I couldn’t snatch my gaze from staring straight ahead. Deuce jumped out of the car, and another bolt of fear shot through me as I wondered where he was going. Was he leaving me here? Would he get hit out in traffic like that? I recalled another man stepping out into traffic on a rainy night. But as quickly as it came, the memory went.
He reached inside of the car after opening the door and unstrapped my seat belt. “It’s okay, baby. I’ve got you.”
Deuce lifted me from my seat and set me in the passenger seat. He slid into the driver’s seat just as the light changed.
I could hear the other car horns honking, but he didn’t pay them attention. Deuce leaned over and strapped me into my seat before he wiped my tears away with his hands.
He kissed the remnant of the tears before he kissed my lips. “Sevyn, I love you. Don’t you ever doubt that, girl. I promise that everything is going to be okay.”
Holding his finger up in the rearview mirror as cars all around us honked, he gave them the middle finger and pulled through the intersection just as the light turned yellow.
Sevynand I had a lot of fun yesterday at lunch and shopping. I’d be the first to admit that I was scared that she and that old lady were about to fight in that store. I knew the woman looked familiar, but I hadn’t been able to place a finger on where I knew her from until Wynter and Autumn appeared.
We had a smooth recovery from that, but when she had that breakdown in the car while driving, I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to put her back together again. She was fragile in so many ways, and I didn’t want to rush her, but I did want to help her regain her independence. I wanted her to feel good about her recovery and confident in the woman she was.
Waverleigh often told me that before the accident, Sevyn had been a very confident woman, in not just her looks andbody shape, but in her abilities and intellect. She saw the same struggle in Sevyn that I did. I thought a shopping trip and a day out would cure that, but it hadn’t.
After we returned home, I got her to agree to let me visit her therapist the next time she went. She had shut down on me and been quiet all night. I repeatedly apologized for forcing her to get behind the wheel when she wasn’t ready. She would only respond that it wasn’t my fault, and I didn’t force her, merely suggested it. But I felt as if I did, and I knew that I held the burden of the responsibility of what happened to her, the same way I held the responsibility for her being in this situation in the first place.
I grabbed the serving tray and placed her breakfast on there, along with mine, before I added two glasses of orange juice. I had gotten up a couple of hours ago, worked out, showered, and then prepared us waffles, chicken sausage, and a fruit bowl.
I walked into the hallway on the side of the house where her room was located and set the tray down on a table across from her door. I tapped gently, hoping that I wasn’t waking her up. When she called out, “Come in,” I noticed that her voice was muffled.
That immediately worried me. I opened the door, turned back and grabbed the tray, and walked inside her room.
The first thing that I noticed was her curtains were still drawn, the TV was off, and she was underneath the cover, staring at the ceiling. Whenever she slept, she always had the TV on. She usually turned it to some sleep music station and turned it down low.
“What’s going on, Sevyn?” I asked, getting on the bed with her after placing the breakfast tray on the dresser.
She cleared her throat. “I recovered another memory.”
“And it made you cry?”
She nodded. “Ethan’s ex, Pandora, showed up at my birthday dinner to inform him that she was pregnant, basically revealing that while we were separated, Ethan had cheated.”
My heart froze midbeat, because I cheated with Lena. Although I wasn’t married and our circumstances were entirely different, we still cheated.My God, what will she think of me when she finds out the truth?
I held her close to me as she sniffled, and tears continued to fall.
“I’m sorry,” she apologized after a while.
“For what?”
“I always seem to be breaking down on you. Yesterday in the car, now again this morning. You’ve brought me this beautiful breakfast. You don’t deserve my tears.”
“And you don’t deserve the pain that you’ve gone through. You don’t have to apologize, Sevyn. I’ll always be that shoulder that you can cry on when times are hard.”
“Why are you sweet to me?”
I kissed her temple and replied, “I’m just giving you a little taste of what you deserve.”
Sevyn leaned into me and kissed me deeply. I knew that I had just made our breakfast, but it was hard to resist her when she wanted me and was so willing to give of herself the way she was.
I buried my face in her hair after I pulled back from the kiss. An old memory of Lena crying on me in a similar way when she was talking about Paul resurfaced. I had to let go of the past so that I could move into the future.
I made up in my mind that I was going to tell her the truth. “Sevyn, I have something to tell you. Something important that you should know.”
She straddled me, and I slid my hands up the back of her nightshirt. “I’m not in a mood to talk right now, Deuce. Maybelater. I’ve had all the revelations that I can handle for one day. Just make love to me right now.”
