Pieces of Us (Confessions of the Heart, #3)(55)

Nothing but a pile of bones. Broken and brittle.

Emotion clotted off the air when the kid with my face struggled to make it through the door.

He did his best to maneuver with those crutches, his legs so goddamn skinny and the toes of his right foot dragging on the floor.

His ankles and knees were bent at an odd angle, his arms and shoulders a bit off, too, but not close to being as affected as his lower body.

And fuck, he had this crooked smile that melted a crater through the middle of me.

A fist of sorrow squeezed my being, and I felt every fucking thing I thought I’d known shatter.

Splinter into nothing.

Devotion rushed in to take its place while a slew of taunts and teases played out in my mind.

Picture after picture.

Izzy alone. Her belly round. A tiny baby in her arms. A lifetime I hadn’t known.

I didn’t know if it was helplessness or sheer determination that lined my body that had me going for him.

Fuck boundaries.

Izzy’s hand shot out. Her touch froze me to the spot, fire spreading up my arm. My attention whipped to her.

She was pleading with her eyes not to make this transition harder.

Not to go in blazing.

Reminding me I hadn’t earned the right.

“Izzy,” I all but choked, and I inhaled a jagged breath, fighting with all of me to keep standing still.

She squeezed my arm, the girl just getting it the way she always had.

She knew I was floored.

Staggered.

Slayed.

Benjamin started to hobble my direction.

My heart burst right there. Nothing but mangled bits crawling for the kid.

With each lumbering step he took, my chest tightened more.

Compressing and swelling.

Energy lashed in the middle of it.

Different but the same.

Could feel Izzy’s anxiety where she stood at my side, and Benjamin shot her a careful, searching glance before sliding his gaze back to me.

And I wondered if he could see it, too.

Feel it.

Bleeding and spilling out.

The way every cell in my body seized in awareness.

Did he recognize me the way I recognized him?

And I wondered if this was what it felt like when a man first held a newborn in his arms. What it felt like to hear his child’s first gurgling cry. Destroyed.

Knocked down so he could be rebuilt.

Become a better man.

Izzy moved to his side. Discretely, she swiped at the tear that had gotten loose and streaked down her cheek.

She cleared her throat, but it didn’t do anything to unclog the emotion that hung from her being, the pain riding out on her introduction.

“Maxon, this is my son, Benjamin.” She set her hand on his shoulder, her voice a song when she whispered near his ear, “Benjamin, this is my friend, Maxon.”

“Hiiii, Maxxxxon,” he said.

The words were elongated, like the letters were getting piled on top of each other. His mouth stretching open wide, jaw wrenching to the side to get the words out.

My lungs squeezed.

He let go of one crutch and awkwardly stretched out his hand, his arm a little disfigured, too.

In it, I saw his perfection.

“I’m glllllad you came,” he warbled.

And I knew right then, nothing else in the world mattered.

Nothing but them.





Sixteen





Mack





Dillon made a beeline for the kitchen, not even pausing as he threw open the swinging door. “Dinnertime!” he shouted.

Sweat beaded at the base of my neck, and I anxiously rubbed my hands together, nerves rattling as I thought about having to stand in front of Izzy’s parents.

People who’d been nothing but kind to me growing up. People who I’d stumbled into a few times over the years, but like a coward, I’d always turned my head, dropped my gaze in a shame that I didn’t want to face.

Acting like a punk who didn’t give a fuck.

It couldn’t be farther from the truth.

Time to man up because there would be no avoiding them any longer.

Benjamin slanted me a wayward smile before he turned around and started toward the door, a whole ton slower than Dillon had gone.

Izzy stepped up behind him, her footsteps slow and tentative. At the doorway, the girl stopped and tipped that gorgeous gaze back at me.

Waiting.

An uncertain invitation on her face.

I forced myself to just . . . move.

To beat down the age-old insecurities. To ignore the scars that felt like they’d been ripped open wide.

Raw and bleeding.

I bypassed Izzy who held open the door. When I did, our arms brushed.

Fire spread.

She sucked in a breath, and my spine went rigid.

God. That was going to be a problem.

The attraction that blazed, barely contained.

Doing my best to ignore it, I stepped the rest of the way into the kitchen and right into the middle of the chaos going down.

AKA: Dillon.

He was running circles around the gigantic island, flapping his arms, shouting the whole way, “Nana, that smells so good. I want all the potatoes. Wait, did you make potatoes? And gravy? You can’t have potatoes without gravy. That’s a rule, right?”

He didn’t even slow for her response, diverting paths and clambering onto a chair at the table where Izzy’s father was reading the paper. He leaned on his forearms, getting right up in the old man’s face. “Right, Grand-Pop? No gravy—no good, baby.”