Thrive (7 page)

“I don’t trust us together. I don’t trust us not to self-destruct and take the other one down.”

“You mean you don’t trust yourself with me…”

“No. I said I don’t trust us together. You have just as much power to ruin me as I do to ruin you.”

We were silent for a long time as Curtis let his words sink in and I tried desperately to process them, to add them to everything I’d found out in the last forty-eight hours.

“We have to trust each other. If we don’t, we’ve already lost.”

My voice was lost to the sound of Curtis’ even breathing as he descended into sleep.

“Once upon a time, there was a prince named Curtis. He was a handsome prince, with a big heart, a sparkly smile and he could kick a football further than all the other princes in the land. He had a mummy who loved him to the moon and back, and he had a daddy who worked hard to save people. He taught Curtis how to treat the special princess who would capture his heart and love him as much as his mummy did…”

Mummy told me the story and sat on the edge of my bed to stroke my hair. Daddy had been called to work. Someone was in danger and it was Daddy’s job to make them safe again. Auntie Lois and Uncle Phil were downstairs watching TV and waiting for Daddy to come home to have dinner with them.

We had a good day at the park today. We had sandwiches and juice and Uncle Phil played football with me when Daddy took a rest. Uncle Phil didn’t like me. He never wanted to play with me so I smiled a big smile when he picked up the football, told me to stand in goal and catch the ball. He called me Oliver…he said, “Good kick, Oliver!” when I kicked the ball and it went through his legs. But I wasn’t Oliver. I think he only liked me when he thought I was. But then the game ended. Uncle Phil took his keys from his pocket and told everyone he had to go to work. He crouched down and told me I was a bad boy and he wasn’t going to play with me anymore. I cried, but Auntie Lois saved me. She gave me a cuddle and promised to take me swimming tomorrow.

Auntie Lois was standing at the door when Mummy gave me a kiss goodnight and told me she loved me to the moon and back. Auntie Lois blew me a kiss when Mummy got up to leave and she turned the light off so the twinkly stars on my ceiling lit up.

I loved Auntie Lois. I loved my Mummy. I loved my Daddy and I loved Uncle Phil, even if he didn’t love me back.

“You failed Curtis. You’re a bad boy. Even in your dreams, you can’t do anything right.” The voice of Uncle Phil broke into my dream and I fought and fought to get out…

~Curtis~

“We need to go and eat.”

I stepped back into the bedroom after the shower Curtis had sent me to take. He handed me the clothes I wore yesterday that he’d washed and dried before he climbed in bed with me last night.

“I’m not hungry.”

I wasn’t. I hadn’t eaten anything substantial since Beth’s wedding dinner, but I didn’t want anything. I was nauseous; I felt sick with worry that my life was going to fall to shit all over again.

“I haven’t fed you, Skye. We need to go and eat.”

Curtis opened his wardrobe and rummaged through it. He took out a black sweater and pulled it on before turning to me.

“You don’t need to
feed me
. I’m a grown woman. I don’t need you bossing me around.”

He shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans, a steely expression burning into my feet as he stared at the floor, and then looked up at me as a frown lowered over his eyes.

“You wanted in to the darkness. This is it.” He stepped closer, until I had to tip my head back to keep eye contact. “We’re going to eat.”

He was trying to intimidate me, using his size and manipulating my decision to do this with him.

“Does that work on other women?” I asked, stepping away from him and closing myself off by folding my arms over my body. “The dominant act?”

“It used to work on you. I only had to say one word and I’d bring you to heel.”

“I’m not a pet.”

He was right, the bastard. I always submitted to him, but because I chose to. Even now, as I prepared to argue and fight for my independence, I knew I’d do what he wanted.

“No. You’re not.” There was an edge to his voice that told me he resented himself for his words, but he didn’t change tact. “Right now, you’re in my care. When I tell you to do something, it’s for you. You need me to be in control because without it? You’ll slip back into the sad woman I watched walk the aisle, with no sense of purpose.”

Shit. Colour me controlled. He was right. He was an asshole for the way he put it, but I did need him to take the lead. I had always given him control over me because it meant I didn’t have to face the reality I’d have to deal with if I didn’t.

“Pancakes,” I said, refusing to continue this discussion. “I want pancakes and bacon. And the best coffee in Kent.”

A smile traced his lips, swollen from our earlier assault on each other.

“As you wish.” He bowed uncharacteristically and left me to get dressed.

***

“And you said you weren’t hungry,” Curtis grinned as I sat back, full and sleepy.

I’d just polished off a plate of pancakes and bacon with maple syrup, and was on my second cup of sugary coffee. We were sitting in a booth by the window in an American-themed diner on the outskirts of town.

“Just being a good little pet,” I bit, with more resentment than I intended.

“Don’t say that.”

His eyes flitted to the carpark; he’d been doing it since we arrived. He was waiting for something, looking for something, or avoiding something. I wasn’t sure which it was, but when I followed his line of sight, I saw nothing but parked cars and passing pedestrians.

“What are you looking for?” I asked when he returned his attention to me.

“Nothing.”

“Okay.”

Placing my palms on the table, I pushed up and prepared to stand. Curtis’ hands shot out and covered mine.

“Sit down.”

I fell back onto the seat. Two words and he’d – how did he put it? – brought me to heel.

“You can't pick and choose, Curtis. Either you let me in, or I’m leaving. I can deal with you bossing me around, but I won't sit here and watch you shut me out.”

“Jesus, Skye.” He dragged his hand through his hair. “We’ve been back in each other’s lives for five minutes. Give me some time to figure this out.”

“While I do what? Sit here and wait, and have no purpose in the meantime?”

“You’ve always had purpose.” His eyes clouded over, with an expression I couldn’t read, but it was one that told me he was afraid. Of what? “I don’t know how to begin to tell you what’s going on.”

I leaned towards him and kept my voice low and quiet. “Am I in danger?”

His eyes never left mine as he nodded slightly, “We both are.”

I gasped, but kept the façade. I had to be strong enough to handle whatever threatened us.

“Then start at the beginning. What have you been doing for the last ten years?”

“I can't tell you.”

“Okay, then you can drive me home when we’re done here.”

I assumed his agreement when he dropped his eyes, bowed his head and stared into his empty coffee cup.

“I’m a monster, Skye,” he confessed, his voice thick with shame and regret. “I should have said no.”

“To what?”

My hands began to sweat and panic set in, making my nerves tremble.

“Charlie…Ms Tattersell.”

My nostrils flared with the instinct to protect. “What did she make you do?”

“Nothing. I did…I
do
it willingly. She owns me and I let her.”

I took a deep breath, careful with my reaction, and reached out to hold his hand across the table.

“Can you get out? Do you want out?”

“I’ve wanted to get out since it started…but I can't.”

“You can.”

“No.” He shook his head. “You don’t understand. I can't get out.” He lifted his head and finally his dark eyes met mine. “I’m a criminal. Nothing I’ve ever done warrants you wasting your time being here with me. I’m putting you in danger.”

I slipped my hand away as if I’d been burned. My skin seared to the touch.

“What have you done?”

My bottom lip began to tremble and my heart began to pound. I couldn’t control the reaction; the panic set in and a sheet of cold sweat crawled over my skin.

“You’re afraid of me,” he said. I nodded, unable and unwilling to lie. “You should be. But I’ll protect you, Skye. I’ll protect you with everything I have.”

“What is this we’re doing?” I asked the only question I could think of.

He
belonged
– the idea brought a fiery heat of rage to the tips of my fingers, sending them curling into tight fists – to another woman, yet here he was with me. Just like my father, his uncle, did.

A growl rumbled low in his chest. He knew what I was thinking and he was ready to pounce, to eradicate the thought. “We’ve never been apart – not really. You’re
mine
, Skillet.”

It was the answer I wanted and it filled me with a sick sense of triumph. I slid out of the booth and joined Curtis on his side of the table. Turning to him, I took his face in my hands.

“And you’re
mine
.” I leaned closer and whispered, “We’re going to get you away from her.”

***

Curtis said I was afraid of him, and I was. I was afraid of what the future held for us, I was afraid of his past, the secrets he’d revealed and those he hadn’t; I was afraid of his fear and the actions it would lead him to take. He was brave, stronger than he let himself believe; he used his aggression and dominant nature to control himself. The one place he couldn’t hide his true, unguarded self? Sleep.

Something woke me in the night; arms encircled me and clamped tight around my body. Curtis’ back arched and strangled cries began in his chest, vibrated against my neck and erupted from his mouth in a bloodcurdling cry for help. I let him hold me while the dream played out. I knew better than to wake someone up when they were in the throes of a nightmare, and struggling against him would have tightened his grip. I knew he was wound up. I knew he could hurt me, and I didn’t want him to blame himself if he lost control when he was unconscious. So I laid still; I let him hold me as tight as he needed, and my heart broke for the man lying in the bed with me, begging for someone to save him.

Curtis stirred in his sleep, rolling over and extending one arm out onto the mattress to reach for me. I was already up, showered and with two cups of coffee sitting on the bookcase next to me while I waited for him to wake up. He wanted control – I got that. I understood why. He was a typical alpha-male, and then some. Add his naturally possessive and dominant nature to the death of his parents, his guilt over Oliver’s death, finding out the man who raised him was my father, and the woman who raised him as her own was stuck in the middle, oblivious to what was happening, and whatever he meant yesterday when he said he was a criminal, I could understand why he was the way he was. I still hadn’t scratched the surface. Like all those years ago, I knew Curtis was hiding himself from me.

But he needed to give control as much as he needed to exert it. I wasn’t the only one who needed protecting. I realised, as he fisted the bed sheet and mumbled something incoherent, that he saved me once before, by sending me away. We would have torn each other apart if he hadn’t. I’d had the gift of Thomas Radley – I’d had the love I’d never dared to dream of. He taught me to be brave, strong, and he taught me to love. I had to remember that. I had to remember how special Thomas made me feel and how precious our borrowed time together was to me. I had to use it to save Curtis. I had to love him the way he deserved, but had never allowed himself to feel.

I decided to let him sleep, setting his coffee on the bedside cabinet, and I carried mine downstairs.

“Down here, sweetie!” came the beautiful voice of Curtis’ aunt when my bare feet touched the ground floor.

I found a door cracked open and stepped through it, descending the stairs to the basement. Lois was sitting at a sewing machine with music playing quietly in the background.

“How did you know it was me?”

She looked up at the ceiling, directly beneath the staircase. “It sounds like an elephant stampede when Curtis comes down them.”

I laughed and accepted the stool Lois kicked out for me.

“Maggie and I used to come down here a lot,” she mused, dropping her hands from her sewing machine to her lap.

“Maggie?”

“My sister. Curtis’ mother. We used to escape down here when the men pulled out the scotch.” I fought for breath at the thought of my father spending time here with his wife when he’d left his other family at home. “After she died it became the only place I could get Curtis to open up. We used to play down here a lot…it was like he felt her, and he became the happy little boy with two real parents again.”

I didn’t respond. I tried not to think of anything but Curtis, and let Lois spend time with her thoughts, waiting for her to continue.

“Phil and Michael never agreed on anything. Maggie and I had known Michael our whole lives, and he didn’t take to Phil. Curtis noticed. I think he thought he was the problem, but Phil resented Michael for never letting him in. I think the resentment passed to Curtis when Maggie and Michael died, and I don’t know how to fix it.”

“I…” I paused and took a breath. “I…Curtis can be difficult. Men can be difficult.” I tried to laugh, but choked. “As long as they both love you, I think that’s what matters. Curtis adores you.”