Sinful Desire

He did the same, then rose. “Better hit the road.”

She nodded. “I’ll be looking for you around these parts.”

He managed a half-hearted smile of acknowledgement. He didn’t know if he’d ever be in these parts again. He didn’t know where the ground was, where the sky ended, or how to find his way back home after hearing her confession.

The only thing he knew for sure was how to avoid the speed traps, so he turned on an app when he got in his truck.

A little more than four hours later, he’d dodged a speeding ticket, but hadn’t been able to stop playing the cruel song on repeat in his head—they made me do it, they made me do it, they made me do it.

Did she set the wheels in motion, then try to cancel? But they forced her? How would that even work?

Gripping the wheel tighter, he cursed up a storm. He’d been such a fool. For so damn long he’d clung to a big what if. That possibility had tied him up, tethered him, and obsessed him.

Today, he was cut loose. Left adrift and unmoored.

Glancing at the green sign on the highway, he registered that he was five miles from his house. He wanted to see his dog, but he also didn’t want to be alone. The closer the truck wheels turned to the exit, the less he wanted to be by himself.

He needed company. He needed someone.

Though he desperately wanted to see Sophie, he didn’t want to see her like this. Not when his head was messier than it had ever been, and not when his heart was twisted into tattered strands.

The time he’d spent with Sophie over the last few weeks was like shedding a skin, molting his old self, leaving it behind.

But now?

Hell, he didn’t know if he was coming or going. If he was the guy he’d been before or the man he’d become with Sophie.

Limbo. This was the utter hell of limbo. He was stuck in it like quicksand, and he didn’t want to drag her down with him.

He needed the three people in his life who’d known him before, during and after.

As he turned on his blinker to exit the highway, he called Shannon, gave her the rundown, and she told him she’d gather the crew.

Then his phone rang, and it was Sophie.

*

Passport? Check.

Luggage packed? Done.

Flight checked into? Good to go.

After zipping her suitcase, she left a small toiletry kit on top of it, which she would tuck inside tomorrow morning. Then she called the car service that would take her to the airport at the crack of dawn, to confirm that everything was set for her pickup.

When she hung up, she scrolled across her home screen in case it revealed a missed call from Ryan. It had been ten hours since he’d left, and she was eager to know how his day had gone. The more time passed, the more nervous she became about what had happened in Hawthorne. But she wasn’t a teenager debating whether to call a boy she liked. She was a grown woman dating a man, so she dialed his number as she walked into her kitchen to grab a glass of water.

“Hey,” he said, his voice hollow.

She had never heard him sound so dead. “Hey to you. So how did it go?”

He sighed heavily. “Let me pull over.”

The sound of the car engine stopping greeted her ears as she turned on the tap. Then he told her his mother had confessed. She gripped the counter, and set down the water glass. Words sputtered out. “Oh my God, Ryan. I can’t believe she told you that. How? Why? How are you doing?”

“I don’t know. I honestly don’t know how I’m doing. It’s like my world is upside down. Because I believed in the possibility of her maybe being innocent for the longest time, and now it’s been twisted and turned inside out. I don’t know what to do now, or what to think about anything,” he said in that same monotone.

Her heart ached for him, and she wanted to comfort him, and hold him close. She wanted to be the one he leaned on. “Do you want me to delay my trip so that we can spend time together? So I can be there with you as you deal with this? I can easily push my flight back a few days if you need me.”

If you need me.

Oh God, she desperately wanted him to need her. Her pulse raced with longing for his yes.

“No,” he said quickly. “I can’t let you do that.”

“I don’t mind. I want to be here for you,” she said, trying to comfort him.

“It’s okay. I need to go see my sister and brothers now anyway.”

“Of course,” she said, and she understood logically why he’d want to go see them. She just wished her stupid heart didn’t hurt the tiniest bit that he hadn’t needed her. “Go. See them,” she said in her cheeriest voice. He didn’t need to detect her worry right now. He had enough on his plate.

“I should probably call your brother, too. I guess I’ll see you…” he said, but his voice trailed off.