right," I said. "Not going to happen."
I leaned back against the dark corner of the bar. I didn't want him to see me in the light. I didn’t want him reading my expression or seeing that glimmer of longing I knew was in my eyes. Hell, I could say I’d be strong against Holden all I wanted but it was a constant fight.
"Carlie. Carlie. You say that but you can't even look at me. What we had was good. Don't you ever wish we were back together? Don't you think of me?”
“No. I never think of you.”
I brushed my hair back from my face, willing the tears not to come to my eyes.
“I need you. I need you to be in my life. I'm not sure yet how to convince you of that but I will. You can't fight what is meant to be."
My heart wrenched out of my chest cavity. That was not what I'd been expecting at all. I'd said I wouldn't throw any more punches at him but my hand twitched to throw something, to scream and kick and tell him to get out and never come back.
I could fight. I'd fight with every fiber of my being. He thought he’d waltz into my life and win me back but he was a damn fool.
I had my pride and I had my anger. Those things were enough to keep me warm at night.
He wasn’t leaving. And he wasn’t taking his eyes off me. I tried to ignore him and focus on the stock orders but all the numbers blurred and I couldn’t read a damn thing.
I grabbed my cigarettes and walked out of the bar. Shit, I’d have to go into the back alley since Alex was still in Violet’s office.
Chapter 8
WHEN I GOT BACK TO the bar, Holden was gone.
"Everyone deserves a second chance," that's what Drew had said. Had he known something I didn't when he said that? I'd have agreed with him in other circumstances but Holden deserved no chances. I'd given him a second chance once. I'd given him a third, even a hundredth. All of that meant nothing. It just made me a sucker.
He said he'd changed but I didn't believe that at all. I just had to think of those stories on the internet. The trouble was that Holden loved women. All women. Too many women. He couldn't keep it in his pants. He'd always been distracted by a pair of legs or a pretty face. Any new territory where he could plant his flag and claim for his own.
I wasn't the type who could live with that. I know some women were okay with open relationships and that kind of thing but I'd lived through those nights at home alone, waiting for him. Not knowing if he'd come back at all and, if he did, whether he'd have the stink of another woman on him.
It'd taken me a long time to get over that pain. That feeling of being second best or not enough, and blaming myself. I couldn't and wouldn't go through that again.
Holden could say what he liked. He'd soon get bored and move on to someone else and, when he did, I wasn't going to let that hurt me at all. My heart would be so hardened against him that it'd be nothing at all.
Yet, there'd been something more. Those nights in his room that seemed so long ago they were almost like something I'd imagined. Holden had been a different person and so had I. We were such babies back then, with big dreams and no idea about the way that life knocks the wind out of you.
We'd both been misfits then. Too cool for our tiny town. Too weird to fit into their little boxes. It'd been harder for Holden. His family were looked down on and he’d had to pay a million times for crimes committed by his father or his uncles. When we'd go into a store, the owner would watch him like a hawk in case he pocketed a candy bar because he came from "that" family. Teachers would be nice to him when they first came to the school until someone on staff put the word in their ear. No one thought he was worth bothering with.
But Holden wasn't like the rest of his family. He had a spark in him that they didn't have. A spark that most of the dead-eyed people in town lacked. That's what made me notice him.
I'd been sent home from school for wearing ripped tights. That was against the uniform code.
"I think they’re hot," he said as I walked out of the classroom.
I shot him a smile and he shot one back and, from then on, we were inseparable. The two of us against the world.
"One day, I'll get out of this place and go somewhere I'm judged for myself," he'd say. "Not as the guy from the wrong side of the tracks. This town is shit. I need to get out. If people know my name, and they will, I want it to be with a smile on their face and good things to say about me. "
I was the only one he let close. The only one who understood him. I had my own issues. Not nearly so bad but I wasn't exactly prom queen either.
In those days, he only had eyes for me. He'd put his arm around me and we'd walk together through town, laughing at their stupid small-town stares and gossip. We'd had our secret places we went to get away from them.
I got jolted out of my thoughts by the sound of smashing glass.
"Drew? Was that you?"
He'd been unloading the dishwasher. We'd found a bunch of hidden glasses behind one of the couches that the cleaning staff had missed. I thought they would be safe with Drew but I'd been wrong. He seemed to have a special talent for smashing things.