest bus station to catch the earliest bus out of there, to...anywhere. Just as far away from Florida as possible. The earliest bus they had was one going to Chicago, so immediately I bought a ticket and after a quick restroom break I was boarding the bus. Stepping onto the cool air conditioned bus, I felt the relief wash through me, knowing I was minutes away from putting even more miles between Florida and me, but what I didn’t anticipate was that Avery would be sat in the front row of the bus waiting for me. It felt as if my life came tumbling down on top of me when my eyes fell on him. My first thought was to run, so in my, terrified, panicked, state I pushed my way through the throng of passengers trying to get onto the bus, and I began to run, desperate to get away from him. But, of course, he caught up with me. Threatening me within an inch of my life, I followed him to his car. I didn’t have a choice. But do you know what the worst thing about him finding me was? It was that I had been given a taste of freedom, only to have it snatched away from me again, and it destroyed me. It was worse than anything he had ever inflicted on me.

After that, things only got worse
. It seemed after I pulled the ‘Ava trick’ as he liked to call it, he was on to me, watching me like a hawk, and it seemed that wherever I would turn, he would be there. Even if he was at home with his fiancé or out of the goddamn country, he would text me constantly, just reminding me of who I belonged to and that without him, I was nothing. He didn’t trust me, and I was pretty sure he had my cell phone wired just so he could keep tabs on me. It wasn’t necessary really because what life did I lead? I went to college and came home. That was it. I didn’t have a boyfriend because Avery ruined that for me. I pretty much didn’t have a life. He dictated everything I did, even to the extent of picking my choice of college, The University of Miami.

I actually wanted to go to UCLA. I could even picture it. I would wake up to a beautiful sunrise, head out to the beach, hit the waves for a couple of hours, then go to class. Then afterwards I would go for a jog and head out with my new friends. I would be free to do whatever I wanted. I needed the old me back, and I knew California was the answer. It was the only answer.

But of course, Avery came along and stomped all over my dream.

That was when he began to hit me. He hit me and told me there was no way in hell he was letting me go to California and that Miami was a better choice of college. And I let h
im have his way because, by that stage, I didn’t have any energy left. So my three only friends Darcie, Britney and Olivia moved away to various states of America, leaving me, stuck in Miami with nowhere to go.

T
he bastard even got married and how sickening is this? He actually forced me to be a part of the wedding party, as a fucking bridesmaid! Do you know how hard it is to help plan a wedding with my sister-in-law to be, knowing what a sick scumbag her fiancé is?

But ev
en on his wedding day he couldn’t keep his filthy hands off me. It wasn’t even two hours after the ceremony when he forced himself on me in the restroom after following me in. That was the day Darcie heard everything. She had been my plus one. She had just moved back to Miami, and it had been five months since I’d last seen her and not having my best friend by my side, was beginning to take its toll. She was who I would go to for solace, a place where Avery couldn’t hurt me, but when she wasn’t here, I didn’t have anybody to turn to. Let’s just say, I was happy she was back.