chapter Fifteen
Denise squirmed, uncomfortable. She had made dinner only to have her children decide they wanted to eat with new friends. After their day at school, she figured they deserved a little bit of time with people who wouldn’t judge. This meant that she and Liam were left alone in his house. Because she’d already cooked, he’d decided to eat with her. It had been a quiet affair so far.
“Have I done somethin’ to piss you off?” he asked, taking a bite of his baked potato.
She looked up sharply. “No, why?”
“Since I talked to you earlier, you seem like you’re either pissed off or scared of me.” He shrugged, rattling his ice in his glass before taking a drink. He watched her closely. It was obvious she wanted to say something, but she held back. “You can say whatever you want to me, I won’t be mad.”
“Are you sure?” she asked, playing with the food on her plate. “Because earlier, you went from a happy-go-lucky guy to looking like you could murder someone with the flip of a switch. It scares me. I have children in this home with you.”
Silence settled over the two of them, so obviously at different points in their lives. Liam thought over how he should answer her. He debated over whether he should tell her the truth or tell her what she wanted to hear. It hurt him to know that she worried about her kids with him. Had he not proven he respected not only her but the kids? Hadn’t he proven that just today?
“Don’t lie to me, please,” she whispered.
“That’s just me.”
That didn’t make her feel better at all. “What do you mean that’s just you?”
“I am that guy. I go from 0-60 in two seconds. I can be your best friend or your worst enemy. That’s who I am.” His stomach dropped as he saw the look on her face. For some reason he wanted to impress this woman, and apparently his answers weren’t cutting it. Never before had it mattered to him what a woman thought of what he did. Now, nothing else mattered but what this woman thought.
“Oh.”
Panic welled up in his stomach. In all his life, he’d never scared a woman, and he was confused as to how he had scared Denise. “Don’t do this, don’t be scared of me.”
She got up from the table and walked to the screened-in porch. Hugging her arms around her waist, she looked out into the black of night. Lightening streaked in the distance, and light rain hit the tin roof that covered the porch. The storm building in the atmosphere matched the storm building inside her.
Was she doing the right thing? Should she stay in this situation with this man? Was she too far in to get out? The big question….did she want to leave? For some reason she felt safe in this environment. Much safer than she had felt when she was on her own with her children. It was all so confusing. Denise felt him enter the small area but refused to turn around and face him.
“You’re not used to me and I know that, but you’re going to have to get used to me. I’ve claimed you. If you leave me, which I can tell you’re thinking about doing, you’d have a bull’s-eye on your back. I know you don’t want that for your children.” He felt like a bastard for even saying those words.
She finally turned to face him. “It may sound weird to you, but I feel safe here. In the few days I’ve been here I’ve felt more at home than I did when I was in my own home. Maybe it’s because I don’t have much to worry about here. The only thing that worries me about you, Liam, is the fact that I don’t know how far you would go for your club.”
“What do you mean by that?” he asked, having a seat on the outdoor chaise.
Denise didn’t want to ask this question because she didn’t want to know the answer, but she felt as if it was imperative that she know. “I mean, have you ever killed anybody?”
He swallowed hard. Telling her the truth would mean letting her in on club business, but lying to this woman would break his heart. Liam sighed. Lies were a part of his everyday life, but he didn’t want to lie to her. He wanted whatever relationship they had to be built on trust.
“I could lie to you and tell you I haven’t, but I want you to trust me. I do what I have to do to keep my brothers safe, to protect my club. That has at times meant we’ve had to put someone down. More than once it’s been either them or me. I don’t like telling you this because I know it scares you about me, but I’m not a violent man by nature.”
“I don’t like violent men,” she whispered, gazing at her hands in her lap.
She looked so lost that he wanted to reach out to her. However, he wasn’t sure whether she would welcome it or not. He’d know this woman for mere days, but it felt like forever. They seemed to be cut from the same cloth, yet he knew that she would never be able to kill someone unless they threatened her children. How could he come to her as he was? With blood on his hands?
Gently he questioned, “Did something happen to you?” Suddenly it dawned on him. “Does this have to do with the twins’ dad?”
A hollow laugh echoed from her throat. In the distance, thunder rumbled and lightening flashed across the sky. “You could say that.”
“It’s only fair that you be honest with me, just like I’ve been honest with you.”
Taking a deep breath, she realized he was right. “Their father was a very violent man.”
“Trust me enough to tell me, Denise. We’re never going to get anywhere if you don’t. I’m not letting you go back home, so you may as well just be honest with me. I can’t let you – it could be dangerous.”
She liked this about him, the fact that he was so tenacious. That he didn’t take no for an answer. It tested every instinct she had honed over the last few years. Tears came to her eyes, and she cleared her throat loudly, gathering the strength to begin.
“I met him in high school, senior year to be exact. He was the captain of the football team. I had always been a nerd. More interested in what book was coming out that month than anything else. Books were the most important part of my life at that time. I was painfully shy, and my home life left a lot to be desired. My dad stayed drunk most of the time, and all my mom wanted to do was stay out of his way. He was violent when he drank, and if I had my nose buried in a book, I could stay under the radar when he went off the handle.” She had zoned out as she talked, it was obvious she had transported back to that time. The rain sounded against the house, just like it had that night. Only it wasn’t hitting the tin roof of a trailer, she was now in a home that was well-built and cozy.
“So when the captain of the football team started showing you attention, you were flattered?” Liam supplied for her.
She nodded, tears silently streamed down her face. “But you have to understand how horrible it was at my house.”
The breath she took was heavy and fragile all at the same time, almost like it would break her in half. A loud clap of thunder rattled the house on its foundation. “I walked on egg shells all the time, trying to do what both my mom and dad wanted me to. Matt, the kids’ father, was the answer to my prayers at first. He took me out on dates, took me out to dinner, brought me flowers, and told me he loved me. He invited me to prom, and I finally told my parents we were dating. Miracle of all miracles, my parents told me to go. My dad liked the fact that he was captain of the football team. It was something for him to brag about at the bar when he got wasted. We had been dating for a few months by the time prom rolled around, and I thought that night was going to be incredible.” She stopped, took another shuddering breath, and composed herself.
“Let me guess, prom night wasn’t all that you’d hoped it would be?”
A sad smile spread across her face. “Let me finish. After we spent an amazing night dancing with friends, he told me that he had a surprise for us. He took me to a hotel room. I lost my virginity in the most amazing setting. He was so gentle. It was everything I had always dreamed of. The next day everything changed.”
“How so?” Liam wasn’t sure he wanted to hear this, but knew he had to.
“He became possessive. If I wasn’t home when he expected me to be there, he was pissed. He would scream and yell at me to the point that he and my father came to blows one night. It was the first and only time my dad ever stuck up for me. If I had a male friend, Matt would try to intimidate them. I started withdrawing into myself again, and two months later I found out I was pregnant.”
Liam could guess how it had gone when she’d shared that news with the daddy-to-be. “Matt wasn’t excited was he?”
A hollow laugh came from deep within her. “That’s the understatement of my life. I was tainted goods, and Matt didn’t want the responsibility he was now going to have. Ole Daddy wasn’t too happy either. The night I told Matt, he beat the absolute shit out of me. Of course I had to tell my dad what happened. Instead of being understanding, he kicked me out.”
He grasped her hand, running his hand along her wrist. “It hurts when a parent isn’t understanding, I know.”
She nodded, sobbing as the rain came down in sheets outside. It had been on a night like this that she had walked miles, trying to get someone to help her. “I mean, here I was an eighteen year old kid who just found out she’s going to have a child and who just had the shit beat out of her. I went home expecting my parents to be pissed but hoping that they would welcome me with open arms and tell me that everything would be okay. Instead, my dad packed a bag for me. Me and my broken ribs were thrown out into the mother of all thunderstorms. Kind of like the one tonight.”
“How did you survive?”
“How does anyone survive? They just do.”
He had tears in his own eyes as she recounted her story. Denise Cunningham was the strongest person he had ever met in his life. “You had no help. That’s what’s surprising to me. You had twins with no help.” The people who should have cared, they didn’t even give a damn.
“I relied on public assistance for a couple of years. Then I got the job at the factory. That was the most money I had ever seen in my life, and we were able to live very comfortably up until the economy took a nosedive. I was proud of how far I had come, but the downturn caused me to question everything. I had worked so hard to provide for my family, and then we had nothing to show for it besides a stack of bills and a mortgage I couldn’t pay.”
“You should still be proud of how far you’ve come and what you’ve done. Everyone has hard times; it’s how we deal with those hard times that define us.”
In that moment, she wanted badly to kiss him. To show him physically how much those words meant to her, but it had been so long since she had kissed a man. She was nervous that she didn’t remember how to do it.
He made up her mind for her when he gently brought his hand up to cup the back of her neck. His fingers lightly massaged the muscles there before he pressed lightly and leaned towards her, bringing them closer. Their lips met in a light touch. He was patient as he coaxed her lips open before slipping his tongue inside her mouth.
She moaned, placing her arms around his neck, pulling him close. Her tongue stroked his tentatively, as she contemplated what to do with her hands. She had wanted for so long to run her fingers through his hair. Throwing caution to the wind, she let her fingers tangle in his long locks, using it to pull him tighter against her lips. It was as silky and smooth as she had imagined it would be, sliding against her fingers as she fought to hold him tighter.
Moments later they separated, both breathing heavily. He kept his hands at her neck while she continued to twirl the strands of his hair around her fingers, a shy smile breaking over her face.
“That was nice,” she sighed, running her tongue over her wet lips.
A thought occurred to him, causing him to smile widely. Crow’s feet broke at the side of his eyes, evidence of the hours he spent on his bike squinting in the wind and sun. “Is that the first kiss you’ve had in all these years?”
Suddenly shy, she buried her head in his neck. “I was raising children,” she defended, her protest muffled.
He laughed. “Well Denise Cunningham, I think it’s about time we get you back to the land of the living.”