Unforgiven (15 page)

“Then why should I stay?”

He leaned to her ear. He could smell her incredible scent. She smelled of subtle shower wash. Not flowery or fruity but warm and sweet like oatmeal and honey. He was guessing it was something like that. He almost stayed there too long, just inhaling against her neck. “Don’t you at least want a chance at redemption?” He pulled back from her.

“Yes.” She nodded, and he finally backed away from her.

“Well, this should be interesting, shouldn’t it?” He could feel his lips pulling up in a smirk. Then he turned and walked away, out her door, and down to his car. He sat for a moment, a bit stunned at what he’d done and infinitely relieved that he’d had the balls to do it. He was right. This promised to be interesting.

Three Years Before

“I was worried you wouldn’t make it. Thought you said you didn’t want to come today. Or you just didn’t want to come with your father and me?” He just looked down at Jess’ headstone as his mother spoke. “I’m worried about you, Darren.”

“Why?” His voice was cold, stubborn, unemotional. He recognized it, but he’d lost the ability to control it. “You shouldn’t worry about me. I’m going to graduate at the top of my class with honors and on time for that matter—regardless of—”

“Regardless of the fact you lost your sister three years ago?”

“Lost? Why do people always say that? Lost suggests something can be found. She’s dead, Mom. Try saying it out loud for a change.” She just watched him. She was so calm. Very little rattled the woman, likely what being a school counselor did for a person’s composure.

“Why do you try to make your academic standing sound like a badge of mental health? Do you think I believe you’re okay just because you’re going to graduate with honors? Is that what it means to be okay?”

“I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“Being okay isn’t a requirement.”

“Oh, come on, Mom. You’re a school guidance counselor, not a fucking grief counselor. Save the psychobabble bullshit for someone else.”

“The fact you just said the f-word to your mom tells me I’m right on the money, hon.” She smirked. “Graduating on time and at the top of your class is only impressive to someone who doesn’t know you as well as I do. Your education has become a smokescreen for what’s really going on with you.”

“Are we really going to have this conversation in a cemetery?” He looked to his father, who shrugged his shoulders. This was his mother’s party, and he was going to let her have whatever conversation she wanted to have in the cemetery. “Fine. And what’s
really
going on with me, Mom?”

“You haven’t moved on. You’re clinging to your anger as though it will somehow honor your sister’s life. You’re using it to block out the pain. Would you like me to continue?” Darren’s father stood stoically by watching their interaction. He wouldn’t interrupt her, and Darren knew that.

“You’re not angry? You don’t wake up every day knowing that your child is dead in the ground? You don’t wish more than anything that you could go back and do things differently? Can you honestly tell me you don’t feel like your life has been destroyed?” She just watched him calmly with tears sitting on the lower rims of her eyes. “Well, I’m happy for you then. Because that’s how I feel
every
day—
every . . . fucking . . . day
.”

He turned and walked away. “You can’t go on like this, Dare. Jess wouldn’t want this for you.”

“Let me guess, I should forgive Bailey too. Is that what you’re going to say next? You sound like some train wreck of a reality show on TLC.” He tossed his rudeness over his shoulder without stopping or turning around.

“Since you brought it up . . . do you think hating Bailey honors Jess? Do you think it helps you in any way? Do you think it’s what your sister would want?”

He stopped, staring at the ground for a moment before rounding toward her slowly. “I think hating Bailey feels really good.”

He turned away again, but before he’d even taken one step, his mother spoke again. “Or, is hating her a good way to torture yourself?” He froze again, refusing to turn around this time. “I know you feel guilty. You shouldn’t, but I know you do. And I also know you well enough to understand that hating Bailey could never make you feel good. It is a very effective way to hurt yourself, though.” He didn’t look back or respond; he walked away, leaving her staring after him.

His drive back to Little Rock was long. Plenty long to let his mind wander and get lost. He was still on track to graduate on time. It really was a damn miracle. Actually, it wasn’t a miracle at all. He’d refused to let Jess’ death slow him down in the least. He threw himself right back into his schedule, barely taking off a full day for the funeral. He knew it was wrong. It was so wrong, but he couldn’t face it, and disappearing into his text books, into the hospital, into his long hours of training, gave him the means to pretend life was grand. And that was how he’d spent the few years since her death.

Other medical students struggled to keep up, struggled to focus in their exhaustion. Not Darren. He thrived on the distraction, and as a result, he was a veritable pinnacle of medical student success. They just couldn’t see the train wreck on the inside. He knew he was fucked up, but he didn’t know how to do anything different than keep pushing forward, hoping one day he could master the art of convincing himself he was okay.

His apartment was silent and empty when he finally got home. His parents had bugged him for months to take the day off and come home for the anniversary of Jess’ death. It almost sounded like a celebration. He’d dreaded it, and now that he was back in his apartment, he didn’t know what to do with himself. Everyone knew why he’d taken this day off, and he didn’t want to deal with the sympathetic bullshit at the hospital if he decided to go in and work. It was the last thing he needed, so instead, he drank himself into a stupor.

When he was drunk enough to cope with being around another person, he called Candace. Candace was the girl he was pretending to date at the moment. In truth, they fucked, and that was about it. He didn’t have time for more, and she didn’t care. She legitimately did not care that their relationship was going nowhere. Darren didn’t have a clue why she was as jaded as he was, and, well, he didn’t care.

Within an hour, he was buried in her body, pounding into her from behind as his hands gripped the spindles on his headboard. She was groaning, and he tuned it out, annoyed she was making it difficult for him to disappear into another world while he plowed into her. He came loudly, and she did too. He lay panting beside her, not even bothering to talk to her, touch her, or acknowledge her in any way.

“Who’s Bailey?” Her voice broke the silence, and his focus flashed to her.

“What?” How the hell did she know about her?

“You said the name Bailey. Or I should say you moaned it. When you were coming? Care to tell me who she is?”

Candace didn’t look the least bit upset, and Darren knew she wasn’t. At the most, she might be offended, but it wasn’t a personal affront to her. They just didn’t care about one another enough to care if the other wanted to cry out some other person’s name during sex. The odd thing wasn’t that she didn’t appear to care in the least he had called her another woman’s name, it was that he didn’t even realize he’d said it. Of course, he was still drunk as a skunk.

“She’s no one,” he muttered, hoping she’d drop it. He wasn’t so lucky.

“Doesn’t make any difference to me. I’m just curious. I mean, you love her.”

“No! I don’t love her.” He was getting annoyed, and it showed in his voice.

“You said, ‘Bailey, oh God, Bailey. I love you.’” She almost sounded like she was making fun of him as she said the words with mock inflection.

Darren stood, walking toward the bedroom door. He stopped and looked back at her. “You can show yourself out.” He didn’t bother making any excuses for what he’d said; he didn’t bother trying to explain. It didn’t have a damn thing to do with her, and he didn’t owe her an explanation. He wasn’t sure he could explain it if he tried anyway.

He heard the front door of his apartment close as he stood in his shower. He was dizzy, and he braced himself against the wall of the shower, wondering if perhaps he wasn’t too drunk to be showering in a hot steam of water that made the dizziness even worse. He thought of Bailey a lot, and apparently that included drunken fuck sessions with his casual fuck partner. Thinking of Bailey was painful . . . and at the same time, it was incredible. He had too many ridiculously arousing memories of her for it not to be incredible.

He stood letting the heat of the shower beat down on his shoulders, thinking about her. He was blocking out the anger and rage that she incited, and he was focusing on the feel of her. Her skin was soft, and he could remember the shiver that would run over her skin whenever he touched her. She likely didn’t know he noticed it, but it was hard to miss. It had always left his cock hard and his own body tingling in need. Now, he was hard again, but the tingles were guilt, and he fought his brain to let her go, so he could quiet the emotions in his mind that he just didn’t want to deal with.

Now

Her phone ringing startled her out of her focus. It was Monday morning two days after her mother left for Memphis, and she knew without looking it would be her mom.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Hi, baby. How are you?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Okay, I guess.”

“You know you can come to Memphis anytime. I have room in my apartment for you.”

“I know.”

“Okay. Well, I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“I am.” They disconnected quickly, and Bailey returned to scouring the newspaper in front of her. The help wanted section was sadly short, and she was losing hope.

The newspaper was spread out over the kitchen table, and her coffee was holding one corner. It was a bit ridiculous that Bailey was drinking coffee when it was over a 100 degrees in her cottage. Her power had been shut off, and she was trying like mad to figure out what she could pawn to make enough money to have it turned back on. How the hell she was going to support herself until she could get an income was becoming a desperate worry. Did it stop her from jogging to the nearest coffee shop for the biggest coffee her change jar would buy her? Hell no.

The heat was oppressive, and she was sweating. She was wearing a loose sundress. The idea of putting a bra and underwear on over her sweaty skin made her cringe, and so she was going commando under her baby-doll sundress that was practically see-through thanks to the thin white material.

The next interruption came when someone knocked on her door. She’d heard the car pull up through her open windows, but she’d ignored it, not wanting to move. Every time she moved, sweat trickled down her skin under her dress. When she pulled the door open, Darren was standing in front of her. He was wearing a pair of plaid cargo shorts and a casual T-shirt and didn’t appear to be drenched in his own sweat at all. Bailey was suddenly feeling a bit self-conscious. He didn’t wait for her to invite him in before he moved past her and into her small entryway.

“Jesus, Bailey. You know you could die of heat exhaustion in here.” She said nothing. She wasn’t about to admit she couldn’t afford to have the power turned on. “Why the hell don’t you have the air on?”

“It’s not . . . working.” She turned to walk away and froze mid-step when she heard the very recognizable sound of the light switch being flipped. She turned slowly toward him, her cheeks burning hot with embarrassment. His eyes seared into her, but he said nothing. She didn’t bother trying to explain or make excuses. At the moment her tongue was in the way, and she couldn’t have spoken anyway. She was just too embarrassed. Rather than try to communicate with him, she turned back toward the kitchen, and he followed her. Bailey sank into her chair at the table, closing the newspaper quickly, but not before she caught Darren glancing down at it.

She watched as he moved to the counter, searching the drawers until he came across a washrag. He ran it under the cold water faucet. She was a bit dumbfounded and had no idea what he intended to do short of washing the dishes for her, and she certainly wasn’t expecting that. When he turned back to her, she just stared.

“Stand up.” He approached as she stood, and he set the rag on the table for a moment before he reached for her neck. She flinched, and he did to. “Relax, Bailey. I’m not going to hurt you.” His voice was quiet, and she had a sudden stab of guilt. He sounded offended. His hands scooped her long hair up the back of her head, pinning it to the crown of her head. “Hold your hair up.” Her hand fumbled with his as she replaced his to hold her hair in place. He watched her the entire time, calm and focused.

She was so focused on his eyes she almost missed the sight of his hand grabbing the rag again. He folded it over twice before slinging it around the back of her neck. She sighed before she could stop herself as the coolness of the water relieved the agony of the sweltering heat. She let her eyes close, and she relaxed against the pressure of his hand. Her sigh wasn’t the only unwelcome reaction she gave him. She moaned quietly as his hand gripped and massaged the cool rag across her skin, and her eyes flashed open instantly to see him watching her. His free hand moved to clutch her waist. His fingers squeezed gently, and hot liquid heat settled in her groin.

He ran the rag around her neck to the front of her chest, and everywhere the wet material touched her skin, it was instantly soothed. He moved slowly, gently caressing over her exposed collar bone. She almost let her eyes close again, but then he abruptly stopped, and when she looked to his eyes, she saw his studying her pebble-hard nipples through her sundress. There was no embarrassment when his eyes found hers again. He studied her calmly as though being caught staring at her tits meant nothing to him.

“I have a proposal.” She cocked her head to the side. “Macy needs a house sitter. I need a house sitter. My neighbors spend a lot of time with Macy, but they’re traveling back home to Louisiana for the next couple months to see their new grandchild, and Macy’s not used to being home alone when I’m at the hospital. I could use some help around the house too. Cleaning, cooking, laundry.” He seemed unsure for a moment, but then he reached for her hand, grabbing it and putting the wet rag in her hand. “Ten dollars an hour? It’s better than any entry-level position you’re going to find around here. Thirty to forty hours a week.”