What was I supposed to say to him?
Did I apologize for everything?
Did I explain?
What the fuck was I supposed to do?
The questions were endless, and I wasn’t sure I was strong enough to deal with all of this.
My grip slipped as my resolve fractured. The pen skid hard across the wood, carving a line too deep to fix. It cut sharp across the intricate design I’d spent weeks creating. The piece was ruined. There was no fixing it.
Somewhere deep inside, I hoped that wouldn’t be me if I went down this road with Harley: ruined beyond repair.
CHAPTER 52
harley
Ipretended not to notice that Maverick was almost half an hour late. I should’ve called Frank and complained, or even fired him. Hell, it’d be faster to bring in a demolition team than try to save this place.
After he left around one-thirty in the morning, I tried to sleep, but I was too wired to relax. I dozed on and off for a few hours, my body buzzing and restless, before just getting up to continue working. The problem was that I got nothing done other thanrenting out a dumpster and setting up the drop-off. I couldn’t make myself touch the boxes. I didn’t know where to start. There was just so much stuff everywhere, and it was overwhelming.
My chest perpetually ached, and my mind raced with jumbled thoughts I couldn’t organize. Between my mother, the house, and Maverick, I was drowning in a way I wasn’t prepared for. Maybe coming here was the wrong thing, even if I needed a break from Vivienne. At least with Vivienne, I knew what to expect. I knew how to handle her. I’d grown accustomed to her aggressive nature, biting remarks, and social expectations. The dull throb of anxiety was a constant thing around her, but at least I knew what to expect and how to handle it.
This? I didn’t know what the hell I was doing.
By the time there was a knock on the door, my foul mood was in full force as wave after wave of anxiety threatened to take me out by the knees.
“Here,” Maverick said when I answered the door. He held out an obscenely large cup of coffee. The bright red caffeine warning label on it unnerved me almost as much as the sight of him did. “Eduardo introduced mega-sized coffee two years ago with more caffeine than most energy drinks. Great for us locals surviving on minimal sleep, not so great for teenagers. A few of the local kids took his free refill policy seriously. One time, one of them thought he was having a heart attack because of the huge amount of caffeine he’d consumed. It turned out to be the other drugs in his system, but Eduardo slapped a warning label on these and got rid of the free refill policy. And all that’s to say, drink this but then drink a fuck ton of water, okay?”
His mouth was moving, but there were so many words coming out that my already frazzled mind struggled to process. Still, I accepted the cup from him.
“You still hang out with Eduardo?” I asked. I wasn’t sure whythatwas what my mind decided to focus on.
“Yeah, he’s practically adopted me at this point,” he replied. “You should hear about the first and only family function I went to.”
When he paused, I waited for him to say more, but he didn’t.Okay, then.
“So, look,” he cleared his throat, shifting his weight, “I owe you an apology.”
The anxious response was visceral. My chest constricted painfully tight, forcing the air out of my lungs. This was one conversation I didn’t want to have.One I couldn’t have.I couldn’t relive the words he’d said or my breakdown after. It hadn’t been pretty then, and it wouldn’t be pretty now. I could guarantee that much.
“Don’t—”
“No, I owe you—”
“I saiddon’t,” I snapped. I refused to unravel in front of him.
“Okay,” he conceded. “But if you’re ever open to it, I’d like to talk about it.”
He didn’t look like he wanted to talk about it any more than I wanted to.
“I’ve got a dumpster being delivered in a few hours,” I told him, desperate to change the conversation before I passed out from the tightness in my chest. “Just… do whatever you need to do.”
“Do you know Dave?” Maverick asked, and I shook my head. “He’s the plumber. I’ve got him coming by this morning to look at the pipes and get you an estimate on fixing it.”
“Okay.”
“And what do you need me working on?”
