Somebody Else's Sky (Something in the Way 2)

“I’m not.” The way his voice broke squeezed my heart, sending more tears down my cheeks. “What can I offer you? How will I take care of us?”

“I’ll ask my dad for money,” I said. I never had, not in the way Tiffany did, but I could do it for a while.

“No.”

“But he gives it to you and Tiffany.”

He took a step toward me, seeming to double in size, and to my surprise, I moved back. “That’s different, and you fucking know it.”

“That isn’t fair.” I dug my toes into the ground, seeking comfort in the soft sand. “Why would it be any different than him giving you money to take care of Tiffany?”

“Because that’s Tiffany and this is you.” He gritted his teeth, looking up at the sky. “I can’t do that with you. I can’t expect you to understand, but I need to you to. I need you to understand this is best.”

“It’s not best, and I don’t understand how you can say it is.” I laced my hands over my heart. “You asked if I could go up there and tell Tiffany? I could. I would say goodbye to her, to my dad, for you. Don’t marry her, Manning. Be a man, and tell her you don’t love her.”

His neck thickened, veins rising from under his sleeves, cording his forearms. “Don’t tell me to be a man,” he said, his fists curling. “What do you think I’ve been doing? Why do you think I’ve been doing it? For you, Lake.” His body vibrated as he ran both hands through his hair, pulling. “You don’t know what you’re asking of me.”

“I’m asking you to walk away from all of this.” I’d never seen Manning so angry, but I needed him to see I wouldn’t break. I wouldn’t be pushed away. Instead, I stood taller. “I can be enough for you.”

“They’ll never forgive you.”

I stepped up to him, into the force field of anger pulsating around him. “I don’t care.”

He looked down his nose at me. “I’m not going to take your family away from you, Lake.”

“You’ll be my family.”

“You should have the world. Fuck the world—you should have the universe, the sky, and every star in it.” As close as I was, I could see every fleck of pain in his eyes, the frown lines etched in his skin, the anguish in his tensed muscles and jaw. “I can’t give that to you. I’ll never be able to. I’ve seen too much. Had too much taken away. I can’t be happy enough to make you happy, and I can’t provide for you the way you deserve. You’re at the start of your life, on your way up, and I . . .” He inhaled a breath through his nose, wincing like it pained him. “I can only bring you down.”

My tears fell faster now, but I wouldn’t lose hope. I couldn’t. Because there was something he couldn’t deny, and if he did, he’d be a liar. “Even if all that’s true, you’re forgetting one thing. You can love me more than anyone else could. How can you ignore that?”

He hesitated. “It’s not enough.”

It’s not enough. You’re not enough. I shook the crushing thoughts out of my head. “It is enough.”

“It’s not. I’ve seen it firsthand with my mom and dad—”

I got in his face. “I don’t care what you’ve seen. You’re making excuses.”

“Why would I?” he asked. “What makes you think I want it this way?”

“So you can be miserable! Because you think that’s what you deserve.” I wasn’t sure where it came from. Maybe I stunned us both because for a second, we each went silent. It all boiled down to the simplest equation—Manning thought I was too good for him, and that he was bad, and those two things were enough to keep him away. “You’re not bad,” I told him. “You are not your father.”

He stepped back as if I’d struck him. I hoped I had if it meant pulling him out of this nightmare. “You can’t say that,” he said. “You don’t even know him. You don’t know what he did.”

“He hurt your sister, your mother, and you. You have never hurt anyone, Manning.”

“No? I put my hands on you when you were sixteen. I fantasized about stripping you of your innocence when you were seventeen.” His already-dark eyes blackened like the sky. “I’m not sure I would’ve stopped that night in the truck if it weren’t for the cop.”

“But you did, even though I begged you not to.”

“Maybe next time, I won’t be able to. Do you see how worked up I get around you?” He pulled on the front of his t-shirt with a fist. “Do you see my anger, Lake? You’re going to tell me I’m not dangerous?”

“You aren’t dangerous,” I said, trying to keep any trembling from my voice. Like that night in his kitchen, his admissions kicked up my heart rate, but any fear I felt just made my toes curl. If this was a dangerous man, I more than accepted that about him. I wanted it.