“We have breakfast laid out upstairs. I’ll bring a plate,” she said. “And some clothes.”
I kind of wished I didn’t have to borrow her clothes now, but I didn’t have a choice. Was I angry with her? She gave Damon information that changed my life forever and sent my father on the run.
But then again, the money we lived off of wasn’t ours, and my father wasn’t a good man.
One way or another Damon would’ve gotten what he wanted. I just didn’t like that more people than just him were in on it. It made me feel like a pawn in a scheme much grander than I knew. Powerless.
And their families weren’t exactly saintly, either, so what right did they have to take mine down?
Damon came over and cupped my face with one hand. I didn’t pull away, but I shifted in my seat, not really in the mood.
He knelt down, coming down to my level. “If you don’t hate me, don’t hate her,” he said. “I had info she needed, and she had what I needed. She regretted giving it to me almost immediately.”
I knew he was right. I shouldn’t hold her to a different standard than I held him.
I’d just already processed my anger with him, and this brought that up again.
He picked up the objects in my hand, and I blinked, remembering I was holding them.
“Why were they here?” I asked.
He didn’t answer immediately, but then told me, “They were safe here, I guess. I didn’t want to leave them at my house when I knew I was going to jail.”
Jail.
For three years.
And I’d been sent back to Montreal to escape the storm and chaos that raged over the town when he, Will, and Kai were sentenced, and to run away from the taunts and whispers of everyone who thought I was a slut.
He lied to me. He shouldn’t have done it, and he paid the price.
But there was so much more than that between us. Buried in the cracks of all the broken things, where the words were always true and days were too long without him.
When no one else could make the world look like he could, and even after years, in the quiet parts of my mind, I missed the feel of his eyes on me.
Maybe on those nights, sneaking into my house and taking me on adventures, was the real Damon Torrance.
I dipped my forehead to his and took my barrette back, clasping it in my hair.
“I need a shower.” I grinned. “Step into my fountain?”
I heard him exhale a laugh, and then he stood up, pulling me into his arms.
Damon
Present
“Ugh, what the fuck?” I said, wincing as I sucked a drag off my cigarette and watched Banks clean my wound.
It felt like I’d been stuck with a red-hot poker.
She sat in a chair in front of me, eye level with the stitches and shaking her head. “What the hell did you do to this?”
“Lots,” Will chuckled, coming into Michael and Rika’s luxury kitchen and rounding the massive marble island.
Just as I thought, they completely douched up the place. I couldn’t bring myself to look at the rest of the house after I’d come upstairs.
Banks dabbed at the blood from the torn stitch, and I just hoped nothing inside was torn as a tiny wave of nausea rolled through my stomach.