Page 228 of Fury

She said, “The other night in my bed, you kissed me, touched me, and…oh, how you touched me. I knew I couldn’t be with you the way that touch demanded and deserved without telling you the truth. We can’t be together if it’s not completely real, completely honest between us. We can’t. I can’t.”

“I can’t either.”

Tears streamed down her face. “I know.”

A thick, heavy plunger rammed down my throat, jamming muck in my every vein. Everything we’d ever wanted had actually come true, but we’d had to deny it, close the door on it. We couldn’t have it. Just out of reach, just out of reach. Like always.

“There’s nothing but sadness here,”she’d told me the night before.

She was so fucking right.

My pulse blew, my lungs crushed together. I couldn’t breathe. For the first time in my life, I didn’t know what to do, how to handle any of this. This sorrow, this disappointment didn’t fit into a saddlebag on my bike along with all the rest of the crap I’d crumpled up and stuffed in there from day one. This…this…

I slammed out of her house, and she didn’t try to stop me, reason with me, chase me. I took off, and headed for Tania’s. I silenced my bike in her driveway and by the time I got to the front door, Butler had swung it open, Tania behind him.

Butler charged at me. “I don’t know what’s going on here, but you can’t just come over here any damn time you want. Tania’s my old lady, and I live here now.” He pushed at my chest. “Her mom’s not feeling good and is sleeping inside. What the hell is your deal?”

Tania stepped to his side, her hand on Butler’s back. “She finally told you.”

“Who told him what?” Butler snapped.

“That I have a daughter out there, practically next door,” I said.

Butler’s hand fell away from me. “You what?”

“She told you,” Tania said.

“I forced her hand. Only after I did a little digging myself,” I said.

“I’m glad.”

“Are you?”

“Watch it,” Butler’s tone was sharp.

“I wanted her to tell you from the very beginning, but she refused. She said it was the only way to be sure everyone would be safe,” said Tania.

“You helped her,” I said.

“She was in shock with you in jail and her not being able to see you or talk to you,” Tania said. “I knew it had to be more than a sad, lonely heart, but she wouldn’t tell me. So, yes, I helped her. I got her a room at my great grandmother’s house in Pine Needle which my mother had turned into a boarding house back then. She wouldn’t let me visit, not once. She didn’t want there to be any connection between us the moment she’d left Chicago.

“I did what I could for her, my cousin too, but she was on her own. And then she disappeared from Pine Needle, and I didn’t hear from her again. But that was okay with me, because I knew that was what she needed to do. I respected her wishes and I supported her decision and kept her secret. I gave her that peace of mind, because that’s what true friends do.”

“Tania—”

Her huge black eyes flashed at me. “We protected that child’s life. That’s what all this was about, Finger. Not her, not you, not me. You once asked me to take care of your Serena, and I did. I did that. This was about protecting that child above all else and at any cost.”

Something inside me cracked, the fissure spreading fast, cold shivers racing over my skin. A wave of emotion jolted through me, and my hands shook. Nausea surged up my throat and I choked it back down, but the acid boiled at my lips.

Tania touched my arm, and I recoiled. She said, “You were at the heart of every decision she made, every thought, every tear. There were so many tears, and you were in every single one.”

I heaved for air, the sun had fallen and the sudden frigid air of the early night sliced through my insides.

“Man, come inside.” Butler’s voice floated over me. “Take a breath. A cup of coffee. Don’t ride like this.”

I slapped his words away, his outstretched hands, his invitation to Betty Crocker comforts. I staggered off, to where I didn’t know. Away. Away from them, from all of it.

Tangled. I was tangled in a thick rope, clawing at it, no out, no escape. It only tightened and tightened around me. A savage snarl vaulted from my chest. I fell to the curb, my head in my hands.

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