I ended up moving in with Wes's sister that day. She claimed to need help paying the rent anyway since her last roommate left her in the lurch. When I asked why she didn't ask Wes for help, she asked me why I didn't ask my husband to let me stay with him. Point taken.
It had been a little over a week since the last time Tucker and I had spoken. I knew, from the ridiculous amount of press he had received since coming back from Finland, that he had stayed out of the limelight. The woman who took footage of me throwing his phone and apologizing to it, posted her video and it went viral quickly. While I was angry that she'd done it, at least she redeemed herself somewhat with the caption she used. "Men – listen up, because too many of you need to hear this. Saying 'I'm sorry' doesn't fix what you broke! It just makes you feel better about that awful thing you did. The woman (or man) who took whatever abuse you lobbed at them (actual abuse, infidelity, or whatever) still has to deal with the fallout and the pain."
At least she had gotten the point of my little demonstration. Someone had tagged all of Tucker's social media accounts in the comments, but I couldn't be sure if he actually saw it. Honestly, I didn't much care anymore. Any possibilities that our marriage might have led to, were all wiped away with his actions. I no longer wanted to be a part of the fake relationship we were supposed to have. He obviously felt the same way since he hadn't bothered to contact me at all.
I was two weeks away from the end of my college career, thirty thousand words – give or take – away from finishing my very first manuscript, and finally settled into the apartment I was now sharing with Luna, my new best friend. Well, my only friend still, other than my sister, but semantics didn't matter in that regard.
Luna worked two jobs. In the mornings, she worked a four-hour shift at the coffee house beneath our apartment. It was a cute, cozy space and I enjoyed going there to soak up the atmosphere, when I had time. Her evening job was as a bartender at a club in the heart of Atlanta. I hated the commute she had to make, but as she said, she refused to live in the city, but loved the money she could make there. So, as long as she was cool with it, who was I to point out that there were probably better options? She only worked the night shifts in Atlanta on the weekends, and truth be told, she made enough from three nights a week there to pay all her bills, so I kind of didn't blame her.
Tonight, she had been called in to the nightclub she worked for because they were short-staffed and had some big event going on. Who held a big event in a bar on a Thursday night? I didn't know, but it did give me the apartment all to myself so that I could knock out a few more words for the week. Normally, weekday evenings were spent binge watching whatever show was popular on Netflix that week. Since my bestie wasn't there to do it with me, I threw myself into finishing my manuscript instead.
I was knee-deep in the thick of my plot twist when the sound of someone unlocking the door caught my attention. Luna had just left, maybe an hour before, surely, she didn't get there only to have them cancel? "Hey Luna, don't shoot, it's me," a familiar man's voice called out.
I continued to sit in the overstuffed chair in the corner of the room, hoping to blend in with the surroundings so he wouldn't see me once he rounded the corner of the entryway, but that was too much to hope for. As soon as Wes entered the living room, his eyes locked with mine. "What the hell are you doing here?" He asked, and while I took offense to his immediate attitude, I couldn't blame him either. As far as he was concerned, I'd probably only met his sister once. She told me that she hadn't talked to him about me at all, because she didn't want it to slip that I was living here. Not that I was in hiding anymore, so much as just trying to avoid conflict.
"I live here," I informed him and then went back to staring at my iPad screen before tacking on, "Luna got called into work. She won't be back until really late."
Instead of leaving, he moved further into the living room and plopped his ass down on the couch, in the corner closest to the chair, where I happened to be sitting. I glanced up and just stared until he blinked and grinned at me.
"I think I'll wait for her," he said.
I shrugged like it made no difference to me and then turned back to my iPad and started typing. Ignoring him was apparently going to be impossible though because he leaned over, trying to peek at what I was doing. I turned the screen, angling it further away from him and attempted to continue my work.
"Can I read it?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because I don't want you to," I huffed out.
"Is it because I'm the star of the book?"
My eyes swept up to meet his denim blue orbs that seemed to hold so much amusement in them. "Why in the world would you think I was writing about you?"
"It's the only reason you'd be afraid of me to read it," he told me, with enough confidence that he thought he spoke the gospel.
"What zip code does your ego live in? I think you might need to rein it in some, because it's managed to get out of bounds."
"Nah, my ego is not that big. There are other parts of me though…" He laughed as I slammed my iPad shut. I really needed to stop doing that. I did not need to have to replace that or the magic keyboard.
"What are you doing?" I asked.
"Sitting here, trying to convince you to let me read your book." His innocent act wasn't fooling me, especially after watching him attempt to bat his denim blue eyes at me.
"Seriously, Wes, what the hell are you doing? Your sister wouldn't want you to wait around all night for her."
"Why is she working on a Thursday night anyway?"
"I told you she got called in." I shrugged. "Some party that they were short staffed for."
"And when did you become my sister's roommate?"
"A while ago," I answered.
"I wasn't aware my sister needed a roommate."
I shrugged my shoulder again. "That's something you should take up with her. I don't know her business. She had a place available, and I needed something, so it all worked out."
"I thought you already had an apartment?"
"I have never had an apartment," I countered.
"Yes, you did. I know this for a fact because you used to be my neighbor."
I shook my head, getting angry with him. "You know, better than anyone, that it was all a lie."
"I don't actually, especially since my best friend has been hold up inside that apartment drinking himself to death."
"And that's my problem how?"
"He fucked up," Wes insisted.
I narrowed my eyes at him. "And you aided in that fuck up, so I really don't think you're the right person to sit here and plead his case."
"I took him down to the bar because all he was doing in the room was talking about how you were mad at him and wouldn't even speak to him before he had to leave. He wanted to bring you along, but with school and your attitude, that didn't happen." I cocked my head to the side at the attitude comment. "He wanted you to come along so the two of you could spend some time together, maybe even become friends or something more."
"I see." I nodded my head. "So, when that didn't happen – not that he tried super hard to convince me to go. He told me about it pretty much like an afterthought. You know, like, 'I would have invited you, but you have school'." Wes seemed somewhat shocked by that.
"That's how he asked?"
I shook my head. "I just told you that he never actually asked me to go. He told me that he was going to, but that I had school, and he didn't want to make things harder on me."
"Jesus, what a fucking idiot," Wes concluded. "Well, when I took him to the bar, it was because I thought you rejected the hell out of him, and he needed to get over it. I swear, it was just supposed to be some shots amongst friends and then back to the room."
"Did you know he took his wedding ring off before you went down to the bar?"
"He… What?" Wes's eyes met mine once again, and I could see that he hadn't known. Either that, or the man was a ridiculously good liar. "No, I don't remember him doing that."
"There are pictures of him that night without it, and he already admitted doing it, so there's no need to try to pretend that's not what happened."
"I swear to all that is holy and pure in this world that I did not know he left without his ring. We went for drinks because he needed a pick me up after what I thought was his wife's rejection."
I scoffed at that. "As if he was ever worried about me rejecting him?"
"Why wouldn't he be? I'm telling you, even though I didn't realize the ring thing, that he was torn up about the fact that there was no way you could come on the trip when he knew it was important that the two of you get to know one another better."
"What kind of game are the two of you playing?" I asked without pulling anymore punches. Something wasn't right about this. Wes seemed sincere in everything he was saying, but I knew better than to believe people like him. Especially when I had Tucker's version of what happened that discredited whatever it was Wes was attempting to do here.
"There aren't any games. You're aware of why the marriage was suggested. There's nothing else hidden."
"Please, stop telling me how distraught the man is over me then. It's not freaking true. If he was distraught over the fact that I couldn't go on a trip with him, then he wouldn't have gone out drinking sans wedding ring. It seems to me – if not you – that he was prepared to find a hook up and didn't want the ring to be a problem. I'm sorry, but that doesn't sound like a man who would be broken up about me in any way. He tried to get back together with his ex-girlfriend, excuse me, he did hook up with her while he was there. It probably would have gone a lot further if she hadn't found out he had gotten married.
"So, he might be distraught about something, but it's definitely not me. And the last thing he said to me before I kicked him out of my hotel room last week was that he was willing to agree to fuck only me because it had to be better than going through all the drama." I stood up then, cradling my iPad in my arms, up against my chest. "Does that sound like something a man who's torn up over me would say?"
"He said that to you? And wait, how do you know he even hooked up with the ex?"
"He fucking told me he was with her, made out with her, slept in the same bed with her, until she threw a fit after finding out he was already married, and she came clean about being there to seduce him on his family's orders."
Wes sat there with his jaw unhinged, just staring at me. Then he shook his head, as if he could clear it of the things that I'd just told him. "I don't understand," he murmured. "It's like we're talking about two different people."
"How the hell could that be?"
"Because the man I know – my best friend – likes you. He liked you from the beginning when this whole scenario was first suggested. He threw that huge fit he did, messing with all those women in public so that your father would refuse the deal and so that his family would leave him alone. He said you seemed like too nice of a person to have to put up with something like that." I laughed at the thought that I had ever been a consideration Tucker made. "I'm serious. You don't understand, he was trying to spare you."
"No. I need you to stop whatever fucking bullshit you're trying to pull; it needs to end." I glanced around, old fears grabbing hold and refusing to let go. "Is your sister in on this too? Is she part of the joke?"
"What? There is no joke," he said, but his words barely made it through the panic.
"Oh, God! I messed up again. I knew I shouldn't have trusted anyone." I ran from the living room and made it to the bedroom where I'd managed to finally get comfortable. Why did people keep doing this to me? I pulled my suitcase and bags out of the closet and started filling them.
"Jesus, Mina, what are you doing? Stop!"
"I can't believe I trusted her," I cried as I emptied the drawers and the closet, filling the bags when I ran out of room in the suitcase.
"I'm sorry, I know you're at work, but this is an emergency. I came to see you at the apartment and was talking to Mina. Now, she's packing everything up and mumbling about everything being a joke and crying about trusting people." I heard him, but it was almost like he was underwater. Everything blurred around the edges and my vision started wobbling toward black. I couldn't catch my breath and suddenly, I was back in that room in the basement of the football house. My arms and feet were tied to the chair and they were cutting my clothing away.
"What were you thinking?" One of them asked me. "How could you think we would ever even have considered you? You look like a 12-year-old."
"Nah, my sister is 12 and she actually has tits," another voice called out and the laughter started all over again.
"Look at her, crying like a baby!" Someone taunted.
"Should we blindfold her?" My roommate was the one to ask that. It only made me cry more, because I realized she had been in on this all along.
"Nope. She needs to watch and see everyone's reactions. I can't believe she thought a football player would be interested in her. Look at her," the girl hissed, then she pinched one of my nipples. "She barely has anything to get a hold of. Someone get the diaper."
They had two of the men standing on the outskirts come over and lift me off the chair just enough that the girl was able to get the diaper under my butt, wrapped, and then fastened around my waist. They were all laughing at me as it happened.
"Look at the little baby, where's the pacifier?" It was only when they put the damn thing in my mouth and taped it there that I realized I hadn't even screamed for help since they cut my clothes away. I'd just sat there, not that I had much ability to move, but I hadn't screamed or called out for help because I'd been paralyzed by their words. Their laughter shattered me. It was when I realized that they had already broken me that I stopped responding, stopped crying, stopped caring.
My eyes still saw things, my ears still heard things. I felt the stinging smack of a palm connecting with my face only to see my best friend standing there, sneering at me. She said something, but it didn't register. She was here with him, the man they convinced me was interested after I told them I had a crush on him.
My roommate pulled her phone out and took pictures. My best friend did too. I should care about that, right? They would probably show people. What did it matter now though? Everyone I trusted was in this room, doing these things to me. I was nothing. Nobody. Who was left to care if there were awful pictures of me out there?
Just when I finally went completely numb, it started all over again, from the beginning, when I first realized, everything was going to go so terribly wrong.
"Please, Mina, you have to listen. You're safe. I promise, you're safe."
"Maybe we should call an ambulance. Are you sure we shouldn't take her to the hospital? Do something?"
"She wouldn't want that," the female said, but they didn't belong here. Those voices weren't the ones who had tormented me that day. "Mina, please, it's Luna. I'm here. You're safe. I promise you that you're okay." Wetness splashed on my face as the room came back into focus. It took a minute for me to realize the wetness was from tears that Luna was crying.
"Luna?" I asked, my voice hoarse. Shit. Had I been screaming?
"Yep, welcome back. Take a minute, and maybe breathe slowly or something. I'm not a hundred percent sure what to do in cases like this but breathing seems important." Her voice was whisper quiet. "Did you have a flashback?"
I started shaking as she asked that question. It wasn't the first time, but it had been a long time since it had happened. I thought I had finally conquered my past, but apparently, all that had been managed was for it to be buried in a shallow grave. I hid my face away in the crook of my arm as the tears started falling again. I couldn't stop my body from trembling, the tears from falling, or the ache from spreading everywhere.
"Shh, you're okay," Luna whispered into my hair as she rubbed her hands up and down my arms. "You just need to take a minute and let it all out, okay?"
"I c-c-can't go through that again," I managed to stutter out. "Please, don't do that to me," I begged. "Please, don't let it happen again. Please, please, please," I begged. As strong as I wanted to be, I knew I'd never survive something like that happening again.
"What the hell is going on?" I stiffened when I realized that it was not just Luna and me in that room. "What happened here?" That voice did not belong there.
"She freaked out. We were talking and then the next thing I knew she was crying and packing her things and talking about how it couldn't happen again. Then she just sort of crumpled to the floor and started crying and mumbling some pretty fucked up shit," Wes explained. "Luna? Do you know what that's all about?"
"The two of you need to get out," Luna told them in a quiet voice, but a serious tone. "She doesn't want this. Mina didn't want anyone to know, so you need to leave and forget what you saw or heard."
"How the hell do you forget something like that?" Wes yelled at her. "Jesus, Luna, I didn't know what to do." I glanced up for a moment and watched through blurry eyes as he pointed at me. "I made that happen. Things I said," he was the one sounding panicky now. "We were talking, and she kept accusing me of playing a game with her. She didn't believe the things I was saying and then…" He pointed at me once more. "Then she just. Fuck!" The last word was hissed out as he turned his back and tried to get himself together.
"What did you say to her?" Tucker was the one to ask the question, and I wondered when he had gotten there and how much he had seen. This was a complete disaster. Of all the times to have a panic attack and flashback, it had to be when one of them was there and apparently called the others to witness my humiliation too.
"They already heard plenty," Luna whispered in my ear. "Is it okay if I fill in the blanks so they understand?"
Our eyes connected as she asked the question, and I knew she was only doing what she thought was best. Truth be told, I didn't know what happened in the outside world – outside of my own mind – when flashbacks happened, but from what Wes had just said, I must have talked about what I was experiencing from my past. The damage was already done, if that was the case. I nodded to Luna.
"Do you want me to do it in here with you, or take them out in the other room while you get yourself cleaned up?" I glanced down at the mess I'd made of myself. Part of my shirt was soaked, and my arms were actually bloody in spots. I knew what that was from. It had happened once before, when I tried to claw the restraints away from my wrists, only the restraints didn't actually exist outside of the memory.
"You know what?" Luna asked as she stood and patted my shoulder. "Sit tight, I'm going to bring you some ice and get the first aid kit. We need to take care of you first, then we'll worry about filling them in. I'll be right back."
Wes followed her out of my room, but Tucker came further inside and sat down beside me. He didn't say a word. He just wrapped his arm around my shoulder, pulled me tight up against his side, and held onto me as if he was keeping all my fragile pieces together. I didn't have the strength to fight his hold, and he had obviously seen enough already to know I was completely broken. So, instead of fighting, I just let everything out and silently cried into his shoulder.
"You scared me, hell, I think you scared everyone here, Mina. What happened? What brought all that on?"
I didn't know how to answer his questions because I couldn't find my own voice. Instead, I sat there tucked into his side as Luna came back into the room with Wes on her heels. The woman, who was proving that she was absolutely my friend and that I could count on her, quickly got busy taking care of the injuries I'd caused. As she did so, she started telling the men about my history, the event that caused the flashback.
They sat quietly, listening to the whole horrible tale and realizing that some of the things I'd said when I was lost in the memories could be plugged into what they now knew happened. Wes left soon after hearing everything. I knew he felt guilty for triggering the flashback, but he couldn't have known, and I asked Luna to go after him and make that clear.
Tucker stayed, but he picked me up off the floor and tucked me into bed, then crawled in beside me. He pulled me close, hugging me so that my back curled up into his front as he ran his hands through my hair. "I'm so sorry that happened to you, Mina," he murmured.
I hated when people felt sorry for me. I didn't want that. "What those assholes did, it's inexcusable. They should have all been punished. God, I wish you had made sure they all got what they deserved. None of them should have been able to walk away from something like that without the world knowing that they took part."
"I didn't want the world to know. It's bad enough that all of them saw, they watched, or they helped, or just laughed. There were already so many."
"I get it, but damn it, it's not right that they got a pass because they play football."
"They have to live with who they are," I argued. "They didn't get a pass."
"Yeah, well some people can live with being giant dickbags." He sighed then and pulled me closer. "I'm so sorry you got dragged into my shit on top of everything else, Mina. Is that why you agreed to it?"
"Partly," I admitted.
"What was the other reason?" When I didn't answer he gently squeezed me and then kissed the top of my head. "I don't want what I walked in on tonight to ever happen to you again. So, let's get everything on the table and be completely honest with one another, okay?"
"Fine," I agreed. As long as I didn't have to look at him when I admitted to my issues, then what did it matter? He had already seen the ugly side of me anyway. "Carlos," I started.
"Wes told me more about him," he admitted.
"He told you about the café?"
"He told me about meeting Carlos, but I want you to tell me why he factored into you agreeing to marry me."
So, I explained about Carlos, Charlotte, and how Carlos had been afraid to end our arrangement because he thought I wouldn't keep tutoring him. As humiliating as it was to admit that, nothing really trumped the shit that had already happened to me, or that Tucker had already seen for himself, so what was the point in hiding it now?
"So, a man who you had been intimate with for more than six months, told you that he was only in it so you wouldn't stop tutoring him, and you decided that was a good reason to get married to me?"
I shook my head and knew he could feel the subtle movement. "Carlos was the closest thing I had to a friend since," I didn't need to say it. He would understand that not having friends stemmed from the what I went through that night during my Freshman year. "Anyway, finding out that he was basically using me brought back a lot of memories, and a lot of reasons why I didn't trust people. The honest truth is that I married you so that I could never be fooled again. I knew what I was getting with you. I knew you didn't want me, that you'd never be faithful, but you were safe in a different way because as long as I was attached to you – no one else could get close and use me, hurt me, or humiliate me ever again."
"I see," he mumbled.
"No, you don't. Not really. I asked one thing of you," I started to say. There was no need to finish though as I felt his whole body stiffen behind mine.
"Not to get caught stepping out on you," he groaned and released his hold on me to roll to his back. I turned over and watched him as he stared up at the ceiling.
"Those people, the ones who took pleasure in breaking me that night, don't deserve to see that life is still beating me down," I whispered. "I didn't want to give them the satisfaction of knowing that the man I married thought as little of me as they did."
"Mina, please, stop, you're killing me here."
"You told me to be honest. That was why I asked you not to get caught. I didn't want to give them something else to laugh at." He turned his head so that our gazes were locked. "I know that I'm not someone people are attracted to. I'm too short, have no curves, look way younger than I'm supposed to unless I use a ton of makeup to trick people. I'm not anything that someone looks for in a partner or a girlfriend. I get that. I knew I was never your type, but they didn't need to know that. They didn't need to know it was fake or that you were out there hooking up with people who are your type."
"Mina, that's where you have it all wrong," he groaned before looking back up at the ceiling.
"No, I don't. You told me," I insisted.
"Yeah, I told you what I thought you needed to hear so that you would run far and fast from what was proposed. Did your father ever explain to you how long that plan had been in the works?"
"No," I answered hesitantly, wondering just how much my father had kept from me.
"When I came back from Helsinki after the summer, my grandfather sat me down and explained that the board was getting nervous about me. They had seen some press about all the partying I had done over the summer. I was with the same woman the whole time, but there were pictures of some of her friends leaning on me, or kissing my cheek, or whatever. We all laughed about those photos together when they came out, because the press had it all wrong. It never occurred to me to care what the press or anyone else thought. The people who mattered knew the truth.
"The thing was, after I found out Venla was cheating on me, I came back to the States and I made the headlines again, but that time, the press had it right. I was sleeping with those women they had me pictured with because I was trying to forget the one who I thought got away. I was a choirboy in college. Never stepped a toe out of line. So, the fact that people were concerned about what I was doing as an adult, at 25 and 26 years old, pissed me off. Maybe it was the rebellion I was meant to have in my late teens or early twenties, but I missed that mark.
"Anyway, after a few weeks of headlines, my grandfather and my dad called me in for a meeting. I thought we were discussing a business venture. They informed me that we were and then explained about wanting the merger to happen with your father's company. Then they dropped the bomb that the merger would come with a hefty price tag. My freedom." He laughed at that. "At first, I told them I wouldn't do it. Then they gave me your information and told me to think on it. I was given three weeks to decide what I was going to do. Three freaking weeks to decide whether or not I was going to marry a complete stranger in order to secure a business deal." He laughed again.
"Honestly, I thought they'd gone mad. I didn't know that the board was threatening to vote against me taking over when my grandfather retired. They didn't tell me that until later."
"Okay, so what changed your mind then?"
"You did," he said with such sincerity that I was taken aback.
"What do you mean, 'I did', I wasn't even aware of the deal then."
"No, you weren't. Since I had your information, I decided to check you out. My first impression was that you were too young, but then I realized my mistake when I followed you into a bar. I watched you meet up with a guy there. I guess that was probably Carlos, now that I know what was happening between the two of you."
"Maybe. I was seeing someone else before I met him in the fall semester."
"Well, regardless, I saw you with a guy, and the crazy thing was, I became jealous of him. Just the hint that you might some day be my wife, and I suddenly felt protective, or maybe possessive of you. It was hard to stomach watching you leave the bar with him that night. I actually sat in on a few of your bigger classes and I watched you."
"That doesn't sound creepy or anything," I commented.
"Shush. If you had known about our impending betrothal you probably would have done the same thing, given the opportunity." Well, he wasn't wrong there. I had indeed stalked him via the internet once I found out about the possibility of a marriage to Tucker. "I watched you, and I liked what I saw. No, you're not usually my type physically, but I realized something as you became my focus for those three weeks."
"What was that?"
"I would have missed out on something special if I'd overlooked you for a flashier person. Your appeal isn't in the initial look, it's in the lasting qualities that other women don't have. Your laugh is infectious when you let go. You're loyal. That brain of yours is something else too. The more I watched, the more attractive you were to me."
"So, you're saying I am an acquired taste?"
"Not at all," he insisted. "I'm saying that I'm an idiot and had been looking for all the wrong things in a person before I got to know you."
It was my turn to laugh. "You weren't getting to know me; you were stalking me."
"Same thing," he laughed along with me. "So, I went back to my family when the three weeks were up, and I told them I'd do it."
"Just like that, without ever talking to me?"
"Yeah, I knew what I needed to know, and well, my judgment was a little clouded too. Remember, I had my heart trampled on in Helsinki not that long before. Kind of like your knee-jerk reaction to Carlos, I had a similar one to what happened to me."
"Okay, but that doesn't explain things though. Not really. You were a complete shitshow in the press even before I found out about the betrothal."
"Well, things happened. Venla showed up. She told me that it wasn't her who had begged my father for the position she received. He approached her. Then, after he gave her the job and the salary she hoped for, he came onto her, made it seem like he wouldn't let her keep the job if she didn't go along with it. She made me believe her. I was ready to turn my own father in for sexual harassment and worse."
"What happened? Obviously, you didn't turn him in."
"My father showed up. He had recorded their trysts and neither of them seemed to be the instigator, it appeared more mutual. Still, Venla swore she was only trying to keep her job. My father had her sent away, and I was angry with him once more. It was like they ripped open these wounds that had only just started to heal. I almost believed her." He hung his head and didn't bother hiding the shame that was written all over his face. "I was about to throw you away and have her take your place. Even if the merger didn't happen the way my family wanted it to, me being married and settled down would look good for the board, especially when they realized it was with a woman I had been pictured with so often."
"But she cheated on you with your dad," I insisted.
He shrugged. "The board wasn't aware of that and I was stupidly willing to overlook it."
"Why?"
"I didn't think you deserved to have a man like me – one who would throw the chance to be with you away so quickly. You were such a beautiful person, I thought you deserved so much more than what I could give you when I was still half in love with the woman who cheated on me. I made a mess of my life in the headlines again after Venla was sent away. That was until my grandfather explained a few things to me. Prior to that, I didn't realize that my father couldn't inherit the company, the family wealth, and couldn't sit at the head of the table of any of the Brighton companies. I never knew it could only pass to male, blood relatives unless the board were able to present a good case of no confidence."
Tucker blew out a breath and then looked my way again. "So, by the time the idea was presented to you, the stuff with Venla happened, and I went a little wild again. Then, I learned the rest of what was happening with my family and the business, and decided that I couldn't throw the chance away, even if you deserved better than what I had to offer. It was selfish as fuck in a way, but I thought if I just kept it as an arrangement, a business deal where we didn't really interact intimately then you would be fine, and one day we could both move on to what we each deserved."
"I see," was all I could manage to get out. "Well, aren't we just the messed-up pair?"
"We are." He sighed, then turned onto his side so we were facing one another fully. "I know that the mistake I made in Finland hurt you, and I can't apologize for that enough."
"No," I whispered. "I actually get it now. You cared for her before. It's hard to walk away from people you care for, even if they hurt you."
"It's no excuse. I knew she might be there. Her family owns the hotel we were staying in. Venla and her friends frequented the bar there. That's why I had the ring off. Some fucked up part of me needed to see if Venla would still want me, or if that ship had truly sailed. I wouldn't have, but when I left, it was clear that you didn't really want a relationship with me."
"Well, let's be fair there. I didn't, at any time, ever think that a real relationship was possible between us."
He nodded and continued looking into my eyes. "Do you think, now that we have everything laid out between us, that we can start over and do things the right way this time?"
"Why would you want that?"
"I told you, I wanted it before," he reminded me.
"What happens when Venla makes another appearance down the road?" He gave me a look, but I just shrugged. "What? It's a legitimate question. She was the reason things kept going off kilter for you, and she's the woman you actually did cheat on me with, even if we had an open agreement."
"No, you're right. All I can say is that there is no chance of anything ever happening between she and I now. Knowing she took payment to be with me, that's something that will never be made okay. For her, the fact that I was married and was still with her, that is something she could never forgive because of what happened with her family. So, trust me when I say, there's no going backwards where she's concerned anymore."
"I don't understand. She was with your father and he was married. Why is it different if you are? Why is it suddenly a problem for her?"
He laughed then. "She never loved my father, so his marriage didn't matter to her." He shrugged when I gave him a dubious look. "That's what she told me."
"Okay. Well, you saw me earlier," I whispered. "That's who I am. I'm broken. Why would you want to try to establish a relationship with me after you saw that?"
He stopped me, not with words, but by bringing his lips to mine for the first time since the day we were married. "You are not broken. You were hurt, but the woman I've seen, the one who made it through that shit and went back to that same school with her head held high, that woman isn't broken. A broken person couldn't have done that."
"You saw," I managed to choke out.
"I saw you have a shit moment that was partially brought on by my bad behavior and my friend saying whatever the fuck he did to trigger that attack. That just means you have things to work through, and that I need to do better by you and be supportive."
"Okay." I didn't know what the hell I was agreeing to by saying that, but the word slipped out and I couldn't grab it back.
"Okay? So, you'll move back in and we'll work on things?"
"Um, no."
"Oh, I thought…"
"I agreed to be Luna's roommate because she needs one, and because I needed a good friend. I'm staying here for now. In the eyes of the public, you cheated on me, that's not something I can just pretend didn't happen. If you want things to be better, then prove to me that they will be. We did this all wrong because our circumstances dictated that we had to. Whose to say that we can't start over the right way?"
"What exactly is the right way?"
I laughed at the fact that he even had to ask. "If we were normal people, and just became interested in one another, what would come first?"
"A conversation?" He asked, as if it had been a trick question. I giggled at that. "I like that sound."
"What?"
"You laughing. It's one of the things I liked when I watched you before."
"Okay, stalker. We're having a conversation now," I told him in order to get back on track. "So, if we were normal people progressing with a real relationship, what's next?"
"A date?"
"Are you asking me?"
"Out on a date?" He answered back with his own question.
I rolled my eyes and turned away from Tucker. It was his turn to laugh. "Of course, I'm asking you out on a date. I just need to know when you're free."
"Tomorrow night, maybe Saturday?"
"Tomorrow sounds great," he said before leaning in and placing a gentle kiss on my shoulder. "I know it's not what normal couples might do when they've only had a conversation, but do you think I could stay the night? After what happened earlier, I just want to make sure you have someone here, and to be honest, I just want to hold you."
"Hold me?" I had been questioning that he wanted to hold me, not asking him to do so, but Tucker wouldn't be Tucker if he didn't take some liberties with things.
"Okay, I'll hold you," he insisted, as if I'd been asking him to do so. Then he wrapped me back up and pulled me into him, acting as the big spoon to my little one. Before long, I fell asleep, and for the first night, in too many to think about, I slept through the night without waking to nightmares.