Ugly Love(71)

I laugh incredulously, then get everything off my chest at once. “There’s a huge difference between f*cking someone and making love to them. You haven’t f*cked me in more than a month. Every time you’re inside me, you’re making love to me. I can see it in the way you look at me. You miss me when we aren’t together. You think about me all the time. You can’t even wait ten seconds to walk in your own front door before coming to see me. So don’t you dare try to tell me you’ve been clear from day one, because you are the murkiest goddamn man I’ve ever met.”
I breathe.
I breathe for the first time in what feels like a month.
He can do what he wants with all that. I’m done trying.
He blows out a steady, controlled breath while he backs several steps away from me. He winces and turns around as if he doesn’t want me to read the emotions that are obviously present somewhere deep within him. His hands grip the back of his neck tightly, and he remains in this position for a solid minute without moving. He begins to blow out steady breath after steady breath, as if he’s doing everything in his power to pull himself together and not cry. My heart begins to ache when I realize what’s happening.
He’s breaking.
“Oh, God,” he whispers. His voice is completely pain-ridden. “What am I doing to you, Tate?”
He walks to the wall and falls against it, then slides to the floor. His knees come up, and he rests his elbows on them, covering his face with his hands to stop his emotions. His shoulders begin to shake, but he’s not making a sound.
He’s crying.
Miles Archer is crying.
It’s the same heart-wrenching cry that came from him the night I met him.
This grown man, this wall of intimidation, this solid veil of armor, he’s completely crumbling right in front of my eyes.
“Miles?” I whisper. My voice is weak compared with his massive silence. I walk to him and lower myself to my knees in front of him. I wrap my arm around his shoulders and lower my head to his.
I don’t ask him what’s wrong again, because now I’m terrified to know.




Chapter thirty-two

MILES

Six years earlier
Lisa loves Clayton.
My dad loves Clayton.
Clayton fixes families.
He’s already my hero, and he’s only two days old.
Shortly after my dad and Lisa leave, Ian arrives. He says he
doesn’t want to hold Clayton, but Rachel makes him. He’s
uncomfortable, because he’s never held a baby before, but he
holds him.
“Thank God he looks like Rachel,” Ian says.
I agree with him.
Ian asks Rachel if I ever told her what I said to him after I met
her.
I don’t know what he’s talking about.
Ian laughs.
“After he walked you to class that first day, he took a picture of
you from his seat,” Ian tells her. “He texted it to me and said,
‘She’s gonna have all my babies.’ ”
Rachel looks at me.
I shrug.
I’m embarrassed.
Rachel loves that I said that to Ian. I love that Ian told her that.
The doctor comes in and tells us we can go home now. Ian
helps me take everything to the car and pull it up to the exit.
Before I go back to Rachel’s room, Ian touches my shoulder. I
turn around and face him.
I get the feeling he wants to tell me congratulations, but
instead, he just hugs me.
It’s awkward, but it’s not. I like that he’s proud of me.
It makes me feel good. Like I’m doing this right.
Ian leaves.
So do we.
Me and Rachel and Clayton.
My family.
I want Rachel in the front seat with me, but I love that she’s
riding in the back with him. I love how much she loves him. I
love that I’m attracted to her even more now that she’s a mom.
I want to kiss her. I want to tell her I love her again, but I think
I tell her way too much. I don’t ever want her to get tired of
hearing it.
“Thank you for this baby,” she says from the backseat. “He’s
beautiful.”
I laugh. “You’re responsible for the beautiful part, Rachel. The
only thing he got from me was his balls.”
She laughs. She laughs hard. “Oh, my God, I know,” she says.
“They’re so big.”
We both laugh at our son’s big balls.
She sighs.
“Rest,” I tell her. “You haven’t slept in two days.”
I see her smile in the rearview mirror. “But I can’t stop staring
at him,” she whispers.
I can’t stop staring at you, Rachel.
But I do stop, because the oncoming traffic is brighter than it
should be.
My hands grip the steering wheel.
Too bright.
I’ve always heard your life flashes before your eyes in the
moments before you die.
In a sense, that’s true.
However, it doesn’t come at you in sequence or even in
random order.
It’s just one picture that
STICKS
in your head and becomes everything you feel and everything
you see.
It’s not your actual life that flashes before your eyes.
What flashes before your eyes are the people who are your life.
Rachel and Clayton.
All I see is the two of them—my whole life—flash before my
eyes.
The sound becomes everything.
Everything.
Inside me, outside me, through me, under me, over me.
RACHEL, RACHEL, RACHEL.
I can’t find her.
CLAYTON, CLAYTON, CLAYTON.
I’m wet. It’s cold. My head hurts. My arms hurt.