Just like that.
Anger spears through me again, especially knowing he’s gone, his presence definitely not in this apartment.
Doc replies, “He’s good, still got a little bit of an attitude, especially after this morning.”
I frown as I sit up, ensuring my sheets stay across my chest.
I may only be on the phone with Doc, but I still feel out of place talking to him naked and sore.
“Trigger has gone for a ride, Ash,” he admits and my stomach drops as he says, “He said goodbye to Cole this morning, which didn’t go down very well. He doesn’t understand, especially when it’s his eleventh birthday next week, but yeah, I told Trigger to take a ride after yesterday, he needed to go.”
My eyes water as my chin wobbles as I croak, “So he gets to ride and leave the fallout while I’m stuck in it when it was me who was raped, who couldn’t save our child?”
“Ashley,” Doc whispers, “he tried to kill himself because he knew just how badly he messed up, he couldn’t live with the guilt. Hehadto go.”
I shake my head as I angrily wipe away a few tears, and a shirt and a note at the end of the bed catches my attention, and I suck in a breath.
“Look,” Doc says when I don’t say anything, my eyes focused on the shirt, the one Tyler was wearing yesterday, “You are family, as much as you don’t think you are, and you are under club protection, so it is time for you to come home where you belong. Pack your shit, and tomorrow the prospects will collect it and take it back to your and Cole’s home.”
“I don’t think so!” I instantly snap, the tee and note going to the back burner for a moment, “I am perfectly fine where I am!”
“What with cockroaches?” he asks, and I growl at the nerve of him.
This was the only place I could get at short notice and I’m trying to find a new apartment, everything is just so damn expensive.
Doc sighs, “Look, Ash, I’m not fighting with you over this. You are coming home whether you like it or not, and you can hate me all you want, but I need you safe, Trigger needs you safe, so pack your shit, and while you are at it, you will end things with that fucker boyfriend of yours. Dirty put him in the database, and the man has given you a fake name, he doesn’t fucking exist.”
You have got to be kidding me….
My mind runs wild as anger sears through me, not just because he’s trying to run my life suddenly when he sat back and watched my husband screw another woman repeatedly. Even ignored my calls when Cole was ill, but because he also looked into my boyfriend, who apparently is a fake.
Is that why I always felt off with him?
I shake my head before snapping, “You have no right to order me around especially when you haven’t been there for me, none of the club has. Watching Tyler screw another woman, hiding it from me! I am not family, I never have been, the lies over the years complete truth of that! This is my life, not yours, so get fucked!”
Doc’s quiet for a moment before he burns all the bridges between us he tried to build as he states, “Either move back home or don’t see Cole again, your choice.”
That said, he hangs up, and my breathing picks up, anger taking hold.
He’s dead. I’m going to officially kill him because I know he means it, and without a doubt, I will never trust him again after this.
Wiping away more angry tears, I chuck my phone across the room with a screech, not caring if it smashed before I grab the note on the shirt roughly as fury spills over with my tears and I read the words written.
Pixie,
I know you hate me. I know I messed up a lot, broken your trust, broken us, and I know I tried taking the easy way out, leaving you with the fallout, and I will forever struggle with that, struggle with my guilt.
I shouldn’t have touched another woman, fuck, I never should have looked at another woman when I had you on my arm, putting me before everything; your family, your schooling, fucking everything.
I was selfish, a prick, and I couldn’t cope with the feelings I felt when you admitted to what you went through, to losing our angel…
I never watched them, not that it matters now. That day, I didn’t watch the bitch, I was in my office trying to figure out which shirt to wear for our date, excited to finally have some alone time with you knowing we were drifting apart when Mama called. She lied to you and got what she wanted out of it. She wanted me and did everything she could to get me, including having you raped.
I squeeze my eyes tightly as I take a few deep breaths before looking at the paper again, sniffling, not bothering to wipe away my tears as I continue reading.
I had to leave, pixie, not forever but for now, for you, for me, for our son. I was becoming self-destructive, wanting to believe you cheated, so I didn’t end up feeling like this. Fuck baby, I did resent you, I did resent Cole. I felt like we didn’t live before settling down, I felt like we both missed out, yet, I had an affair with a woman I pictured as you just to get affection and pleasure and you decided to date a tool not even our son likes, both not happy, both only wanting each other but I messed up. We both did in some way really, because you didn’t tell me, you heard that bitch’s lie and ran with it, keeping me in the dark about your trauma, your pain, not that I blame you because like you said, I did have a wandering eye when I shouldn’t have.
I don’t plan on being gone for too long, but, pixie, when I get back, that boyfriend of yours, if he isn’t gone, I will kill him. I want my wife back, my family, and I will do everything I can to get you both back where you belong, with me. I need to try to learn to live with the guilt first.
