Seaside Secrets (10 page)

She nodded, and her eyes grew serious as they dropped to his chest again. “You have a new scar.”

He glanced down at the thin white scar that snaked along his left pectoral muscle. “Yeah. Rough ride in the spring. I texted you about it. Cane Garden Bay, remember? In the Caribbean.”

She held her finger an inch from his chest, her eyes trained on his, as if she were waiting for him to stop her. When he didn’t, she ran her finger over the scar. “I remember.”

He felt himself getting hard and laced his fingers with hers to keep from losing his mind. The cottage was quiet, save for the sounds of the leaves rustling in the wind through the back window screen. He wanted to pull her against him and close his eyes, drift away to sleep with her warm and safe against him. He wished that she’d somehow inherently know what he was there to say. But as he looked at her expectant, trusting eyes, he knew it was time to tell her the truth. It was time to tell her all the things she’d never let him say fourteen years ago.

“Amy, I’m sorry I hurt you.”

Her eyes dropped to her lap, and he drew her chin up so he could see them again.

“Tony, please. You did me a favor. My feelings for you were holding me back, and now…” She shrugged, but she didn’t look thankful.

Thank fucking heaven for that.

“It’s okay that I’m not your type, Tony. I get it. I’m—”

“Not my…” His breathing quickened. “Amy, for Christ’s sake. You are one hundred percent my type. Can’t you see that? Can’t you see how hard this is for me?” He didn’t mean to raise his voice, and when he saw her shaking her head and withdrawing from him, he was sure he’d blown it.

“Stop.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “Just…stop.”

“No, Amy. I won’t stop. You need to know how I feel. How I really feel. How I’ve felt for years.”

She looked away, and he got up and paced, too frustrated to sit any longer. “Don’t you see? You’re
Amy Maples
. You’re sweet and good and all things tender wrapped up in this beautiful person. You’re generous and giving, and—”

Amy pushed to her feet. The towel fell to the floor, and gravity sent his T-shirt down to her upper thighs. “And not your type.” She crossed her arms and the shirt inched up higher.

Tony forced himself to look into her hurt-filled eyes.

“That’s not true. I said that because I’m not the man you
need
, Amy, not because I don’t
want
you.” He closed the distance between them and couldn’t help touching her arms. Jesus, everything felt different, more intense, more important and urgent. He knew he’d been fooling himself by thinking that after knowing she might be gone forever he wouldn’t do everything he could to keep her with him. Her lower lip was trembling, and he was pretty sure it wasn’t from the cold, because he could feel heat coming off of her, drawing them together until their thighs collided. It was all he could do to remain focused on making her understand where he was coming from. But he had to. It was now or never. He couldn’t let her drift further away.

“Amy, you deserve to be put on a pedestal. You deserve flowers and candy and a man who will always put you first. You deserve a man who will spend every minute of every day taking care of you, loving you.”

Her hands splayed across his abs, making him harder and causing his thoughts to teeter between apology and desire.

“And you’re not that guy.”

It wasn’t a question, and he didn’t try to respond. Silence stretched between them, doing nothing to dampen the heat that spread like wildfire beneath her palms.

“I want it to be you,” she said with hopeful eyes.

“So do I, Amy, but…” Had she buried their past so deep that she truly didn’t remember? “Amy, what happened between us wasn’t a mistake.”

She turned away. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Her shoulders rounded forward. Tony touched her arm with his fingertips, just to ground her. To let her know he wasn’t going anywhere, and he wasn’t going to let her send him away this time.

“Yes, you do,” he said firmly.

Her wet hair stuck to her back as she shook her head.

“Amy, we were in love. We were kids. We didn’t—”

She covered her ears with her hands.

Tony took a deep breath and pushed on. “We made love a dozen times, and I know it was my fault. I never should have made love to you without protection. I take full responsibility, but please, Amy. Please don’t shut me out this time.”

He felt her trembling and stepped closer, pressing his chest to her back and circling her waist with his arms.

“I never meant to hurt you. I wanted to be there for you.”

She broke free and crossed the room, waving her hands behind her, motioning for him to stop. To leave. To shut up.

“Amy…”

“Stop it, okay? Stop it. Just stop. I can’t go there.” Her words were garbled by sobs as she leaned both palms on the kitchen counter and bowed her head.

He wasn’t going to lose her again. He’d come this far. He had to say his piece, no matter how much she fought him on it.

“We never dealt with it, Amy, and we have to.”

She spun around with venom in her eyes. “I dealt with it, Tony. I moved on. It never happened.”

In three determined steps they were toe to toe. He didn’t touch her, didn’t want to get her any angrier.

“It happened,” he insisted just above a whisper.

She shook her head, and her body trembled.

“It happened, Amy, and it wasn’t your fault. It was mine.”

Tears streaked her cheeks as she inhaled a jagged breath. “I…No.”

“Yes, Amy. It happened. Look at me. Please.”

She stared at the floor as she whispered, “I never blamed you.”

“You didn’t have to. I blamed myself. Every minute of every goddamn day.”

She lifted her red-rimmed eyes. “It wasn’t your fault,” she whispered. “It was mine.”

Tony couldn’t keep himself from touching her, comforting her. He brought his hands to her cheeks and looked directly into her haunted eyes.

“Baby, you’re wrong. So very wrong.”

For a few seconds they stared into each other’s eyes. Years of hurt passing between them like shards of glass, until Amy shrugged from his grip again and crossed the room with too much rancor in each step. It cut Tony to his core. How long could she pretend she was okay?

“I moved on. You did, too, so let it be. No one knows. I made sure of that.”

Fuck, that’s what he’d thought. She’d taken the burden alone, without him, without the girls, and God knew how that had eaten her up. How the hell had she survived it? He’d done the same, shouldered the burden of their loss alone, but he was a man, used to dealing with hard knocks and shitty situations. He’d wanted to be there to help Amy, to share the pain and help her heal. To build a life together, a future…the only future he ever wanted.

“I haven’t moved on,” he admitted.

Amy blew out a half laugh, half breath. “Yeah, right. You have girlfriends galore. You have a successful business. You’re an amazing surfer—”

“No shit, Amy. You know me. If anyone in this blessed world knows me, it’s you. Burying my feelings, using that frustration to excel in other ways and try to prove myself worthy is what I do best. Wearing a coat of armor so thick it smothers me but never showing it to the world. That’s me. Those women were camouflage.” He turned his back to try to gain control of the burn in his gut.

“Don’t you know why I take care of you? Why I make sure you don’t get hurt by other assholes who are only looking out for themselves? Don’t you see how hard it is for me to leave when I carry you home? How I nearly lost my mind when the guys at that bar were checking you out? Don’t you know why I’ve never had a single long-term relationship?” He turned around and closed the distance between them again.

She turned her back to him and wrapped her arms around herself.

“Because of you, Amy. Because of us. Those women were substitutes. Every goddamn one of them. I don’t know if I can be the man you want and the man you need, but damn it, I want to try.”

She turned back around, her gaze and voice softer. “You’re the best man I know, Tony.”

“Bullshit. The best man wouldn’t have given up when you sent me away. The best man would never have made love to you without protection and risked a pregnancy in the first place.”

She circled her arms around his waist and rested her chin on his chest, and his anger turned to sadness, softening his tone.

“The best man wouldn’t have filled the gaps with other women.”

“Tony…”

His body was shaking now, damn it. He felt like he could barely breathe.

 “You’re strong and sensitive. You’re thoughtful and more of a man than Rambo. Any guy would have…” Fresh tears filled her eyes. “Would have been with other women. You did what you had to in order to move on, to
survive
, just like I did.”

He closed his eyes to try to center his thoughts. When he opened them, he nearly gave in to her trusting, honest gaze and the desire building within him, but she’d sent him away once before, and he knew he couldn’t survive it again. And he’d turned her away so many times, he wasn’t sure she could survive it if it wasn’t real. He had to be sure this time. Sure of her love and sure that he could be all she’d ever need.

Her eyes remained trained on his as she drew her shoulders back and spoke in a confident, warm tone. “And you’re the only man I want.”

His breath left his lungs in a rush. He’d waited fourteen years to hear those words, and now he wasn’t sure he was worthy. He moved her wet hair from her shoulders and stroked her cheek. His words tumbled painfully from his lips.

“I’m not the best man, Amy. You’re the only woman I want in my life, and I didn’t protect you at a time when it mattered most.”

She stepped back and looked up at him through wet lashes. “You did what mattered most. You loved me.”

He pulled her against him again, needing her close in case she didn’t want anything to do with him after everything they’d said and what was yet to be said. In case this was all he’d ever have. He drew in a deep breath and held it, preparing for her response, clenching his teeth a few times to strengthen his resolve for honesty.

“We were so careful all those nights we made love that summer. That night in the woods, I was too damn weak. I’m a man, Amy. I should have been thinking of you, not me. You should always come first. All I could think about was being buried deep inside you, loving you, joining together in a way that would make me feel whole again. Only you could make me feel so loved, and damn it…”

He swallowed against the tears welling in his eyes with the memories of how she’d freed him. She was the only one who had noticed the changes in his father that summer. How many times had he hammered Tony’s worthlessness into his head?
You won’t amount to shit. A surfer? Surfing is for losers. Get a fucking job.
Tony had never told a soul. Not once. He hadn’t even told Amy. But Amy had known. He had no fucking idea how. His father had been careful to say things when no one was around. He’d been slick like that those few difficult weeks, so different from the man he’d been before that summer. But Amy knew. She’d eased all the hurt from what his father had said when she’d told Tony at the beginning of that summer, just as she told him now,
You’re the best man I know.
But that humid June night he hadn’t been the best man. He’d been selfish
.

And she’d never wavered from loving him over the following weeks. Until after she’d gone to college, when they’d returned for that fateful weekend. The weekend they’d lost the baby he’d had no idea they’d conceived.

“I knew it was risky. I knew that withdrawing wasn’t foolproof. I was older than you. I
knew
the risks, and I still did it. You need a guy who won’t ever be that weak.” He looked away, not wanting to see the disappointment he was sure was filling her eyes.

She laughed, a sweet, unexpected, tear-laced laugh.

Laughed
.

 He looked down at her, and she was smiling through her tears.

“Did you take a vow of chastity that I’m not aware of?” she asked.

He couldn’t even form a response. He couldn’t find one funny thing about their discussion.

“Tony...” She pressed her lips to the center of his chest, and he felt the walls around his heart crumble a little more. “I can’t deal with the past, not now. But you’re human. Any man would have made love to me in that way and filled that empty place with other women when I sent you away.”

“Not when they loved someone else.”

She dropped her eyes, and in that moment he realized what she
wasn’t
saying.  She’d been with other men. Of course she had. He’d known that, hadn’t he?

“Yeah, they would,” she whispered.

He pushed away thoughts of her with anyone else and focused on them. “Bullshit. Caden and Peter, do you think they would be with other women? Even for a second? Kurt, for Christ’s sake?”

She laughed again. “Uh, yeah. If they’d been…if they’d gone through…”

She couldn’t even say the words, and he knew, at least on some level, that they’d never be able to move forward until they
both
dealt with their loss.

“It’s normal,” she whispered.

“I never wanted to keep things secret back then, and I allowed myself to be swayed. If there’s one thing I’m certain of, it’s that you deserve a man who is better than normal.”

“Tony, I don’t know where you got the idea that I should be put on a pedestal, but I shouldn’t. I’m the one who sent you away. I’m the one who couldn’t handle it.” Her thighs were still pressed against his. She had to feel how just being close to her again, allowing himself to
feel
again,
with her
, aroused him. The points of her breasts against his bare chest were only making him harder, swamping him with memories of their love and the connection he’d never stopped feeling—memories of their bodies as close as conjoined twins.

“Don’t sell yourself short,” he said.

“Tony.” She sighed. “I’m addicted to my label maker. I have the body of a prepubescent girl, and I can’t hold my liquor.” She ran her fingers up his back, sending heat to all the right—and wrong-for-the-moment—places. “I can’t deal with heavy things. I hide from them. I don’t deserve a second look, much less to be put up on a pedestal.”