Pieces of Us (Confessions of the Heart, #3)(71)

“What’s wrong?” she asked again, the green of her hazel eyes glowing in the muted light.

“I just needed to see you.”

Something good. Something good.

Relief.

A frown tore through her expression, and she slowly reached up and ran those tender fingertips across his cheek.

“Are you missin’ your mama?”

Grief clutched his chest.

His stomach.

His mind.

Knives and whips and chains.

His body felt like it was on fire.

Incinerating.

Eaten alive.

If this went on any longer, he was sure his heart was going to fail.

He grasped her hand and pushed it closer to his face. “I want to die, too.”

A tear slipped from her eye, and she leaned up higher on her knees, angling his direction. “Don’t say that. Please, don’t ever say that.”

“Why not? What’s the use in livin’ when it always ends?”

Her head shook emphatically. Desperately. “Because I’m here, and you belong here with me. We belong together. Always, Maxon. Always.”

He slumped to the floor. So tired. So tired.

Rolling onto his back, he stared at the darkness that danced on her ceiling.

Tingles spread across his skin when she snuggled against him.

She rested her head on his chest.

He winced.

He regretted it the second that he let his weakness show because she scrambled to sit up and jerked at his shirt.

“Did he do it again?” she gasped in horror.

Frantically, her little hands tried to expose him. To lift the fabric. To show off his vulnerabilities.

He didn’t want her to know how weak that he was.

He grabbed at her, trying to stop her frenzied search. “Please. Don’t.”

His daddy had gone on one of his drunken rages, coming after Mack when he hadn’t gotten the wheels off a car he’d been stripping in the shed fast enough.

Instantly, the tirade had gotten physical, the vicious words coming from his father’s mouth turning to the loss of Mack’s mama, the way they always did.

The way she’d died in that fiery car crash.

Blaming it on the Lanes for making her pack her things and run.

It’d been Mack’s idea, though. His fault. He’d begged his mama for them just to go.

To go somewhere else. Somewhere better. Somewhere where he could keep her safe.

Even if it meant being away from Izzy for a while. He would have gone back. Found her.

His mama had been on her way to get him at school. His backpack stuffed with his things had been hidden in the woods behind the schoolyard, ready to go.

She’d never shown.

Only a police officer had been there hours later when he’d finally gone back to his house, there to tell his daddy that his mama was gone.

“I hate him, Maxon. I hate him, I hate him. I’m gonna tell my mama.”

This time, he gripped Izzy’s wrists. Hard. “You can’t do that. You know the only thing it’s going to do is make him madder, and he’ll just hit me harder.”

It wasn’t like anyone was gonna do anything about it, anyway. It didn’t matter how much people acted like they cared. In the end, they always turned a blind eye. A lame excuse enough to explain it all away.

It’d been that way his entire life. Except for the Lanes. They were the only ones who’d really cared. They’d tried to get custody of him when his mama had passed. Funny how that judge had declared his daddy fit.

Izzy slumped down, her voice going soft. “It’s not fair.”

No.

It wasn’t.

Guilt beat a path through his body.

Lying there, he had to wonder if he really was meant to be there with Izzy at all.

Lately, sneaking through her window had started to feel wrong.

She was so much better than him. So much better than the thoughts that kept coming on stronger every time he was around her.

She was going to have a better life than the one that was set out in front of him.

Taking over his daddy’s business.

He almost rolled his eyes.

Like his life was normal. Like his daddy might brag to the other parents that his son would be the next successor in line.

How proud he’d be.

No.

Mack didn’t belong there beside her.

The princess and the pauper.

But right then, he didn’t care, and he snuggled her closer, let his fingers flutter through her silky hair, and begged his body to stop the way it wanted to react.

Izzy wasn’t like anyone else. Not one of those girls who let him touch them and touched him, too.

She was better than him.

He needed to remember that before he got lost and forgot who he was.

Who he was always gonna be.

“You’re my best friend, Maxon,” she whispered.

He leaned over and kissed her temple, inhaling her scent.

Wild jasmine and the sun.

She sighed. Touched his chest.

“Little Bird,” he whispered. “Let’s fly away.”

“Okay, my dragon, just tell me where you want to go.”





Twenty-Two





Mack





“You did it, Big Ben.” Barely managed to get the words out as I knelt in front of my son who had just wrapped up his appointment.