I wanted to beg. I wanted to grab him and kiss him. I wanted to do a lot more than kiss him. But I knew that I couldn’t.
If I did, I would be opening the door to a world full of emotions, feelings, and regrets.
I didn’t do well with any of those things.
After what felt like a two-day drive as an ’80s kid without any devices, he dipped his chin in a nod.
I exhaled a breath I hadn’t even known that I’d been holding as I stepped back so he could enter. My shoulders relaxed at the knowledge that there were a few more grains of sand in the hourglass of time with Maddox. I had no idea how long he’d stay. A minute. An hour. All night.
All I knew was that the awkward hug at my door hadn’t been the final goodbye between us.
It could have been my imagination, but as the door clicked into place his energy shifted again. The only light in the room came from the tiny sconce above the television. I thought about turning another one on, but somehow the subdued hue seemed to fit the mood.
“Did you want something to drink?” I asked even though I never indulged in mini-bars. If I wanted to drink, I either went down to the hotel bar or I stopped at a liquor store or gas station and bought a respectable bottle of my alcohol of choice.
He stopped in front of the TV and turned toward me. “Why?” he asked gruffly.
“Um, I thought you might be thirsty,” I responded.
“No.” He shook his head. “Why did you come to the group home that night? Why did you crawl into my bed? Why did you tell me you were ready? Why did you leave and not say goodbye?”
I felt tears welling up in my eyes. This was the conversation we’d been avoiding all night. We’d danced, we’d reminisced, we’d been…polite.
This conversation was the reason I wouldn’t have come to this reunion if Maddox had RSVP’d that he was going to be here.
I licked my lips nervously and I saw his eyes dip down to my lips. I could see the desire was still there. I knew his tics, I knew his expressions, I knew him.
“Um, I came to the group home because I needed to see you. I crawled into your bed and told you I was ready because I wanted you to be my first. I didn’t say goodbye because I knew that if I did, you’d convince me to run away with you.”
I did my best to answer his questions as honestly as I possibly could.
He inhaled slowly through his nose as he lowered down on the armchair in the corner of the room. His shoulders dropped as he leaned forward and rested his forearms on his knees.
I waited, allowing him time to process my answers. His eyes were cast down and I took advantage of his distraction to study his handsome face. His jawline was so square and strong. My fingers itched to reach out and touch him.
“Would that have been so bad?” His words were rough and ragged, like they’d been dragged through gravel. “If we had run away together?”
I could hear the agony in his question. I wanted to ease it, but I knew that I couldn’t. “Yes.”
He hung his head again, and his shoulders slumped.
“For you, not for me.”
His head lifted and I saw fire in his eyes. “How in thefuckwould it have been bad for me?”
I sucked in a startled breath. Maddox had never cursed at me. He’d always treated me like a china doll he was scared would break.
“I’m sorry,” he apologized as he took another deep breath.
“No, it’s fine. It’s…I understand.” I licked my lips nervously again. Hearing and feeling the depth of his emotions, especially after all this time was both flattering and also terrifying. It somehow made me want him so much more. I wanted to walk over and crawl onto his lap and kiss all of his pain away. But I couldn’t do that. I’d made too many mistakes. Mistakes that, I knew, if he knew, would make him hate me.
He might be mad at me now, but he didn’t hate me. Because he didn’t know the truth. At least, not all of it.
Instead of comforting him physically, I hoped that my words would bring him some comfort. “My father wouldneverhave just let me go. I was…his property. I was a reflection of him, of his success. He would have found us, and when he did, he would have putyouin jail.”
“I was a minor, too,” Maddox argued. “I’m younger than you. It’s not like he could have charged me with kidnapping.”
I looked at him and saw that it wasn’t thirty-five-year-old Maddox talking now. It was the teenager that I’d abandoned. The child that his mother, father, and even his grandmother had abandoned.
