Hell on Heels(39)

I pursed my lips. I liked my neighbours, but more so, I think I knew he meant what he said when he said this conversation was happening.

If he wanted to duke it out, fine.

I’d learned to use brass knuckles with my words over the last ten years.

“Fine.”

Careful, so as not to touch him, I moved to open my front door.

The polite thing to do would have been let him enter first, but to hell with that. The polite thing to do was tell someone you were leaving him or her.

Stomping into my apartment, I threw my bag on the floor and turned around to face him.

He’d changed from earlier. His hair was still wet from a shower, and he had on a leather jacket with yet another pair of worn out jeans.

“Do you ever buy new jeans?” I scolded him.

His eyes widened in surprise and then dropped to my legs. He smirked.

I followed his gaze and was reminded that I had on ripped jeans.

“Whatever,” I hissed. “Talk. You have five minutes.”

My legs were spread hip-width apart and my hands were balled into fists at my sides.

I was prepared to fight.

“This is how this is going to go.” He moved towards me. “I’m going to explain, and you aren’t going to like it.”

I rolled my eyes.

“What you will do is let me finish before you start yelling.”

“Fine.”

Dean pointed towards the living room. “You might want to sit down.”

“Four minutes and fifty seconds,” I reminded him bitchily.

He didn’t like it, but he spoke anyway.

“I loved you back then.” That line, I took like a right hook to the cheek. “But I was young. We were so damn young and I was stupid. The summer you went to New York, I got lonely. I missed you, and I didn’t know how to handle it. I picked up an extra job in Langley building houses for cash, and I met someone.”

That, I took like a kick to the stomach. My face paled, but I kept my mouth shut. I’d waited a decade for closure, and I was going to get it.

“We fooled around for a few weeks, but I knew I’d made a mistake, so I called it off.” He took off his baseball cap and ran his fingers through his hair. “You came home, and I didn’t know how to tell you.”

Coward.

“Less than a year later, I got a call from her. Her name was Brooke,” he added, and this time, I did scoff.

Like I cared what her name was.

“She told me she was pregnant and that she was going to keep it. I panicked.” His tone was so desperate for understanding. It was some kind of plea. “I never had a family; you of all people know that. I had a chance to do the right thing and I wanted to. I wanted to be there for my kid like my parents hadn’t been for me. I was doing the right thing.”

I shook my head.

Bullshit.

“I couldn’t tell you, Charlie.” I growled and he flinched. “I tried. I tried, but I just couldn’t do it.”

My silence had hit an expiration date, and I exploded.

“That’s your big explanation? That you cheated on me? That you knocked up the girl you cheated on me with and then chose her over me? That’s it?” I was practically yelling now.

He threw his hands in the air. “Would you just shut up for one goddamn minute and let me explain?”

Dean had never yelled, not the boy I remembered anyway, but the man did.

He did so well enough that I shut my mouth.

“So I left. I left in the middle of the night like a little bitch, because I couldn’t tell you what I had done.” He took a step towards me and I took one away from him. “Brooke went into premature labour two weeks later.”

I crossed my arms over my chest like I was protecting my heart from what was coming.

“There were massive complications during labour, and they had to take her for an emergency C-section.” I closed my eyes. “She haemorrhaged on the table and died.”

Jesus Christ.

“I thought I’d done the right thing.” His voice broke a little, and my heart started to hurt for the little girl I’d seen this afternoon. “But now I was a twenty-two year old kid with a kid of his own, and you were about to go to school, and I couldn’t…” My eyes opened when his voice stopped. “I couldn’t burden you with that. It wasn’t the right thing to do.”

“The right thing to do would have been to tell me!” I shouted. “I’m sorry about what happened to Brooke, and I’m sorry you went through that, but you abandoned me too, Dean.”

“I know,” he whispered.

I took a step towards him. “No. No, you don’t know. Where were you when Henry died, huh? My world was falling apart, and where the f*ck were you?”

I knew I’d landed a hit with that one when he flinched.

Maybe I was a callous bitch, but he deserved it.

“What happened to Brooke is tragic, but you knew her for weeks. You knew Henry since you were eight years old! You knew me! Where the f*ck were you?”

He put his head in his hands. “I drove out for the funeral.”

I stopped yelling and felt my chest heave.

“I saw you, in that black dress, but I couldn’t do it.”

“You’re a coward,” I told him, the tears rushing down my face. “How dare you make me love you and then leave me?” I cried. “Did you really think so little of me that I wouldn’t be there for you? Even as your friend…”