Pulling her jacket over her head, she carefully navigated the steps and then circled to the back of the building—where she stopped cold.
Tyler was there, seated on the weatherworn bench, head hung low, unmoving beneath the downpour. The dark strands of his hair were soaked through, along with his T-shirt and jeans, and water ran down the bottle of whiskey that hung from his fingers.
Oh God.
“Tyler.”
She took a step toward the bench and his head came up, rain streaming in rivulets he didn’t seem to notice as his desolate eyes met hers before dropping away.
“Leave me alone, Maggie.”
The rain was soaking her through, but she walked to the bench and sat beside him. “I can’t.”
If nothing else, he wouldn’t be alone.
Tyler’s chest rose and fell. He took a drink and then said, “She married him.”
Maggie couldn’t speak. Didn’t know what to say. Prayed she hadn’t understood, but looking at Tyler, it was clear she had.
“Gina. She called to tell me. And to—” Tyler turned his face to the pouring rain and let out a laugh that reminded her of that first day she’d stood at his door, that one raw, unguarded moment of pain. “To thank me. Once Ray saw how close he was to losing her, he realized he wanted to marry her.”
His jaw shifted to the side and after a breath, he finished. “But only on the condition she cut off all contact with me.”
All contact? There was no way she could be so cruel. “Charlie? The updates?”
Tipping the bottle to his mouth, he took a long swallow. Winced, and then cast a sidelong glance her way. “Go back to the house, Maggie.”
No way. “I don’t want to go back without you.”
“And I don’t want to go back,” he growled.
She squinted through the rain at the darkening sky above. No lightning.
“Okay,” she answered, letting her arms stretch out wide in a gesture of acceptance. “So we’ll stay out here awhile. As long as you like.”
For a minute, she thought he was going to argue, force her to leave. But then he pushed up from the bench and walked down the dock. Another slug of liquor and he shook his head, scowling at the bottle. “I keep waiting for this stuff to fucking do something. To numb me up or make me not care, but I feel every bit as bad as I did before I cracked the cap.”
“If it’s not working, then maybe you should stop.” She eyed the three-quarters-full bottle, hating the idea of him feeling worse later because of something that wasn’t even offering relief now.
He shoved his wet hair back from his brow. “That would be the right thing, wouldn’t it?”
“Probably,” she answered quietly, getting up to walk to him. “Here, I’ll take it for you.”
He looked at the bottle and then back to her, not offering it up. “You know what I’m sick of, Maggie?”
When she stopped where she was, shaking her head, he answered, “Doing the right thing. The smart thing. The careful thing. Since Gina left, and I’ve been trying to figure out a way to get Charlie back, I haven’t been able to risk anyone getting the idea I was anything less than a stellar role model. As upstanding a goddamned citizen as you could get. So I live in a solid neighborhood. Keep a neat apartment. A clean lifestyle. Hell, I even stocked the refrigerator with dark green vegetables. And I learned to how to cook them. Kale, Maggie.”
Kale could be delicious when cooked right, but instinctively, she knew this wasn’t the moment to comment.
“Anything that even hinted at irresponsibility, instability, or unsavory, I’ve avoided like the plague. But even before Gina left, once Charlie was on the way, I stopped staying out late. I gave up reckless sports. You’ve seen me—I wear a helmet when I bike. I come to a full stop at every stop sign, every time. And that car I drive. It’s got one of the highest safety ratings around! You know what I drove before Charlie was born? A Ducati, Maggie. A fucking fast motorcycle I’d tear up the road riding for hours. But not anymore. I haven’t done fast for years. I haven’t done anything. I make a shitload of money, Maggie, more even than I did back in New York. And you know what I do with it? I save it. I put it in stable, safe investments. Because I knew if I got another shot with Gina—if I could get her to marry me, let me adopt Charlie—eventually she’d do the same thing she did before, so I wanted to be ready. I needed the lawyers to see, the courts, anyone who might ever have reason to judge me…I’m rock solid.”
He raked his hand through his hair, an agonizing expression on his face. “So solid, I’ve sacrificed everything for a commitment to a boy I’m never going to get back.”
Stepping forward, she slipped her arms around his shoulders.
Her heart was breaking, tears pushing at her eyes and getting lost in the rain.
“I know.” All too well. “I’m so sorry.”
For a moment Tyler was stiff within her arms, his breathing forced and short.
She whispered his name and on his next exhale, some of that rigid control let go. His muscles released and she wrapped her arms tighter, let out her own sob when he turned into her, closing his arms around her body and holding her close.
God, she was so selfish, because even knowing this man she loved was dying inside, being this close, holding each other, it felt so good. So right.
They could stand in this rain forever if it meant not having to lose his arms around her. Not having to find out what was coming next.
But forever wasn’t in the cards. Slowly, Tyler’s hold on her eased and he pulled back without actually letting her go.
He pushed a few wet strands of hair from her brow before letting his knuckles run down the side of her face in a caress so light and reverent it nearly stole her breath. “So pretty.”
“Tyler,” she whispered, turning in to his touch.
His gaze dropped briefly to her mouth. And like that, everything changed, because suddenly Tyler wasn’t looking at her like a friend or confidante. He wasn’t looking at her like a man determined to put as much distance between them as possible. He was looking at her the way he had after that first kiss on her front stoop. Right before he’d kissed her again.
God, she wanted this so much. Wanted to be the one he came to. The one to ease his pain. She wanted what they’d started before Gina ripped apart his life again. But more than all that, she wanted him to be okay, and right now, he wasn’t. Not even close.
“Tyler, this isn’t a good idea.”
“No, it’s not.” His hand slid around the back of her neck, beneath the fall of her hair. “But like I said, I’m sick of doing the right thing.”
A shiver ran through her, one that had nothing to do with the cold. And then there was just Tyler, pulling her into a kiss so hard and good, she couldn’t stop herself from giving in to it. Melting into the arms that locked around her and opening to the hot thrust of his tongue, the sweet taste of whiskey, a spring storm, and relief.
The bottle hit the dock with a dull thud.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, she registered this was a mistake, a rebound. Tyler was drunk and hurting so bad, he was in no shape to make a decision about doing the right thing or not. Which meant if there was going to be a voice of reason, it would have to be hers.
Only then her shoulders met the worn planks of the boathouse as Ty leaned in, and she had the hard press of him against her body and between her legs, and the only thing she could think about was his hands roving over her waist and down her thighs. He groaned at her ear and she felt the rough vibration resonating deep through the center of her, to that needy spot that made her a slave to Tyler’s touch.
This was what she’d been aching for. What she’d thought never to have again.
Her palms smoothed over the wetness of his jaw, her fingers sifting into his hair as she met his eyes.
Eyes as ravaged and haunted as they were hungry.
For her? For a reprieve from the pain? Or just for anything to feel good when all he felt was bad?
She wanted to
give him what he needed. Be the balm to his battered soul. But if they did this, at best, she’d be an all-too-temporary bandage. Something with the potential to hurt worse when it came off—and that wasn’t how it was supposed to be with them.
None of this was how it was supposed to be.
“Tyler, I know you feel like doing the right thing hasn’t panned out for you—but I’ve got enough experience with the wrong thing to tell you it isn’t any better. You and me, right now, like this…it would be a mistake. And as much as a part of me wants to do it anyway, prove reason and sense wrong and grab hold with both hands, this time I can’t.”
She couldn’t do it to either of them.
—
Jesus Christ, what had he been thinking?
Maggie reached for him, concern etched through every line of her face, there in the tentative way her hands hovered in front of him before landing back on his shoulders.
“It’s not because—”
“Maggie, I shouldn’t have—hell, I don’t know what I was thinking. You deserve better.”
He’d been thinking she was there. And as of that evening, all the reasons he’d been telling himself he couldn’t have her didn’t exist anymore. But that wasn’t precisely true. The reasons he’d had to walk away were no longer an issue. But the very fact that he’d walked away in the first place—yeah, that shit wasn’t winning him any points. And how about Hot Doc? He couldn’t say for sure whether it had actually been a solid forty-eight hours since they’d broken up or not.
Add to that the booze and the pouring rain. She was shivering, soaked to the bone, and he’d been mauling her against a fucking wall in plain fucking view of the whole fucking lake. Where the hell were Sam and Ford when Maggie needed them? Was he going to have to kick his own ass for being the biggest piece of shit this year had seen?
Backing off, he held up his hands and shook his head. “I’m sorry.”
And because she’d never been one to let him off with a simple last word, she kept moving toward him anyway.
“Don’t be. Just come back to the house with me. I’ll make you some coffee and you can warm up.”
No way. Not after the bullshit stunt he’d just pulled. “I need some space.”
He’d stay upstairs in the boathouse while he sobered up. Then, tomorrow, he’d—shit, he’d have to figure that out, too, because he had no idea what he was going to do tomorrow. Or the day after, or the one after that.
The only thing he knew for certain was that he wouldn’t be waiting on Gina.
He wouldn’t be there to protect his little boy from the piece-of-shit blood relatives he’d been screwed with.
Charlie’s single-toothed smile flashed through his mind, ripping him open all over again.
What had he done with that bottle?
Only then Maggie was in his face again, giving him those heartbreaking eyes he couldn’t look away from. “I’ll leave you alone. But come back. If you don’t go in, neither will I.”
And there it was. The ultimatum he wouldn’t even try to fight. He didn’t know how long they’d been out there together, but more than him needing to put the distance back between them, he needed her to get out of the weather. Get dry. Get warm.
Shame burned hot with the whiskey in his gut. It was the least he could do.
“Okay, you win.”
—
He’d wanted to be left alone. To have some space. She got it. At least as much as someone who hadn’t lived through the loss Tyler had suffered could.
But it nearly killed her when she heard the door to the kitchen close at five in the morning and then the engine turn over out in the drive—and she knew it was Tyler, leaving.
They hadn’t talked.
After the kiss, they’d come back to the house and she’d offered to make him something to eat, asked if he wanted company. But he’d shaken his head and gone to his room. Stayed there until after she went to hers.
She’d figured giving him the night was for the best anyway. All he needed was some declaration of love from her when he’d just suffered such a monumental loss. Even without the booze, he wouldn’t have been in the right place to hear it.
She’d thought, in the morning.
But now, for all she knew, his apartment would be cleared out before she got home.
Gina married Ray. His last hope of getting Charlie back, and the only reason he’d stayed in Chicago, gone with a single phone call.
God, she didn’t want him to leave.
The first floor was empty when she finally ventured downstairs. She made coffee and then took a mug down to the end of the dock, waving at Sam, who was working on swapping out a rotted board on the shed as she went.
Pulling her phone from her sweatshirt pocket, she saw a voicemail alert from four-forty that morning. Just before Tyler had left.
She started to shake. Dialing in, she cursed her sleep settings and then Tyler, too, for not just coming to her door to talk to her in person. But then maybe it had been intentional. He’d known her phone wouldn’t ring.
When the message started to play, she found herself lost in the low timbre of his voice, the gruff sincerity in the apology he didn’t need to make.
He’d booked a flight back to New York so he could tell his family what had happened with Gina and Charlie. He figured they deserved to know as much as he needed to get his head straight.
With every word, her heart sank deeper.
Until finally, “We’ll talk when I get back.”
Her breath came out in a rush of relief she told herself she was crazy to be feeling. Of course he’d be coming back. The man wouldn’t disappear into thin air.
Sure, he was still renting month-to-month, and had a career that was infinitely portable…but he had stuff. An apartment full of it, that at the very least he’d need to make arrangements for.
She’d see him again.
Chapter Thirty
The first days back in New York had been brutal. Tyler hadn’t been kidding about needing to get his head on straight. He’d been a mess. All the shit he’d been forcing himself to keep a lid on the past year suddenly went unchecked and was boiling over every time the realization of what he’d lost hit him anew.
His parents, both of them, cried when he told them what happened. And for some reason it surprised him when his mother shared that her tears were for him. For her own little boy and the helplessness of not being able to ease his pain. His brother Ryan called and talked to him for an hour from New Zealand. And Mitch had come by for dinner the first night, called the second afternoon, and then shown up that morning with his overnight bag and a suspiciously casual attitude, complete with back slaps and belly laughs.
Tyler figured he knew what was coming from the kid, but was good with waiting it out while he sorted the messy carnage of his emotions. The rage, the sense of betrayal, the relief, and the guilt.
He wanted to call Maggie again, but she’d been right about him needing to know what he wanted before he did. He’d already messed up enough where she was concerned, and she deserved a hell of a lot better than some chump making a bunch of promises he couldn’t keep. He wouldn’t do it to her again.
“Got a minute?”
Tyler looked up from the laptop open on his high school desk to where his brother Mitch was leaning against the door frame with a towel wrapped around his waist and another to dry his wet hair.
Time to talk.
“What were you thinking, man? Gina’s poison. How could you not see that?” His brother had been waiting for his parents to go to bed, just like when they were kids, so he could get down to the unfiltered truth of something that needed to be said.
Tyler shook his head. His brother didn’t have kids. As far as he knew, Mitch had never even been in a serious relationship, so he couldn’t understand what it felt like to hold a precious new life in the cradle of his hands and love it so much, he’d be willing to make any sacrifice to ensure his safety and happiness.
“Mitch, t
his has never been about Gina. From the minute I found out she was pregnant, it’s only been about Charlie. About doing what was right for the boy I loved more than my own life.”
His brother nodded, his brow furrowed. “Shit, I know. I’m sorry. I know you love him. And you know I did, too, right?”
Yeah. “I know.”
“So what are you going to do now? Does the fact that you’re back here mean you’re ready to start living your life again? That you’ve figured out how to let him go?”
Tyler shook his head. “I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to really let him go. I don’t even think I want to. But my biggest hurdle over all this time was feeling like I couldn’t give up because—blood or not—I was the only father Charlie had. The way Gina told it, Ray didn’t give either of them enough of anything. He didn’t provide enough. Wasn’t around enough. Hadn’t cared enough.”
Pinching the bridge of his nose, he thought about the nights he’d woken in a cold sweat, paralyzed by the idea his kid needed help, and he couldn’t give it to him. “It’s been driving me out of my mind thinking he was missing out on a father who loved and wanted him, a parent who would put him first instead of using him like a bargaining chip, when I’ve been right here. All I could think was, I couldn’t give up. I couldn’t abandon him.”
His brother let out a heavy breath. “What the hell is wrong with her to do that to you? Wasn’t lying about you being the father and then waiting a year to steal your kid away from you enough? She has to torture you with shit about the deadbeat she’s hooked up with being a crappy dad, too?”
There’d never been a doubt there was something screwed up about the way Gina related to guys. How she always needed to keep one waiting in the wings. How she needed the grand gestures and high drama.
But looking back now, there was only one person to blame for the dynamic between them this last year.
“It’s on me.”
Mitch looked like he was about to blow a gasket, but Tyler held up a staying hand. “I let all this go on, because I wasn’t ready to see Gina’s bullshit for what it was. The one time I saw all of them together, Charlie was refusing to go to Ray, and the guy threw up his hands and walked off. It was maybe three weeks after Gina had moved out, and when I think about it now, I imagine that would be a pretty rough transition. One they probably would have overcome in time, only I never really let myself see it going that way. I wasn’t ready to accept that Charlie had a life I wasn’t a part of, and never would be again. I wasn’t willing to acknowledge that maybe I couldn’t be Charlie’s father anymore, because he already had one.”