“You…would…would you be willing to adopt?” He asked softly.
I blinked.
“What?” I asked in surprise.
He looked down at his hands, inspecting his fingers as he said, “Would you be willing to adopt? Or have kids that weren’t mine? Maybe by a sperm bank or something.”
I considered that for a moment, letting what he was saying sink in.
“Are you asking me if I’d be willing to adopt a child and still be with you?” I confirmed.
He finally looked up at me, and my breath caught.
His pupils were dilated and I was fairly positive it wasn’t because he was on drugs.
He took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“I miss you.”
Three simple words that had the power to defeat me.
“Michael, us breaking up…it wasn’t over something minor. It was huge. Pivotal. But it wasn’t even just the fact that you said you didn’t want kids with me. It was the fact that you were so final about it. You wouldn’t talk to me. You wouldn’t share your feelings with me. Hell, but you fucked me with your t-shirt on, and wouldn’t let me in! Then you just shut down and didn’t even explain,” I said fiercely.
He let all that he was feeling seep into two words. “I’m sorry.”
I just shook my head. “It’s going to take a lot more than just ‘sorry’ to make everything alright.”
“Will you…will you come with me. Somewhere? I want to show you something,” he said softly.
“I have to go to a meeting tomorrow at eight. I can’t stay out late,” I tried.
He shook his head. “I’ll keep you there as long as you want to be there. The minute you want to go home, I’ll take you.”
“My car’s here,” I countered.
“I’ll drive you back up here in the morning,” he said pleadingly.
I looked at him for a long while before I came to my decision.
“Fine. Just…don’t hurt me again, Michael. It hurt enough the first time to last me a thousand lifetimes. I don’t think I could survive it a second time,” I whispered hoarsely. “Promise me.”
He made a sound in his throat that hurt my heart, but I didn’t relent.
I watched him and waited for him to promise me, and promise me he did.
“I swear on my life that I will never intentionally hurt you again. I promise.”
Chapter 5
Life’s a bitch. Oh, no. Wait, that’s you. My mistake.
-Secret thoughts of Nikki Pena.
Michael
“This is my favorite place in the world,” I admitted softly as I pulled my truck up into the front row parking spot of Peek’s Tattoo Parlor.
“It’s a tattoo parlor,” she said in surprise.
I tossed her a grin as I opened the door to my truck and dropped out.
I didn’t know what the fuck I was thinking.
All I know was that this day had been complete shit, and I’d had to do a lot of thinking. Something I’d been avoiding doing for quite a long time now.
Nearly a year and a half to be exact.
From the moment that I let Nikki misunderstand why I didn’t want kids, I knew I’d made a terrible mistake. But, at the time, I thought I’d been doing a good thing.
She would have a terrible life if she stayed with me, and there was no one on earth that I’d want to have to deal with my shit.
But then I’d held that boy, while he’d drained his lifeblood on my chest, and I knew that I couldn’t deny it anymore.
I loved her. And I’d do anything to have her. Even have a child with her if that was what it took.
I was tired of being lonely.
And when I walked in on her reading to the baby, I knew I’d make her mine again.
No matter what it took.
It all started with letting her into my world. Letting her see me. And that started here.
“So, I guess I need to start by telling you why I do the tattoos,” I started, swallowing convulsively before I flayed myself open. “When I was twelve, I started cutting myself.”
She gasped in surprise and whipped around to stare at me.
I put the tailgate of my truck down, and hopped up, holding out my hand to her.