Ruining Me: The Insidious Seven MC, Book Two, page 39
Once they sit, I give them no time to get comfortable. The faster they explain every single detail that led up to the situation I've been forced into, the sooner they can leave. And then I can start planning my permanent escape from this place.
Glancing between them, I make my impatience known with one word spoken from indignant lips. “Speak,” I growl. And with one last long look at each other, they do.
Three hours and a pitcher and a half of margaritas later, Tatum and I sit next to each other on my brother's back deck, watching as Liam pushes our niece in her tiny pink electric motorcycle across the lawn. The battery died about thirty minutes ago, but she wasn’t ready for the fun to end so soon. And since she has her uncles wrapped around her little fingers, well, let's just say all she had to do was pout her bottom lip and Uncle Li was putty in her small hands.
I smile as she giggles while he speeds down the small hill in Oli’s backyard. Both of their laughter rings out, the sound warming my heart.
I glance over at Tatum, wanting to see her reaction to the love of her life playing so wholesomely with his niece. The twinkle in her eyes and the smile of adoration on her lips tell me everything I need to know.
“Careful, real easy to catch baby fever around here,” I mutter into my still-chilled margarita before sipping the sweet drink. Her smile widens as she glances at me and chuckles. She shrugs one shoulder before bringing her drink to her lips and glancing back toward her man. “Are you guys ever gonna pop out a few of those?” I ask, genuinely curious if I can expect more nieces and nephews in the near future. I watch as a distant look crosses her beautiful eyes.
“It’s fun to talk about, but Liam and I won’t be having kids anytime soon,” she admits before returning her gaze to me. One side of her lips ticks up in a half-smile. “Kinda hard to have baby fever when you lead the type of life we do.” She shakes her head as if shaking off a sad thought. “What about you?” she asks, bringing her glass back up to her lips. “Do you want kids?”
I furrow my brow. “I don’t know,” I answer honestly, never really having thought about having kids with anyone before. “Maybe with the right person.” I shrug as if a ball of lead isn’t forming in the pit of my stomach created by this conversation I stupidly started.
“What about with Declan?” she asks bluntly. Sucking in a harsh breath at the mention of his name, I stand abruptly and head back toward the house while downing the rest of my drink in one gulp. Annoyance and uncertainty driving every movement as I push through the glass door and head for the kitchen. Tatum catches up to me just as I’m reaching the sink.
“I know, that was a stupid question. It’s just my assbackwards way of asking if you’re going to leave,” she rushes to say as I brace my weight against the sink. Anger and sadness churn in my core, bringing an intense heat to the back of my eyes. My shoulders rise to my ears as the thought of leaving bounces around my head.
The thought of leaving Declan.
I fight the urge to hyperventilate as I realize what a shitshow my reality has become. I'm grappling with the decision of whether I need to leave not just this city, but also the only man I have fallen so fucking hard for.
Maybe you should forgive him, as you have forgiven everyone else.
I shake myself, cutting off the streaming line of thoughts before they start to make too much sense. After hearing Liam and Tatum explain how I found myself in my current situation, I decided to forgive everyone.
Well, everyone besides Declan. For some reason, their betrayal didn’t feel as potent as his. Sure, my brother was the one who initiated all this, came up with the plan to best hold a blind over my eyes while keeping me safe from a psychopath. But Declan’s betrayal is so much more than that. His deceit devastated me on a whole other level.
Clearing my throat to fight the emotions swelling in my chest, I let my anger drive me as I face the purple-haired woman on the other side of the kitchen. A pang of guilt punches me in the gut as I realize I have to tell her something; otherwise, she’ll never drop it.
“I’m not seeing much of a choice,” I say, surprised that my voice doesn’t wobble.
Her eyes flare with something that resembles shock before she quickly schools her expression. She nods before finding my gaze. “Oh, you’re preaching to the choir, babe.” She sets her half-drunk margarita on the counter before waving me off and shaking her head. “You are looking at the queen of running, so I totally get where you’re coming from,” she says before placing her hands into her back pockets and rocking back onto her heels. She sucks her teeth before widening her grin at me.
I furrow my brows as my lips tighten into a thin line of annoyance. “I know what you’re trying to do,” I say flatly.
She quirks a dark brow before pointing to herself as if confirming that I'm speaking to her. I roll my eyes before stepping away from the sink and heading toward the living room, with the only thing on my mind being escape.
“I’m not doing anything besides relating to your situation,” she says as she rushes to catch up with me.
“Pft,” I scoff as I march down the long hallway with her one step behind me. “You think I’m making a mistake, you think I’m running, and you’re trying to stop me,” I growl.
My words must give her pause because her steps falter for a brief moment before she regains her momentum. I speed up, trying to put more distance between myself and one of my only friends in this world.
“Okay, so maybe you do know what I’m trying to do,” she says, following me into the living room.
“I’m not running,” I mutter.
“That’s not what it looks like from where I’m standing,” she snarks.
My temper flares, and before I can stop myself, I’m spinning around to face her. Her steps screech to a halt, and she almost collides with me before she can fully stop herself.
“Really?” I snap, my brows climbing my forehead as I press my tongue to the inside of my cheek. “Well, since you know everything, please tell me what this looks like to you, Tatum. Because to me, it looks like I’m leaving a place that has brought me nothing but heartbreak, near-death experiences, and disappointment.”
The flash of hurt that flares in her eyes has me wishing I had bitten my tongue. I shake my head and let some of my anger deflate. “I’m sorry,” I breathe. “I told you I forgave you and I meant it.” Flicking my eyes back to hers, I soften my gaze and allow a small grin to play on my lips.
I did forgive her, right after they essentially forced me to sit down with them to explain everything in great detail. And when everyone's sins were laid bare on the table before us, they both apologized, and I accepted. Although I would never condone their scheme to keep me blissfully unaware of the death threat looming over my head, I do understand their logic.
My world had just been turned upside down with the loss of my home. If I had learned about the threat on my life on top of everything else, there’s no doubt I would have gone to my eldest brother for protection. He’s a seasoned detective in his part of the world; he would have harbored me and dealt with the problem through all the correct channels of the law. But that would have only caused the loss of control for the MC.
By keeping me in the dark, it ensured that the danger was localized to New Orleans and therefore could be dealt with in-house with little to no widespread casualties. Meaning, if I had gone to Florida and let Damon handle the problem, it would have followed me, endangering not only my life but also the lives of everyone in Damon’s life as well.
Maybe it was my brush with death that made me so forgiving of their transgressions. Perhaps it was because I saw the madness in Mi–Matteo’s eyes. The madness that told me he would never stop unless he was wiped from the playing board altogether. Regardless, when I told them I forgave them, I meant it.
And, if I’m being completely honest, I forgave Tatum the moment she took a bullet for me that day in the parking lot.
“I just need a fresh start,” I mumble as I shift on my feet.
You mean, another fresh start. My inner voice mocks.
“You asked me what it looks like,” Tate blurts as she grabs my hands and pulls me to the couch, making me sit next to her. The empathy in her eyes is almost too much to bear, but I force myself to look at her nonetheless.
“You look like me almost five years ago.” She nods her chin down at me. When confusion mars my brow, she places a soft smile on her lips and slides closer to me. “You look like I did when I was running from my problems.”
I frown and part my lips to refute her accusation, but she cuts me off with a wave of her hand. My annoyance flares as I narrow my eyes and bite my tongue. At my silence, she continues.
“You can tell yourself you’re getting a fresh start, tell yourself everything will be better if you just remove yourself from the situation. But I can speak from experience that running never solves anything,” she says firmly, avidly driving her point home. “Trust me, Sof, your problems never truly go away just because you ignore them. If anything, they get bigger and bigger until they are so all-consuming that you can think of nothing other than what you’re running from in the first place.”
“You can’t compare your situation to mine. I’m not the one who caused this.” My chest heaves with my heavy breath, and my heartbeat pounds against my ribs so hard I’d be surprised if she can’t hear it. “I’m not the one who lied and used sex as a way to get closer to me so he could protect me,” I growl, spitting the word as it sours on my tongue.
Tatum frowns. “Is that really what you think he did? Fucked you in order to protect you from a murderer?” she asks. My lips form my agreement, but before I can say anything at all, I’m rendered speechless for some inexplicable reason.
All I want to do is say yes. Yes, I think Declan used sex as a way to get closer so it was easier to keep tabs on me. But, for some reason I can’t explain, I can’t force the words to leave my mouth. She squeezes my hands and searches my eyes.
“If Declan really wanted to use you to gain the upper hand on his enemy, why did he fight you for so damn long?” she asks, leaving me at a loss for words once again. She nods knowingly. “You can’t answer that because it doesn't make sense.” Her sympathetic smile makes it difficult to keep looking at her. “Look, I’m not going to pretend to understand why his twisted mind led him to believe that convincing you he hated you all these years was the best way to keep you safe from him. Especially when it's so blatantly obvious he has been in love with you all this time.”
Her words cause my breath to stall in my chest as flashes of violet eyes clouded with adoration fill my mind's eye. On the day everything happened, the day all the lies came crashing down around me, he looked into that one-way mirror and admitted he never meant to fall for me. I couldn’t hear the words back then, too fearful that I might forgive him on the spot as I felt his honesty with every fiber of my being.
That was the moment I crawled out of that window and into the hands of a crazed man. Embarrassment washes over me, bringing a flush to my cheeks.
“All I can say is I think you’re blurring the lines and connecting the fact that you were lied to, to Declan finally letting himself have you. He didn’t exploit you to increase his opportunities to spy on you and get the jump on Pelosi. I think he loved you because you healed something inside of him that has been broken for far too long, and he finally allowed himself to hold on to something good for once.”
I want to tell her she’s wrong. Make her see that what I’m saying is actually the truth. I want to kick and scream and stomp my feet, anything to distract from the fact that what she’s saying is making too much sense. But I can do nothing other than stare at her with my lips pressed in a tight line.
She rolls her eyes at my stubborn silence. “I mean, come on, Sof. The man literally ran into a burning building because he thought you were inside, faced a deathly skilled lunatic, and a pit full of starved gators for you. That's some serious superhero-type shit.” My lips twitch despite myself. She grins at me, her eyes twinkling with humor before she turns serious again. “How can you continue to punish him for the same sin you’ve forgiven us all for commiting?” she asks, doubt plain in her tone.
“How could I not?” I blurt out as if her question has loosened my tongue. I pull my hands away from hers and stand up abruptly from my seat before pacing back and forth in front of her. I roughly wipe my hand down my face before eyeing the beautiful woman in front of me, as if she asked me the question in a different language. “He… did something to me, unlocked something inside me.”
My lungs seize as I say the words, making it difficult to get a full breath. I place my flattened palm against my chest to stop the tremors as I close my eyes briefly, trying to compose myself. Finding it impossible as the lies I’ve been telling myself come crumbling down around me.
I pat my chest, clearing my throat before opening my watery eyes again. The concern written on Tatum’s face making me want to close them all over again. “I finally accepted a part of myself that I’ve suppressed most of my life all because of the way it felt to be in his arms,” I breathe. “He made me feel safe to be me. Made me trust him,” I say, finding her dark eyes as anger and sorrow swirl together in my veins, making it hard to speak without my voice trembling. “He made me love him,” I admit, feeling a weight lifting from my chest as if the words I’ve kept to myself weighed a thousand pounds.
I blink rapidly to keep my tears at bay and swallow thickly, nearly choking on my emotion. “And then he left his fucking phone in the bathroom, and everything fell apart,” I grouse, my words garbled as they tumble from my lips.
Shifting on my feet, I start picking at my fingernails with my uninjured thumb. I’ve never been this open, this raw, with anyone. I’ve always held myself apart, until now. My brush with death served as a wake-up call that I desperately needed. It allowed me to learn exactly who the people I should be letting in are.
So, I can tell myself all I like that I hate Declan, that I want nothing to do with him. But when the cards were laid on the table, he was the one who showed up for me. Logically, I know I shouldn’t be punishing him for what I’ve already forgiven others for. But that broken and lonely part of me, that part that still bristles and snarls at the thought of forgiving him, never wants to give him the opportunity to crush me again.
I swipe angrily at my eyes, clearing away my tears of hurt and frustration. “I want to hate him for lying to me, for humiliating me,” I growl even as my eyes fill with more liquid fire.
Pulling my watery gaze away from Tate, I stare down at the plush rug below my bare feet. I can’t look her in the eye as I speak my next truth. “But even more so, I want to hate him because even though he did all that, I still can't stop loving him.”
I feel like crumpling into a ball on the ground as my honesty sits between us. But Tatum would never allow that to happen. A fact she proves by standing from the sofa and pulling me in for a hard hug. I wrap my arms around her and bury my face in the crook of her neck, ignoring the small voice inside my head whispering for me not to let my guard down again.
“So stay and let’s hate him together,” she says as she pulls away, taking her warmth with her. I sniff as I meet her dark gaze. She shakes her head as she grabs my hands again. “Don't do him the service of leaving. Let's go back there and beat his ass. Spit in his eye and kick him in the dick. You can never go wrong with a solid throat punch,” she says, drawing a snort of laughter from me. My lips part with a watery smile as she shakes me. She chuckles as she continues. “Kick, scream, cry. But don't just fucking give up and leave. Stay and fight.”
Her expression turns serious as she stops moving my arms. I stop breathing and try to calm myself. I have a feeling that what she’s going to say next is something I need to hear.
“Because believe it or not,” she says, rubbing her thumbs against the back of my hands. “He's not the only one you're punishing by leaving. He's not the only person here who loves you and needs you to stay.”
My lips tremble, and more tears leak down my cheeks as I nod my head, no longer able to form words. I’m the one who pulls her in for a hug this time, needing my friend now more than ever.
It may seem like I’m agreeing to do what she’s asked. It might look like I’m going to stay right here and fight for the life I want. But the truth is, I still have no idea what I’m going to do. I don’t know if I will be able to face Declan again. I don’t even know if I will have the courage to open that door tomorrow when he comes knocking.
Right now, the only thing I am certain of is that, regardless of whether I choose to stay or leave, my life is never going to be the same.
THIRTY-TWO
DECLAN
Shimmering amber reflections dance on the hardwood table below my fingers as the bar door swings wide, allowing peaks of the waning sun to shine against the full bottle of Jack Daniels in front of me. The sunshine scatters fragments of light that chase away the shadows around me. A tattooed hand reaches out next to me, snatching the bottle and stealing the glimmering light with it.
My gaze follows the black dove with its wings spread wide, like a beacon of sinister freedom, as Romeo pops the cork from the top of the bottle and pours two healthy shots of potent whiskey into two crystal-clear glasses. His hands flex as he replaces the top and slides the glass toward me, like a polished barkeep.
“Drink, Fratellino,” he says shortly before bringing his own glass to his lips. His violet eyes watch the door opening and closing as he sips the rich liquor. Heavy footfalls divert my focus from my twin. Ignoring the glass of Jack, my eyes shift to the open door as three men, who look eerily alike, walk into the bar and head directly for the stairs.
