CHAPTERTWENTY-FIVE
MARCUS
It's beenthree days since I told Denielle this was happening. This.Us.While I didn't see her during the days, things fell into a rhythm.
She went to work, with Jenn following her every move. Saturday afternoon, Denielle sent me an all-caps text message toinform her babysitterthat if she followed her one more time to the bathroom, she would hurt me in my sleep. I barked a laugh and got an odd look from Ben. He wasn't used to me being…happy.
I had moved to second shift, and once I got off work, I showered at the guesthouse where Denielle was already waiting. We spent the night together and repeated the pattern the next day. Even though nothing happened, it was the most content I'd felt in…ever.
Monday morning, I woke up before her alarm and watched her sleep. Her constant guard was absent, and she looked so much younger. Lying on my side with my elbow bent under my head, I scanned her features. My steady heartbeat suddenly slowed, and a hollowness took over my chest. How could I be happy when my little sister would never get the chance? The muscles in my neck and shoulders coiled, and I rolled on my back, staring at the ceiling.
A small hand suddenly landed on my arm. "Talk to me," Denielle's sleepy whisper relaxed the tension instantly.
I wanted to respond that everything was fine, but the words rolled off my tongue. "I was thinking about Ken. She'll never have a future, find someone she'll…" I trailed off.
Denielle's thumb began to caress my bicep, and with every pass, I relaxed under her touch.
"Ken would want you to be happy. The same way you would wish that for her," she declared softly.
She was right. "It's hard to let go," I admitted.
Denielle snuggled closer, resting her temple on my shoulder and draping her arm over my stomach. "No one is asking you to let go." She tapped the spot over my heart with her index finger, causing a flutter to drive out the darkness that had lived there for too long. "She's right here."
I wrapped my arms around her and placed a kiss on her forehead. Neither of us spoke until her alarm signaled us to start the day.
After Denielle left for work, I unlocked my phone and pulled up my best friend's number. This would be the first time I had spoken to King in weeks.
"Are you ready to explain yourself, Bax?" I winced at the sneer when she answered. Despite being a grown-ass fucking man, King had my balls in a vise from day one—not in a romantic sort of way.
She laid into me before I could form a reply, even threatened to withhold Haddie when she came into town on Friday—a threat I did not take lightly. I loved my goddaughter like my own, and she knew it. For her to resort to such drastic measures warned me how disappointed she was. My insides knotted. I owed her an explanation. We used to talk several times a week until the vineyard. After that, my attention was captured by a different woman.
"So?"
It was my turn. "Do I have a choice?"
"No." Footsteps in the background and a door clicking indicated that she ensured the privacy of this conversation. "Talk to me, Marcus. What's going on?"
Marcus, not Bax.
"Denielle."
"What did she do?" she asked low, hesitant.
"She didn't do anything." I wasn't going to reveal what I witnessed whenever Denielle disappeared in her head. That wasn't my place. "I… Things have changed."
"How?" Suspicion coated the question.
I grasped for the right words. "You never asked why I hated her."
King didn't speak for a moment. "If you wanted me to know, you would've let me help carry your burden."
Her choice of words hit hard.My burden."Victor Keller was Ken's surgeon the night she..."
"Denielle's father?" she cried incredulously.
"One and the same. He left the OR because Denielle had jumped into the pool and almost drowned. She was in the emergency department. The aneurysm ruptured after he left, and they couldn't save her."
"Oh, Bax." The quiver in my name told me how she felt for me. For Ken. For Denielle.