“And you not remembering her was poetic. You both loved each other so much, and it was fucking perfect when you didn’t remember her. Why take the chance of getting caught in a lie when I could just take your place? And I wasn’t taking the chance of you remembering.”
I’d give anything to reach through the glass and wrap my hands around the smug bastard’s throat. Nothing would be more satisfying than watching the life drain from his eyes.
“Once she woke up, you must have been worried that one of us would remember,” I state through gritted teeth.
He sits back in his chair, crosses one arm over his chest, and rests the other elbow on top of it. “It was a chance I was willing to take. And it was so fucking satisfying having her so close to me right under your nose.”
“What in the hell did I ever do to you to make you hate me so much you’d fuck with my life like you did? Your own fucking brother.”
He sighs and scrubs his hand down his face.
“It wasn’t you, Luca. It was her. When I saw you come in with her that day to pick up her car, my whole fucking world stopped. I had seen her first, she was always supposed to be mine. You fucked up my life.”
I bare my teeth. “If you cared for her so much, why did you keep Aria from her once she woke up?”
Anger flashes in his eyes and he sits up straighter in his seat. “Because she was supposed to be mine too. It was just another way to punish her for picking you over me.”
“Why did you move her from across town to our hospital?”
His lip curls up into a sneer with that one. “It had been years and she still hadn’t woken up, and you never regained your memories. I thought it was safe to think she’d never come out of her coma. In the beginning, I wanted to keep her as far away from you as possible. United was the safest bet. It was my fuckup to move her to General. I should have fucking known you’d come across her eventually.”
It was divine fucking intervention he did move her. I never went to United, so I have no doubt had he not moved her, I would have never laid eyes on her again. It makes me wonder if she would have ever woken up had I not found my way into her room. I like to think it was my presence that brought her back to life. She was waiting for me to find her way back.
I ask one final question. The answer doesn’t matter, but I still want to know.
“Do you regret it?”
His answer is immediate and the sinister look in his eye is maniacal.
He leans forward until his nose practically touches the glass. “I’d do it again in a heartbeat. Over and over. You may have her now, brother, but never forget, I had her too. She was never meant to be yours.”
His words break the final single thread of feeling I had for my brother. I didn’t realize until just now there even was any feeling left, but it’s fucking gone now.
My voice is void of emotion when I tell him. “My brother died the day he raped my wife and tried to steal her from me. You’re wrong, Theo. Jules was never yours. You may have kept her from me for years, but we would have always found our way back to each other. There’s nothing you could have done to change that.”
I hold his eyes, ones that look identical to my own, for several moments before deciding I’m done. I didn’t really learn anything new from the bastard; most of it was what I had already guessed.
I pull the phone away from my ear, ready to hang it up, when Theo calls my name. His eyes look desperate and despondent as he pushes himself closer to the glass. I bring the phone back to my ear. Not because I feel sorry for him, that ship sailed a long fucking time ago, but because I’m curious if he’ll give me something else.
“How’s….” He drops his gaze to his lap then looks back through the glass. “How’s Aria?”
His hopelessness has my blood turning cold. He deserves no answers from me. He played with Aria’s life just as much as he played with mine and Jules. If it were up to him, I would have never known about Aria.
I give him the only thing I can, and only because I know it’ll hurt. Even so, his pain could never compare to my family’s.
“My daughter is fine. Goodbye, Theo.” I replace the receiver back on the cradle and stand, uncaring of the pained expression on his face. I take one last look at him, knowing it’ll be my last, before I turn and walk away.
I leave the prison, get in my truck, and drive back to my family.
I SIT BEHIND ARIA, my legs, chest, and arms cradling her, looking over her shoulder and helping her as she smoothly runs the tattoo machine over the fake skin in front of her. Not that she really needs my help. She’s a fucking natural. Both of our breathing is even, our hearts beat in time, and our hands are steady.
I bought her a small tattooing kit with fake skin to help her practice on. The kid still has it in her mind that she wants to work at Ink Me when she’s old enough. I want so much more for her. I want her to go to college, get a degree, and become something big. To leave this shitty town behind. She’s only nine, ten in a few months, so she could still easily change her mind, but something tells me she’s too much like me for that to happen, and in a way, that makes me so damn proud. I’m honored as fuck she wants to take after her daddy. Once she’s old enough, and if her life choices stay the same, I’ll compromise with her. She can intern under me, but I want her to at least go to the local college at the same time and earn a degree that’ll be useful should she ever change her mind.
She pulls the machine away and releases the pedal.
“How’s that, Daddy?” she asks, looking over her shoulder at me.
“Really good, boo. Almost perfect.”
She beams a smile at me and it fills my heart with so much love I can feel the seams stretching to accommodate it all.
I kiss her cheek and take to my feet. My eyes land on the drawing hanging above our TV. It’s the one that I had been working on when Jules came back into my life. A wisteria tree with low-hanging branches. A girl beneath them. I had to redraw it because the silhouette across from her was me. At the time, my mind wouldn’t show my face because I had no memories of her. The full vision came to me soon after they returned. I added dandelions because the field was full of them when I asked her to marry me. I remember them blowing around us like snowflakes. I realized as I was redrawing the picture that the tiny lights in my dreams were the seeds of the dandelions. The tattoo on my arm, the one of the dandelions, I got four years ago. I woke up one day with the vision in my head and an uncontrollable need to have it tattooed on me, along with the words l'amour est gratuit, love is free. It was what Jules said to me after I asked her to marry me. It was just another way my mind and heart wouldn’t let her go.
I look over when the floor squeaks and see Jules standing in the doorway, leaning against the frame. Her smile is vibrant and so damn beautiful.
“Hey, Mom!” Aria calls. “Come look what I did.”
Jules ambles over and looks down at the heart wrapped in ivy. Her fingers shift naturally through Aria’s hair without thought as she carefully looks over the design.
“That’s beautiful, Aria. Your lines are getting better.”
“Thanks,” she says proudly. Her eyes move to mine. “Can we do another one?”
“How about you do the next one on your own. Show me what you can do.”
“Okay.” She turns back to the table and grabs another piece of fake skin.
I turn to my wife and pull her against me. Her growing stomach prevents me from getting too close. She’s eight months pregnant, and I can’t wait to hold our baby in my arms.
As if agreeing with me, a nudge knocks my lower abdomen, followed quickly by another.
“Junior is restless,” I murmur, and run my hands along the sides of Jules’s stomach.
She smiles at me and slides her hands up my chest to my pecs, her diamond ring sparkling in the light. “He’s hungry.”
“Well, then, we better feed him.” I nip at the tip of her nose.