Sugar Rush (3 page)

Tomorrow I'd look at things with a fresh eye and a clear heart, and figure out where to go from there. I suppose I'd need to go back to my apartment, and hope that Beck will quickly deliver my clothes so I can have something to wear. I also need my phone, and I have class tomorrow at one
P.M
., but I'm thinking of skipping. Right now my heart isn't into anything except sleep.

I pull my keys out, locate the one I need, and open the door. Dad and Maria are both at work, and I'm glad. I don't think I can handle the questions that would inevitably come as to why I was showing up out of the blue in the middle of the day. I'll deal with them when they get home.

For now, I drop my purse onto the small side table beside the couch, dumping my keys inside. I walk back to my bedroom, which really doesn't look like my bedroom anymore. It still has my bed and dresser, but nothing left of the high school girl who once lived here. Maria's sewing machine sits on my old desk where I used to write in my journal.

I toe off my shoes and pull the covers back on the bed. I crawl in, pull them up over my head, and close my eyes. I try not to think of Beck, but that's virtually impossible. He was so many things to me in such a short period of time. He was a new life.

A fresh start.

A possibility I thought I'd never have.

But right now, he's the man who just broke me.

I pull up to William Halstead's house in Belle Haven, put the car in park, and cut the ignition. My pulse is hammering, my throat is dry, and my palms are sweating.

That's because Sela's in that house and I have no clue if I can fix what I just so carelessly broke several hours ago.

I've been going out of my mind all day with worry about her. I went to her apartment and I waited.

For three hours.

She never showed.

I went back to the condo, hoping she'd come there.

She never came.

At my wit's end, I dialed information and got the home number for William Halstead. Thank fuck he had a landline in a day and age when most people only had cell phones. I called three times, hanging up each time the answering machine came on. He finally answered an hour ago.

“Hello,” he'd said in a booming voice.

“William…it's Beck North,” I feel compelled to identify myself because even though we've met that one time before, he probably wouldn't recognize my voice.

“Beck…nice to hear from you,” he said jovially, and by the tone of his voice I could tell Sela wasn't there. He'd never greet me so nicely otherwise.

“Listen…I'm looking for Sela,” I told him, not wanting to beat around the bush. “We had a fight. A bad one, and I can't find her.”

“I just walked in, but she's not here,” he said, his tone going from amiable to worried. “When did you last see her?”

“Around ten thirty this morning.”

“Did you try calling—” he started to ask, but then said, “Wait a minute. Her purse is on the table.”

I held my breath and couldn't hear anything. Several seconds passed, and then he was back on the line, his tone low. “She's in her room…sleeping. What's going on?”

“I'm on my way there,” I told him, ignoring his question.

“Beck,” William said with worry. “What's going on?”

“That's for Sela to tell you, not me. But I'll be there in less than an hour.” I cannot tell him how that clusterfuck went down, because I have no clue if he knows his daughter was raped. That's not my place to tell him that.

Silence, then a soft sigh. “Okay. See you soon.”

I hung up, ran out of my condo, and hightailed it down to the garage. Rush hour was winding down but it was hell getting out of San Francisco.

And despite the fact I just had an hour to try to perfect my apology, I was as lost as I've ever been in my life. I have no clue how to make up for the fact that I was a supreme douche, and that I pretty much called her a liar about her rape. I can only hope that Sela has a forgiving heart and she lets me try to make it up to her, because I don't know what I'll do if I can't have her in my life.

My progress is slow as I make my way up to the house. William has apparently been watching out for me, because he opens the front door and steps out onto the porch, his hands tucked into his pockets. I stop at the end of the walkway and look up at him.

“Is she okay?” I ask hesitantly.

“No clue,” William says, pinning me with a hard look. “I woke her up after you called. I told her you were coming but she's stayed in her room. I'm giving her space.”

“I can't give her space right now,” I tell him firmly. No fucking way am I leaving without talking to her.

“I'm not sure it's a good idea—”

“William.” I cut him off. “I was here just three days ago, eating dinner in your house. You told me that Sela sometimes withdraws into herself. You told me if I ever caught her doing that, I had to pull her right back out again. So that's exactly what I'm going to do.”

“She can be fragile sometimes,” he says softly.

“That's not something I respected about her today,” I tell him with bruising honesty. Sela may want her dad to know exactly what went down and I'm prepared for this bear of a man to try to whip my ass for it. “But I swear to you, I understand that now and I'm going to treat her with the care she deserves. I just need to talk to her.”

“Did you hurt her?” His voice is hoarse and pained.

“Badly,” I admit.

William's eyes get wet and his gaze slides away from me and out to the street. He swallows hard, takes a deep breath, and looks back at me. “Sela's had immense suffering in her life. She's—”

“I know,” I tell him, because by those words it's clear to me that William Halstead knows his daughter was raped and he's suffered for it as well.

“You know?” he asks with surprise.

“Yes, and I handled it badly. I hurt her badly. So I'm begging you, William…please let me go in there and beg her forgiveness. Let me show her I can be a good man. Let me take responsibility for my wrongs and give me the chance to make it right for her. At the least, she deserves to know how very sorry I am.”

He raises a meaty hand and scrubs his fingers through his hair, scratches at the back of his neck in contemplation. Finally, he nods and steps to the side of the porch, giving me silent permission to enter.

I expect him to snarl words of warning, or threaten to throw me out if I upset her, but he merely says ever so quietly, “Please make it right for her.”

“I will,” I say confidently, even though I'm scared shitless that I'll never see Sela look at me again with warmth, care, or desire.

The house is quiet when I walk in and I assume Maria's not here. I walk back to Sela's room and don't bother to knock on the door. I twist the knob and slowly open it, peering into the gloom. The lights are off, and the only way I can see Sela's bed is from an outdoor light that's on right outside of her room and illuminating the front yard. The glow filters in through the open blinds and I can see Sela laying on the bed, on her side, curled into a ball. My heart squeezes in pain over her attempt to crawl into herself.

There's enough ambient light that I make my way over to the side of her bed, reaching out to turn on the small lamp on her desk as I walk by it. My gaze locks on her and I'm surprised to find her staring straight at me, her blue eyes flat and empty.

Three more steps and I'm beside the bed. I kneel down on the carpeted floor, restraining myself from reaching out to her. Her face is blank, not a drop of emotion showing, but her eyes are slightly red, which tells me she's been crying.

I take a breath, let it out, and tell her, “You were raped by JT.”

It's an emphatic statement. Not a question, not a guess, not a possibility. It's fact. It's truth.

So I acknowledge it.

She doesn't respond, but I don't want her to. I have so much more to say and I'm afraid her next words may very well be to tell me to get out.

So I press on. “It took only moments after I slammed that door in your face for it to sink in. Penetrate the truth of what you were saying. For me to believe you unequivocally. But you were already gone.”

Another breath, and I quickly press forward, needing to explain my bad behavior before I could request absolution.

“Sela…you don't know much about my past, and if you give me the chance, I want to tell you all about it, but just know this…I couldn't even focus on what you were saying to me. It's like your words weren't punching through the anger, and I'm so fucking sorry for how much anger there was. My past has shaped me, and one of my weaknesses is a lack of tolerance for dishonesty. I couldn't see past you being in my office. I reacted so badly, and I'm ashamed and sickened of what I did to you. I have no excuse though…not really. I should have given you time to explain. I should have trusted there was an explanation. And when you told me that JT raped you, it truly just didn't seem possible to me. I thought you were talking about since you and I had met, and I just knew that wasn't the case. Knew it in my gut. But then quickly, I started thinking about everything I knew about you, and I remembered how you looked at JT that day you walked up to him at that Sugar Bowl Mixer. That look on your face. You hated him, and I realized…you
had
been raped by him. It had just happened long before you and I ever met, right?”

I don't wait for her confirmation, but I do lean forward a little closer to her as she stares at me. I don't think she's even blinked once during my story.

“I ran out of the condo after you, not five fucking minutes after you left. I couldn't find you. I went to your apartment and waited forever. I went back to the condo, hoping like hell you'd come back. I finally tracked you down here, and I had to come and tell you how very sorry I am for acting so harshly and not believing you. You have to know I'm going to beg your forgiveness after we talk, but please know this…I'll never forgive myself for what I did. I care about you so—”

“How did you know in your gut?” she asks softly, her first words to me, and I almost shudder in relief just from hearing her sweet voice. It's like music to my ears.

“Know in my gut?” I ask, confused.

“You said you knew in your gut I couldn't have been raped by JT since we'd met.”

I hold nothing back, because if Sela grants me with her grace and forgives me, there aren't going to be any fucking secrets between us. “Caroline was raped,” I say softly, and she gasps in response.

“Oh no,” she says, sitting up slightly and leaning on her arm to peer at me. “Caroline?”

I nod, my heart twisting over the shit my sister's been through. “I've seen the hell a woman goes through right after. You weren't going through that, so I finally figured out…he had to have raped you a long time ago. Not to say you don't continually live with it day in and day out, but I've also seen how the healing can occur, and how you can move on with life. You clearly were doing that too. With me. It just finally made sense that you were talking about sometime in the past with JT.”

She gives a tiny nod and drops her gaze from mine, her fingers plucking absently at the sheet. “It was ten years ago.”

“I am so sorry, baby,” I say, and I bring my hands to rest on the edge of the mattress. My voice cracks, almost deserts me, when I say, “I'm so fucking sorry, Sela. I can't stand to know you were hurt like that. It's tearing me up and I want to do something to make you feel better, but I don't know what to do other than beg you to let me try.”

She drops her gaze again, her brows furrowing inward with consternation. For a moment, I know what I did was so heinous I feel like she just starts to slip away from me, but then her eyes snap back up to mine in question. “Do you really believe me?”

“That JT raped you?” I ask, but I know that's what she wants to know. “Yes. I absolutely believe you and I'm so fucking sorry that I wasn't telling you that immediately when you said it. I was just so angry about finding you in my office.”

“But I was in your office. I stole your key, made a copy, and was searching through your office,” she says with a pointed look.

“You forgive me Sela for what I did and you get a fucking pass on my office. In fact, you can look through anything in there you want.”

And Christ above answering my prayers, she smiles at me. It's small and quite thin, but it's genuine.

She pushes up further on her arm, leans in toward me. “You hurt me.”

“Yes,” I whisper, my breath now frozen in my lungs as I await her verdict.

“Don't do it again.”

“Never,” I vow.

“It's actually a good thing,” she says softly, and her hand slides across the bed to rest on mine. “That you hurt me.”

I blink at her in surprise, my wrist turning so I can clutch her fingers. “Excuse me?”

“For me to be hurt like that, it means I cared for you deeply, otherwise your reaction wouldn't have mattered to me.”

I grip her her tighter, almost afraid to hope.

“And for you to be so angry,” she continues. “To the point where you weren't even really understanding what I was trying to tell you…Well, I guess that speaks to the same thing. You had feelings for me you felt were betrayed.”