Completely Wrecked: A Dramatic Romance Page 10

“You’re an unusual woman, Elizabeth. I mean that in the very best way.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome. If I have any questions, I’ll call but I think you’re good to go. It was a pleasure to speak with you, Elizabeth. I wish the circumstances were better. Samuel, until next time.”

  The line went dead.

  She let go of the breath she didn’t realize she was holding. “I’m going to head home. Update the guys about what’s happening and wait to hear what happens. I’ll be relieved if he’s safe but…I’ll feel like Chicken Little.”

  “No, Elizabeth. Don’t look at it that way.” Pam gave her a reassuring smile. “Better safe than sorry. You’ve already seen this woman’s handiwork in the past. Even if he’s safe, it can’t hurt to check.”

  After hugging them both, she walked back to her house where Riley and Donovan waited.

  As she lowered herself into a chair, Riley placed a plate of food in front of her. She managed to nibble at the grilled salmon and steamed vegetables but couldn’t deter her mind from the memory of how emaciated Dylan always was when he came to her.

  Appetite effectively crushed, she sipped a glass of tea and told her friends everything about her visit to the Hellers.

  * * *

  Uncertain about the next few hours, Elizabeth showered and prepared her outfit for school the next day. She straightened the house and put fresh sheets on the guest room bed.

  Almost four hours after leaving the home of the mayor and his wife, her cell phone rang. She almost dropped it in her desperation to answer the call.

  “Samuel?”

  “Elizabeth.” He cleared his throat. “First, let me tell you that Davis is safe and sound, currently on his way to a temporary foster home. We’ll handle the paperwork over the next few days. Second, I thank God you came tonight. I won’t go into the details now. I can’t even think about them myself. Just know that you saved him, Elizabeth.”

  Tension she hadn’t even known she was carrying seemed to leave her in a rush. Lightheaded, she sat on the upholstered chair in the corner of her bedroom.

  “Thank you, Samuel. I’ll stop by your office tomorrow afternoon when school is out.”

  “I’ll ask a representative from child welfare to drop off all the papers you’ll need to fill out so we can get the process started.”

  “You’re a good man. Please thank Pam for everything.”

  “I will. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  Rushing from her room, she opened Riley’s door without knocking and startled him in the act of performing oral sex on Donovan. She quickly turned her back.

  “I’m sorry. Damn it.” Then she started to giggle nervously and couldn’t stop.

  “Okay, awkwardness handled. We’re decent, you can turn around now.” The smile in Donovan’s voice was obvious. “Sorry, love.”

  She faced them and her blush wasn’t helped by fanning her face. “Don’t be! That was really pretty actually. I’m just so embarrassed for invading your privacy.”

  Riley shrugged on a t-shirt. “Elizabeth, you’re the only woman I know who would call two men in the act of oral “pretty” and I love you for that.”

  They patted the bed and she climbed up between them on her knees. Her smile felt bigger than her entire face. “He’s okay. They took him out of the house and he’s going to be alright.”

  For half an hour, they asked her questions about her plans.

  “You know me living here might be a problem, Elizabeth.” Riley brought it up matter-of-factly but she imagined it wasn’t easy.

  Elizabeth smiled warmly. “It won’t. I’ll take them to court if I have to.”

  “Don’t get people riled up because of me, honey.”

  Leaning over, she kissed Riley’s forehead. “I love you and as long as he’s safe, that’s what matters. I’d love to have him here but you were my first friend, you’re my best friend, and I’ll fight for you, Riley. Davis would be loved and welcomed in this home…with you and Donovan in it.”

  Suddenly anxious, she murmured, “I might not get him anyway. Dylan might not want him and might not want me to have him.”

  Smoothing her hair from her face, Riley told her, “Then he would be a fool, Elizabeth. I can understand the pain under the circumstances. In this case, it’s no worse than a woman forced to bear the child of her rapist. Anyone who wouldn’t want you to raise a child is a fool.”

  She nodded. “Thanks.”

  “I have to tell you something, Elizabeth. I should have said something a long time ago but…I didn’t know. I feel horrible for how I treated him while he was here.”

  “What?” She couldn’t hide the dread in her voice.

  “I lived on the next block over, right behind and diagonal to Dylan’s house. A few weeks before I left home…I was sitting on the roof one night and I saw them.”

  Swallowing hard, she closed her eyes. “Dylan and his stepmother?”

  He nodded. “He was…cuffed to her bed, Elizabeth. I thought it was consensual. I’m so fucking sorry I didn’t say anything.”

  Picking up his hand, she held it between hers. “If I’d told my secret, what you saw would have made sense and you would have told yours. I was trying to protect him. You were trying to protect me.”

  Donovan grabbed her in a huge hug. “Settle in and watch The Usual Suspects with us.”

  “I don’t want to intrude.”

  They dragged her higher on the pillows and pulled the blankets up. Riley picked up the remote and pressed play. Grinning down at her, he rubbed noses.

  “You never intrude. Now shush.”

  One of their favorite movies, they recited lines together and picked apart clues most people hadn’t caught when the movie released. Riley fell asleep first and Donovan held her hand.

  When he drifted off, she carefully climbed out from between them and turned off the television.

  Pulling their door closed quietly, she returned to her bedroom, sat in her chair, and stared out the window until dawn.

  Then she dressed for work and went downstairs to make coffee.

  * * *

  Elizabeth didn’t see Davis James for four days.

  Her outward cheerfulness was the hardest ever to fake. Filling out several hundred pieces of paper kept her mind off worse case scenarios and regular updates from Samuel and his wife kept her sane.

  She heard from Pam that Donna James-Lang had been arrested on charges of extreme child neglect and abuse. She was being held without bail.

  If there were any justice in the world, she would rot in a prison cell for the rest of her life.

  Friday afternoon, Elizabeth stood up from her desk and gathered her things. She was uncommonly tired and wondered how much longer it would be before she knew what the future held.

  “Lizzy.”

  Chapter Eleven

  The voice that came from the door of Elizabeth’s classroom froze her ability to move or think.

  Only one person in the entire world called her Lizzy.

  Dylan Lang. Davis James’s biological father. A man she hadn’t seen in years…who had told her he loved her and walked away.

  Blinking hard, she straightened and took a deep breath.

  Mentally, she said a prayer – but not to God. “Nana, I need you so bad. Please help me be strong.”

  Turning, she took in the sight of the only man she’d ever loved and the changes in him astounded her. He was taller, broader now. Regular meals, sunlight, and exercise had given him the build he’d always been meant to have. Perfect posture made him look even taller.

  His hair was sun-bleached, his skin tanned in a way she’d never seen on him. It made his eyes stand out strikingly from his face.

  They stared at one another in silence for almost a minute.

  “Hello, Dylan.”

  He walked further into the room and she watched him move. He stopped on the other side of her desk and her heart pounded painfully in her chest.

  “You know why I’m he
re.”

  “Yes.”

  Her confirmation was met with the closing of his eyes. “How did you find out?” The words were barely audible but she heard them anyway.

  “He’s a student in my class.” Copper penny eyes opened and focused on her face. She gave him a sad smile. “I recognized his eyes, his hair, the way he moved.”

  So many unspoken and spoken words hung between them. Elizabeth wondered if she could suffocate from stress.

  “You got him out.” It wasn’t a question. “You saved him.”

  “I talked to people who were able to save him.”

  This time, it was Dylan who smiled carefully. “You never did understand the magnitude of your actions, Lizzy.”

  She didn’t reply and he went quiet for a long time.

  “I never wanted you to know…what happened.”

  “It wouldn’t have mattered, Dylan.”

  She shook her head slowly. “Nothing you’ve done or gone through would have made a difference. Not to me.”

  Exhausted now, unsure of what to do, Elizabeth picked up her bag and walked to the door of her class.

  When he passed through it, she locked it behind her and headed for the main exit. He fell into step beside her and she was more than a little awed to realize he was at least six-four.

  “I’m sorry, Lizzy.”

  “I know. It doesn’t matter. What matters now is Davis. Have you confirmed paternity?”

  He stopped and touched her arm. She faced him but looked over his shoulder. They were too close for her to bear looking into his eyes. Her own filled with tears but she kept them from falling.

  “It was confirmed before my leave was approved. I haven’t seen him yet. I don’t know if I want to. I know how that makes me sound.”

  She nodded and her heart twisted. “Let me take him, Dylan.”

  His face contorted in horror. “You’d raise that whore’s child?”

  Part of her had expected his reaction but it hurt anyway. “No. I’d raise your child, Dylan.”

  One blink, a long pause, a second blink as he stared at her. “Why?”

  So many words came into her mind. Things she wanted to tell him, that she wanted him to know. Then, she got angry. Truly angry with a man so wrapped up in his own shit that he was unable to see exactly what he’d done to her over the years.

  He was oblivious about how much she loved him.

  Stepping closer, she kept her voice low. “Dylan, you have your life. You have drifted in and out of mine like a warm breeze before the first snow. This is not about you. This is not about me. This is about a little boy who needs care, comfort, and safety he has never experienced. I can provide that. I will provide that in an environment where he will feel welcome and loved for the rest of my life.”

  His jaw clenched but he said nothing.

  “I ask you to let me do that without conditions because he did not ask to be born under such circumstances to a woman who despised you and despises him. He did not ask to be tortured and starved, beaten until his bones broke and his skin split. To be molested and made to feel as if he begged for her to do it. That child is as innocent as you were.”

  Dylan vibrated with tension. Elizabeth pressed on.

  “No matter your past and your pain, you no longer get to make me vulnerable. You do not get to hurt me. You do not get to justify your feelings toward him nor do you have the right to mine. Why? Fuck you and your why. Sign him over to me and go back to whatever the hell it is you do when you don’t need me for something.”

  With that, she stepped through the front doors of the school and walked home.

  * * *

  Samuel and Hollow were pushing to get resolution to Davis’s case and get him settled in a permanent home.

  Friday night, she barely ate and Riley begged her to come out with them. They had reservations at their favorite restaurant and planned to take in a show.

  She declined and they waited a long time to leave.

  When they were gone, she locked up and went upstairs to shower. At the last minute, she decided she needed a soak instead. For two hours, she added hot water as it cooled and tried to think positive thoughts. Only Dylan had the power to disrupt her entire existence. Standing, she dried and shrugged on her robe.

  A banging from downstairs startled her badly. Making her way to the first floor, she was cautious as she approached the door to the back steps.

  Dylan – drunk and sobbing her name – stood on the other side. She brought him in before he woke the neighbors and he collapsed into a chair. He wreaked of alcohol and she handed him a towel to wipe his face.

  “Brought it all back, Lizzy. All of it. That was my fucking life she screwed up. Mine, Carol’s, and now this boy’s.”

  “Davis. His name is Davis.”

  “I don’t care. I can’t care, Lizzy. Kid’s fucked as surely as my sister was, as surely as I am.”

  She didn’t answer as she made coffee. When she sat across from him, he tried to focus on her face.

  “How are you always so happy? How do you forget and move on from awful things, Lizzy?”

  “Holding onto negativity will poison you. Bad things happen to everyone, Dylan. Not usually as bad as your life, not like Davis’s, but they happen every day. Time passes, things change, life moves on. You can live back there – where it was awful – or you can live in the present. Live for your future. It is a choice…you have to make a choice.”

  Then Dylan was on the floor at her feet, his head in her lap, his arms wrapped tightly around her waist as he sobbed brokenly for a long time.

  Her hands rested on his head, stroking gently through the silken strands of his hair that was so much healthier and shorter than it was the last time she saw him. She murmured to him, did her best to soothe him, and eventually, he calmed. When he lifted his face, she wiped his tears.

  The kiss Dylan gave her was not completely unexpected. The way he shoved Elizabeth’s robe aside and unfastened his pants was not unwelcome.

  It was only when he was thrusting hard and fast into her body, her own body meeting the rhythm he set, that she realized he wasn’t using protection.

  Opening her mouth, Elizabeth started to tell him but then he was kissing her again, his tongue coiling seductively around hers as his cock shuttled in and out…and she didn’t care.

  He’s drunk…you know exactly what you’re doing, her subconscious whispered.

  Elizabeth did know. For once, she was going to take something she wanted, something she needed, and deal with the consequences afterward.

  She was tired of thinking, sick to death of being ready to rescue everyone else when her own loneliness almost ate her alive.

  If luck were on her side, even if Dylan didn’t give her his first child to love and raise, she would have his second. A child to love, who would love her. A companion to teach and grow with warmth and positivity, as Nana had done for Elizabeth.

  Accepting what her heart wanted, she returned his touches just as frantically.

  No matter how angry she might be, Elizabeth loved Dylan with every part of herself. She suspected he would be the only man she would ever love.

  She also knew that no matter how much he might need her, he was unwilling or unable to love her in return.

  There would always be this between them but nothing more.

  There was no doubt in her mind that when he left this time, she wouldn’t see him again. His visits were getting further and further apart.

  This time, instead of six years, it would be ten or more and there was no way she could remain emotionally unaffected by his absence.

  “Lizzy, how I’ve missed you. Always miss you so much.”

  “I missed you, too Dylan.”

  It had been years since he’d touched her last but Elizabeth’s body remembered him, welcomed him, and loved him just as her heart and her soul loved him. She held him tightly and he did the same. He whispered that he loved her but she held back the words that lodged in her throat.
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  “I’m sorry for everything. So fucking sorry, Lizzy.”

  “I know. I know.”

  “You feel so good, always so good in every way.” He shoved the robe away from her breast and bent his head to suck her nipple. “I want all of you, Lizzy.”

  No, Dylan…you don’t.

  His strokes were faster, harder now and he released the pebbled peak to return to her mouth.

  Elizabeth pushed every emotion out of her mind and focused on the physical sensations only this man inspired.

  On and on, Dylan drove them both until her head dropped back on her shoulders and she let the climax take over.

  She felt her walls tighten around him, watched him gasp for breath, then he slammed to his base inside her and went still.

  It seemed his release would never end and she hoped the spurts of warm fluid would leave her with a gift to herself, something special to remember him.

  Their bodies pressed together as tightly as possible, he opened his eyes and stared into hers. They were brilliant in his face. She saw the moment he realized he hadn’t used a condom.

  “Lizzy…”

  “It doesn’t matter, Dylan. Don’t ruin this for me.”

  “But…”

  “Don’t. Just don’t.”

  Unwrapping his arms, he lifted his hands to cup her face. Smoothing his thumbs over her jaw, he whispered, “I love you, Lizzy. I’ve always loved you.”

  She nodded but couldn’t speak. Her throat felt blocked with a lump the size of a baseball.

  “Do you hate me?”

  Her fingertips traced the lines of the face that seemed harder now, definitely older, but her mind was unable to see anyone but the boy she fell in love with.

  “I could never hate you, Dylan. I love you.” She kissed him softly and hugged him tight. “You’re just so bad for my heart.”

  He sobbed against her neck and held her hard enough to hurt.

  Always repentant but never able to change.

  When he settled a few minutes later, she cleared her throat. “Let me make you something to eat. You can sleep for a little while.”

  He nodded and withdrew carefully from her body. For a long moment, he stared at her tummy, placing his hand there, large and warm.