I shut the top and gasp for breath.
Part of me that wants to throw the laptop against the wall. But a deeper part needs to read these words. Whether it’s just to hear Mom one final time, or whether it’s to punish myself for what I did, I really don’t know. I thought I was ready, but I was wrong. I slip the computer back under my bed.
But when I feel the ghost of Mom slipping into my dreams, I don’t try to stop it. And when the nightmare comes, I embrace it.
Chapter 11
Marcus
It wasn’t until I was in the parking lot with Addie that it occurred to me giving a team member a ride home might be exactly the kind of thing Principal Monroe was counseling me to avoid. But it seems rude to make her walk when I’m driving by anyway.
As I think it, I realize I’m sitting here trying to justify it. Because it has nothing to do with being rude. It has everything to do with how much I really like spending time with Addie.
I pull into a parking spot at my apartment and rest my forehead on the steering wheel. Do I have feelings for her beyond wanting to help her? The ball of nervous energy sitting in the pit of my stomach is all the answer I need. Christ…what am I doing? I can’t be falling for a student…a goddamn member of the team I coach.
I breathe deeply and hold it before exhaling. I have to rein this back. Whatever I’m feeling can’t happen. It’s wrong on so many levels.
I set my resolve.
No more rides. No pizza. No being alone with Addie anymore.
When I have my shit together, I head inside…and find Blaire sitting on the couch.
“Hey,” she says, setting the bag of Doritos in her hand aside and licking her fingers. “Bran let me in before he left for the bar. Hope you don’t mind.”
“Hell, no,” I say, yanking her off the couch into a one armed hug. “You alone?”
She doesn’t miss the derision in my voice. She shoves out of my grasp and scowls at me. “He’s your brother-in-law now, Marcus. Can you at least pretend to like him?”
I think about the root of all this animosity. There is the very real possibility that have feelings for Addie. But that’s what makes Caiden and me different. I’m keeping it in my pants. “Probably not.”
She shakes her head at me. “You should have let this go years ago, Marcus. I love Caiden. I always have. You don’t get to choose who you fall in love with. That’s why it’s called falling. It’s out of anyone’s control.”
Addie’s face flashes in my mind and I know Blaire’s right. I have no control over what I’m feeling. It’s only my actions that I can control. I’m not going to let myself ruin that girl. “What are you doing here?”
She sinks back into the couch. “Caiden dropped me off on his way up to Sierra State. He’s petitioning the dissertation board.”
I feel my eyes widen. When Caiden was arrested on statutory rape charges, it was because his faculty advisor caught him screwing my seventeen-year-old sister in the university library. He was only a few weeks away from defending his dissertation and finishing his PhD in Comparative Lit when he was thrown off campus and out of the program.
“It’s been four years.”
She nods. “But he completed all his coursework and his dissertation was finished. He just never got the opportunity to present. He’s hoping now that Dr. Duncan has retired and there’s a new chairperson, they’ll consider letting him finish.”
“I thought he liked his job…even though I’ve never really got what he does,” I say.
“Knowledge management?” she says with a nod, “and he does. He would have been fine just letting it go. I’m making him do this. He worked so hard for that degree.”
As she talks, the creases around her eyes deepen. She’s carried that guilt around for so long—the belief that she ruined Caiden’s future.
“Everything that happened was his fault, Blaire. He made those choices.”
She shakes her head. “There was no stopping it. Believe me, he tried.”
“Not hard enough,” I grumble.
“So you’re going to hold this against him forever? Even though we’re married and I’m happier than I’ve ever been?”
I blow out a breath and drop onto the couch next to her. “You’re really happy?”
“Ecstatic,” she says. “And you know that’s totally against my religion.”