“Before you give me a lecture, Cap,” I say, interrupting him before he has the chance to continue. “You know she’s better off.” I turn and face him. “You know she is.”
Cap chuckles, nodding his head. “That’s for damn sure.”
I look at him disbelievingly. Did he just agree with me?
“Are you saying I made the right choice?”
He’s quiet for a second before blowing out a quick breath. His expression contorts as if his thoughts aren’t something he necessarily wants to share. He relaxes into his chair and folds his arms loosely over his chest. “I told myself to never get involved in your problems, boy, because in order for a man to give advice, he’d better know what the hell he’s talkin’ about. And Lord knows in all my eighty years, I ain’t never been through nothing like what you went through. I don’t know the first thing about what that was like or what that did to you. Just thinking ’bout that night makes my gut hurt, so I know you feel it in your gut, too. And your heart. And your bones. And your soul.”
I close my eyes, wishing I could close my ears instead. I don’t want to hear this.
“None of the people in your life knows what it feels like to be you. Not me. Not your father. Not those friends of yours. Not even Tate. There’s only one person who feels what you feel. Only one person who hurts like you hurt. Only one other parent to that baby boy who misses him the same way you do.”
My eyes are closed tightly now, and I’m doing all I can to respect his end of the conversation, but it’s taking all I have not to get up and walk away. He has no right bringing Rachel into this conversation.
“Miles,” he says quietly. There’s determination in his voice, like he needs me to take him seriously. I always do. “You believe you took away that girl’s chance at happiness, and until you confront that past, you won’t ever move forward. You’re gonna be reliving that day every single day until the day you die, unless you go see for your own eyes that she’s okay. Then maybe you’ll see that it’s okay for you to be happy, too.”
I lean forward and run my hands over my face, then rest my elbows on my knees and look down. I watch as a single tear falls from my eye and drops to the floor beneath my feet. “And what happens if she’s not okay?” I whisper.
Cap leans forward and clasps his hands between his knees. I turn and look at him, seeing tears in his eyes for the first time in the twenty-four years I’ve known him. “Then I guess nothing changes. You can keep on feeling like you don’t deserve a life for ruining hers. You can keep on avoiding everything that might make you feel again.” He leans in toward me and lowers his voice. “I know the thought of confronting your past terrifies you. It terrifies every man. But sometimes we don’t do it for ourselves. We do it for the people we love more than ourselves.”
chapter thirty-seven
RACHEL
“Brad!” I yell. “Someone’s at the door!” I grab a dish towel and dry my hands.
“Got it,” he says, passing through the kitchen. I take a quick inventory of the kitchen to make sure there isn’t anything my mother can insult. Counters are clean. Floors are clean.
Bring it on, Mom.
“Wait here,” Brad says to whoever is at the door.
Wait here?
Brad wouldn’t say that to my mother.
“Rachel,” Brad says from the kitchen entryway. I turn around to face him, and I immediately tense. The look on his face is one I rarely ever see. It’s reserved for preparation. When he’s about to tell me something I don’t want to hear or something he’s afraid will hurt me. My immediate thoughts fall to my mother, and I’m gripped with worry.
“Brad,” I whisper. “What is it?” I’m holding the counter next to me. The familiar fear washes over me that used to live and breathe inside me, but now it’s something that only grips me on occasion.
Like right now, when my husband is too afraid to tell me something he’s not sure I want to hear. “Someone’s here to see you,” he says.
I don’t know of anyone who could make Brad as concerned as he is right now. “Who?”
He slowly walks toward me and cups my face in his hands when he reaches me. He looks into my eyes as if he’s trying to brace me for a fall. “It’s Miles.”
I don’t move.
I don’t fall, but Brad holds me up anyway. He wraps his arms around me and pulls me against his chest.
“Why is he here?” My voice trembles.
Brad shakes his head. “I don’t know.” He pulls away and looks down on me. “I’ll ask him to leave if you need me to.”
I immediately shake my head. I wouldn’t do that to him. Not if he came all the way to Phoenix.
Not after almost seven years.
“Do you need a few minutes? I can take him to the living room.”
I don’t deserve this man. I don’t know what I’d do without him. He knows my history with Miles. He knows everything we went through. It took me a while to be able to tell him the whole story. He knows all of this, and he’s still standing here, offering to invite the only other man I’ve ever loved into our home.
“I’m okay,” I tell him, even though I’m not. I don’t know if I want to see Miles. I have no idea why he’s here. “Are you okay?”
He nods. “He looks upset. I think you should talk to him.” He leans in and kisses me on the forehead. “He’s in the foyer. I’ll be in my office if you need me.”
I nod, and then I kiss him. I kiss him hard.
He walks away, and I’m left standing silently in the kitchen, my heart beating erratically within my chest. I take a deep breath, but it does nothing to calm me. I brush my hands down my shirt and walk toward the foyer.
Miles’s back is to me, but he hears me round the corner. He turns his head slightly over his shoulder, almost as if he’s just as afraid to turn around and look at me as I am to see him.
He does it carefully. Slowly. Suddenly, my eyes are locked with his.
I know it’s been six years, but in that six years, he’s somehow completely changed, without changing at all. He’s still Miles, but he’s a man now. This makes me wonder what he’s seeing, looking at me for the first time since the day I left him.
“Hey,” he says, treading carefully. His voice is different. It isn’t the voice of a teenager anymore.
“Hi.”
I lose his gaze as his eyes travel around the foyer. He takes in my home. A home I never expected to see him in. We both stand in silence for a whole minute. Maybe two.
“Rachel, I . . .” He looks back at me again. “I don’t know why I’m here.”
I do.
I can see it in his eyes. I got to know those eyes so well when we were together. I knew all his thoughts. All his emotions. He wasn’t able to hide how he felt, because he felt so much. He’s always felt so much.
He’s here because he needs something. I don’t know what. Answers, maybe? Closure? I’m glad he waited until now to get it, because I think I’m finally ready to give it.
“It’s good to see you,” I tell him.
Our voices are weak and timid. It’s weird, seeing someone for the first time under different circumstances from when you parted.