I can’t even begin to explain how it felt to finally have her in my arms, her hair tickling at my chest, and her fingers lightly tracing the outline of my tattoos.
“Why did you decide to get these done?” she asked softly, outlining the angel that stood proudly on my arm. “I remember you always having one or two, but it seems like all of a sudden, you have a whole sleeve.”
I nodded. “I guess it was kinda like that,” I admitted. “When I got my club patch tattooed, it made me feel different like I’d finally found that place where I actually fit in. I found a new family. But it also reminded me that there were two other people out there who were my blood, and I hadn’t done enough to watch out for them.”
She lifted her head up off my chest looking down at me in surprise. Meyah wasn’t just beautiful, she was intelligent and funny, and had a sweetness to her that made my chest ache.
Before, I was attracted to her because I wanted to protect her. I wanted to be able to hold her close and keep the demons away from this perfect, pure being that I never imagined would want anything to do with me. Hearing she had clocked that little motherfucker in the face and broke his fucking nose, it was like I was suddenly seeing something inside her I hadn’t before, and the fight to stay away crumbled to little tiny pieces.
“Where’s the rest of your family?” she asked, resting her chin on the center of my chest. I tried to ignore the way her naked breasts pressed against me and the way my hand was still resting on the perfect curve of her ass.
With my free hand, I brushed away the loose, crazy strands of hair from her face sparking a shy smile to form on her lips. “My parents were killed by a drunk driver when I was in my senior year of high school.” Her smile instantly fell, turning into a subtle grimace, like she could literally feel the pain in my words.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured before pressing her lips to my chest and letting her forehead rest there for a moment. It surprised me the way in which she already knew me. How one simple gesture gave me all the comfort I needed.
“Nothing to be sorry about,” I reassured her, hooking my finger under her chin and lifting her eyes to mine. The color was warm and reminded me of hot chocolate, a soothing color that I felt right down to my soul. It made me want to hold her a little closer, feel her warm body against mine, and refuse to ever let her leave. Figuring this was as best time as any since we were already in that place, I decided to tell her what she didn’t want to hear. “You need to go and talk to your mom.”
She sat straight back, and I instantly wanted to reach for her, but instead, I let her have her space. “Ham…” she stalled, trying to look away. I took her chin and turned her back to face me, noting the way her top lip curled just slightly in annoyance.
“No. Look at me, and listen,” I ordered, waiting almost a minute before she finally took me seriously and allowed her eyes to meet mine. She wanted to snap back not liking my demanding tone and showing me how much she was coming into herself—a strong, independent woman. I almost wished she fucking would because I was starting to find the attitude kind of a fucking turn on. Instead, I forced myself to focus. “I lost my mom and dad when I was eighteen. I’ll never see them again. Never be able to call them to ask them how their day was or what their opinion is on the girl I’m falling in love with.”
Meyah’s cheeks flushed, the cute pastel pink color a contrast against the dark strands of hair falling across the front of her face. She still didn’t speak. Though, I could tell she wanted to. She felt like she needed to argue, to tell me things were different, but they weren’t.
“You don’t have to justify to me what you did or why you walked out on her,” I assured her before she started babbling. “I fucking get it. She hurt you. She kept that information from you and still is. You feel like something’s missing, and it’s hard to understand how she could keep something so important… not just why she kept it, why she lied about it.”
“Do you think I’m being dramatic?” she asked, sitting back on my thighs and pulling the bedsheet across the front of her body.
“Hell no,” I disagreed. “I don’t think you’re being dramatic. I think you’re hurt, and I think your mom needs to know she did something wrong. But here’s my question for you. What’s the last thing you said to her?”
Meyah stilled, her hands twisted in the black sheet, her brow creasing nervously. “Why?”
I placed my hands on her hips needing her to listen and really hear what I was saying. “If something happened to her right now, would you be okay with the last thing you said to her? Would you live with regrets for the rest of your life because you were angry?” I squeezed her hips making sure her eyes were focused directly on me. “There isn’t a damn second that goes by where I don’t think about how I complained about my mom cutting my lunch wrong before storming out to school, or the way I didn’t have time to run back inside and say goodbye to my dad. I missed that, Meyah. Are you gonna miss that, too?”
Tears bloomed in her eyes, and she furiously blinked them back. “I told her I couldn’t even look at her,” she whispered, her voice catching, but her face scrunched up in anger. “I was so fucking mad at her. She kept that information from me. She made me think there was nothing she could do to help me find him, but she knew the whole damn time that she could.”
I grabbed her face in my hands and pulled her mouth to mine licking my lips when I pulled back savoring the taste of her tears. “Go. Talk to her. Listen to what she has to say. You don’t have to forget, but if you truly want her to start seeing you as more than just a little girl she constantly has to protect and control, you need to show your mom that you’re ready to hear what she has to tell you… good or bad.”
I brushed away the tears from her cheeks with my thumbs before sweeping her hair back from her face. She licked her lips. I could tell she was nervous. “What about your family. Are you gonna go and talk to them?”
My body tightened, and I tried to play stupid. “I don’t know what you mean.”
She scoffed not buying my bullshit for a minute and calling me out on it. “You said you had people out there who were your blood.”
My heart thumped against my chest as if it were screaming ‘let me get the fuck out of here!’ It knew that every single time I talked about my brother and sister, it hurt more than any pain I’d ever experienced in my life—more than a stupid tattoo, more than being shot or stabbed or kicked in the nuts.
“They were a lot younger when our parents died,” I rasped, my voice threatening to crack. I coughed, trying to clear it, so I could speak properly and not break down. “Romeo was sixteen, and Ophelia was twelve. The foster system took them and wouldn’t grant me custody. I don’t even know why. I was a good kid. I never got into trouble. They just fucking refused.”
Meyah shook her head. “That must have been horrible. When’s the last time you saw them?”
My gut twisted. I could feel it clenching like it was preparing to throw the contents of my stomach up all over the bed. I choked it back. “I saw Romeo yesterday, down in Nevada… in a prison visitor’s room. I’m trying to convince him to come to Athens. He got himself into shit… shit I could have prevented and that could come back to haunt him.”
“Wow,” she whispered in awe, falling forward and bracing her hands on either side of my body. My eyes instantly went to her breasts, my hand twitching as I fought to stop myself from reaching out and touching them. “And your sister?”
I hefted my body up into a sitting position moving so my back was against the wall behind my bed. I huffed out a laugh. “Honestly? I think I might actually be more scared of seeing Phee again than I was seeing Romeo. That bastard can look after himself. I wished I’d been there for him, so he didn’t have to go through hell. But in the end, he could fight his own battles. Phee is my little sister. She shouldn’t have to. She should have two big asshole brothers beating up boys who get too close and pretending that she isn’t growing up. She was always a fighter, but she should have never had to be.”
“She will forgive you.”
I closed my eyes and took a long breath in before opening them again. “I don’t care if she forgives me, I just want to have her in my life.”