Because I Can (Necklace Trilogy 2)

His tone is cranky for sure, but I know he’s bruised, beaten, and hurting. And on some level, on perhaps a wildly evident level, I keep going back to Tyler being an asshole, but he wasn’t wrong when he said that Dash believes he deserves to be punished. Maybe this, what is happening this morning with his sister, is even a part of his punishment, something he feels he deserves, even if this part of the equation would be avoided if possible.

Interesting though, people with bad habits, know how to hide them. The very fact that he’s not prepared to hide this from her, has me wondering if he really hasn’t fought in years, or if he somehow avoids his sister by design, at designated times?

Dash stalks toward the bathroom. I’m still standing in the same spot when the alarm on the front door sounds, and Bella is officially in the apartment. This means I need to pull myself together and look presentable enough to be comfortable navigating a whole lot of potential sibling trouble. I rush after Dash, find him at the bathroom sink, and join him, to do exactly what he’s doing, brush my teeth.

Once we’re both holding brushes, this becomes a shared, intimate, domestic moment, that does funny things to my belly. When our eyes meet in the mirror, there’s a punch of awareness between us. But there’s also his damaged face and the dread that is not only his, but mine, over Bella’s reaction.

“She’s going to freak out,” I say softly.

“I know,” he replies. “Believe me, I know.” The grimness of his tone tells me that, yes, this is punishment. But not the kind he welcomes.

He pushes off the sink and exits to the hallway and the closets. I fight the urge to follow and press him to talk to me, recognizing that he’s a man of control that’s had control stripped away from him. We haven’t even faced this situation, and now, he’s facing me and Bella, in one swift hellish morning. He needs space to pull himself together. I grab one of my bags that’s thankfully already in the bathroom and start pulling out the items that I need to try to make my hair and face respectable. Since I cried hard last night, I’m all puffed up and I don’t want Bella to ask questions that only lead to lies. And my hair, my God my hair, is a mess. It dried naturally only a few hours ago, and it dried looking like I stuck my finger in a socket. It’s a disaster. Digging in to fix the mess I am, I grab my flat iron from my bag and plug it up. A few minutes later, I’ve tamed the mess on my head, used stringent pads, moisturizer, and applied a little makeup and lip gloss. At this point, I look tired, not hungover from tears. I think. I hope.

I hurry into the closet, pull on leggings, a sweater, and sneakers, eager to join Dash. I find him at the window, dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, with boots, his hand on the glass. As if he senses my presence, he turns to face me. And in the sunlight, that shiner is shining all right.

“I think I should go talk to Bella. Just wait here.” I round the coffee table and wrap my arms around him. “Really, Dash. It’s bad. Seeing her later, not sooner, when it’s not this dramatically horrid is a good idea.”

“You can’t save me from my sister, cupcake.”

“I don’t want to save you from Bella. I just want to soften the impact of her reaction. Don’t underestimate me. I can do more to help than you think I can.”

“I assure you, Allie, I do not underestimate you on this or anything else. But neither do I underestimate my sister’s reaction. Let her scream and shout because she will. And then let this be over.” He catches my arms and pulls me to him. “I know we have to talk, but when we get down there—”

“I’m with you, Dash,” I say, meaning it in every possible way. “I told you. I shouldn’t have left last night. Nothing that happened after I did changes that.”

“It depends on what changed your mind.”

“You,” I say. “You changed my mind.”

“I’m not good for you, Allie. I know that. And I know what the right thing to do is.”

“What does that mean, Dash?”

“It means, I know what I should do right now, but I’m just not going to do it.”

My stomach knots. Is he talking about walking away from me? Or continuing to fight? “What does that mean?”

“Dash!”

At the sound of Bella’s voice from somewhere nearby, Dash’s jaw clenches. “If we don’t go to her, she’ll come to us. We deal with her. Then we’ll deal with everyone else.”