Arrow's Hell (Wind Dragons MC #2)(72)

“I didn’t want to lose you, Anna. I can’t lose you. I need you to know that if I knew . . . if I knew, I wouldn’t have done it. Fuck, Anna. I didn’t know. I didn’t even know you then . . .

“Fuck,” he mutters, going to his knees before me. “I do love you, Anna; do you know that?”

My heart grips on to his every word.

“I wanted to say it back to you when you said it to me, I wanted to . . .”

“Why didn’t you?” I ask.

Why now? I want to ask. Is he just telling me because he thinks he’s going to lose me?

“Because I knew I didn’t deserve to say those words, and I don’t deserve to say them now, but I’m selfish when it comes to you.”

Arrow hugs me, wrapping his arms around me tightly and telling me how sorry he is, how he never knew, how if he could change it he would.

I believe him.

“You didn’t know, Arrow,” I tell him. “But I need some time alone, okay? I just need to work through all this.”

He looks like his heart is breaking, but I need to fix me now. I can’t fix anyone else when I’m feeling so broken.

“Anna, don’t ask me to leave you alone. I f*ckin’ can’t.”

“Just give me a few days, Arrow,” I tell him. “Please.”

“Okay,” he whispers, kissing my forehead, then swooping down and kissing my lips once.

The gentle kiss feels final.

Like he’s saying good-bye.

I can feel the want, the need for me, pulsating off him.

I want to tell him everything is going to be okay—but I can’t right now.

I’m too confused.

Blade picks Arrow up, and I get back into bed.

I roll over and bury my face into the pillow, crying for the father I’d lost but never had in the first place, and for the man I loved but didn’t know if I could forgive.

*

The next morning, a large bouquet of flowers and a huge plush tortoise arrive at Lana’s front door.

I know they have flowers for every occasion, but I didn’t think there was one for finding out the man you love murdered a father you’d never met. Orange tulips, however, were beautiful and my favorite.

The note reads:

Don’t give up on me. I love you. —Arrow.





TWENTY-SEVEN

THE next day, Rake enters my temporary room at Lana’s, coming to sit next to me and pulling me into his arms. “How you feeling?”

I shrug. “I don’t really know, to be honest. Numb, I guess. You?”

He sighs. “I never knew him, Anna, and he obviously didn’t care about getting to know us. He left us with our bitch of a mother, and he had to have known she was drug-f*cked. Arrow, on the other hand, has always had my back, is my brother, and will always be there for me.”

“Do you not care that Dad is dead because he was president of an enemy MC?” I ask him, frowning. It was obvious the club meant more to him than a father we never knew. How come I am having a harder time looking at it that way?

“Sometimes you got to make your own family, Anna,” he says, smiling sadly.

It is a sad truth. I don’t want to think about Arrow having killed my father, but I’d never even known the man. I love Arrow, and he’s always been good to me.

“When did Arrow tell you?” I ask him.

“After the two of you spoke. He’s devastated, Anna,” he says, looking upset.

“What are you going to do about Talon?” I ask him. I couldn’t think about Arrow right now.

His eyes harden slightly. “Nothing. He kidnapped you, Anna, and he knew you were his stepsister. That speaks louder than any words could. He’s not even blood related to us anyway—just because that bastard raised him doesn’t mean shit. And it’s his mother’s fault we never had a father in the first place.”

“That’s not true. It was our dad’s fault he wasn’t there for us, not Talon’s mother. Although she sounds like a bitch too. Wow, our dad had really bad taste in women,” I say with a bitter laugh, then continue. “I wish Talon had just told me the truth instead of putting everything on Arrow’s shoulders.”

No matter how wide and broad they are.

“I think he wanted to put it on Arrow, revenge for killing his father. He laughed in Arrow’s face and told him that now he was going to lose someone he loved.”

I lift my head off his bicep. “He said that to Arrow?”

“Yeah. Arrow feels like shit, Anna—I’ve never seen him like this in his life. Not even when Mary was killed.”

I don’t know what to say to that.

He killed my father. Shouldn’t I want nothing to do with him? But I don’t feel that way. I can’t imagine my life without Arrow.

“I’m so confused right now,” I tell Rake. “I don’t know what to do, or how to feel.”

“Do you love Arrow?” he asks.

“Is it that simple?” I ask, sniffling. “Of course I love him.”

Rake smiles kindly. “I think it is.”

“Love isn’t always enough.”

Rake nods. “I suppose so. But think about this—our father never bothered to see us, to check on us, to see if we were alive or dead. What has Arrow done for you?”