Page 45 of Shattered

Our eyes remain locked on one another, seconds ticking by until I finally open my mouth and voice one of the thoughts that definitely should have remained internal. “Are you here trying to get back at me through my son?”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Sienna

It takes a moment for his question to sink in, and once it does, the utter surprise of seeing him here standing above me disintegrates, replaced by pure raging anger. How dare he come to my place of work and accuse me of something so incredibly low and hurtful, not to mention egotistical.

And by the appearance of his face, he realizes the absurdity of his question all too late, though he doesn’t take it back. Instead, with hesitant movements, he leans down and attempts to take Adi from my arms. But I slap his hands away, giving him a lethal glare while trying to contain the sizzling blood running through my veins. There are things I want to say to him, and I don’t want to wake up the sweet boy snuggled against me before saying them.

“I will carry him to his car seat,” I tell him quietly, not even attempting to address the other comment yet, and not giving him a chance to argue. “It took a little while for him to fall asleep, and I don’t want to wake him up by moving him around so much.”

Neilix steps back with a single dip of his chin while I carefully shuffle to the edge of the seat and then stand. My arm muscles strain while carrying Adi across the room without so much as checking to see if Neilix is following. Gosh, this kid has grown so much over the past year, and I’m not sure how much longer I’ll be able to carry him like this. A sliver of sadness manages to sneak past my anger at the thought.

As we pass by the front desk, I catch Cindy’s eye and angle my head toward the parking lot. She nods, her lips slightly curved, before her eyes dip down to Adi in my arms, and then fall back to the papers in front of her. This isn’t the first time I’ve done this, though it’s always been with Navi talking quietly beside me, not Neilix trudging close behind.

She’ll briefly tell me about work, and sometimes about her boyfriend, and on the odd occasion, Adi’s father—Neilix.

I step into my slide-ons by the door and silently wait for Neilix to put his boots on and open the door for me, fuming on the inside the entire time. Once outside, I wait for him to walk to his vehicle and open the door for me.

With a skill I’ve practiced over the past year, I settle Adi carefully into his booster seat, gently buckling him in, then find a small blanket on the backseat to replace my sleeve in his hand. Thankfully, he didn’t wake up with any of the movements.

I could feel Neilix’s eyes on me the whole time I was walking, and when I finally straighten and quietly close the door, then turn to face him with my full wrath, they’re still on me. For some reason, he’s wearing a frown that matches my own, and that just pisses me off further because he has no right.

“Who the hell do you think you are, showing up here and accusing me of that when you know absolutely nothing about anything!” I push his chest, forgetting the fact I’m still technically at work. “I’ve been working here for two years. A full year before Adi started coming.” The wheels in his head start turning as he takes in the little nugget of information. “That little boy has been attached to me since day one, and I’ve loved him from the beginning. So don’t you dare come here and question my work ethic or morals, suggesting I would do something like that, you asshole!” My chest is heaving when I’m done speaking, and annoyingly, I have tears in my eyes. “And I’m not crying, I’m just angry.”

Neilix looks thoroughly ashamed, as he should be, and runs a hand through his hair while no doubt trying to think of how to respond to my outburst. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

I fold my arms across my chest after swiping at my eye. “Damn right, you shouldn’t have.”

He nods, looking off to the side like it makes him uncomfortable to see me like this. “I don’t know why I said it.”

“Yeah. It was low.”

Returning his gaze to me, he sucks his bottom lip into his mouth before replying, “I may not know you now, but I can’t imagine you would have changed that much. You’ve always been a passionate woman with a heart of gold.”

Though lovely and complimentary, his words only anger me more, since the conversations from the other night are so fresh in my mind. “And yet, you don’t want to be friends and have no problem rejecting me.”

Looking skyward, he pinches the bridge of his nose, mumbling something. Then, looking at me with a creased brow, he says, “I thought it was best for the both of us.”

“Best for the both of us,” I repeat slowly, nodding. “Well, you get your wish. Drive safely.”

I turn to walk away with my head held high, but I’m half jerked to a stop by a hand gripping my arm. “Wait.”

I close my eyes, sucking in a breath through my nose before glancing at him over my shoulder, waiting to see what he has to say. But he just looks at me with a conflicted expression, like he has no idea what he’s doing. An extended silence passes, and I attempt to free my arm, but he keeps his grip on me, not allowing me to move away.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m not sure.” His eyes lower to the hand holding my arm, as if he isn’t the one in control of it. “I just don’t think I want you to walk away like this.”

My features twist into angry confusion. “You didn’t seem to care about it the other night.”

A spark ignites in his golden-brown eyes when he meets my gaze. “I was pissed. I was pissed that you so easily offered something I had once begged for.” When I go to say something, he cuts me off. “I know. I know I hurt you. I also hurt myself in the process. But I fucking needed someone back then, and there was not a single person who stuck by me. I’ve learned that it’s easier to keep everyone away. It hurts less when they decide to ditch me.”

He finally releases my arm, but I remain in the same spot, absorbing every little thing he just said with a fresh wave of pain slicing my chest. This time, for different reasons.

I knew he lost Jason and me at the same time, but I guess my own pain had me blocking out the fact that he had also lost the other guys at the same time, and his parents were never super involved in his life, letting him fend for himself most of the time. He had told me how much I meant to him through those texts, how much I helped him, whether he knew it was me or not.

And then he had nothing.

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