Bastard(122)
“How is Meg? Do you still see her?” When we were kids those two were always together.
“She lives overseas with her husband, Drew. We still talk on the phone when we can, but it’s not the same.” You can clearly hear the sadness in her voice as she talks. “They move around a lot, and with the time differences between countries, it’s hard. I miss her so much.” I bet she does. Meg married? For some reason I can’t picture that.
“Does she know about the tumour?”
“No. She has her own worries. She doesn’t need to be burdened down with mine,” she replies giving me a half-hearted smile.
“Regardless, Indi. She’s your friend, she’d want to know.” She shrugs at my reply.
“If the opportunity arises next time we talk, I’ll tell her.” I can see this subject is getting her down, so I quickly change it to something else.
“I can’t wait for you to see my shop. There’s something special about it that I haven’t told you,” I say squeezing her hand.
“Really?” Her face lights up when she looks at me. “What?”
“You’ll see when we get there.”
“Indi Ink,” she whispers when I pull up outside. “Oh my God. You named your shop after me,” she squeals, her head snapping in my direction.
“I did,” I reply smiling when I see the look on her face.
“When?” she asks excitedly as we exit the car.
“When I opened it.”
“But that was four years ago.” Her beautiful eyes widen when she walks towards the shop, her head tilted back so she can see the sign.
“I know. It’s silly I guess, but I wanted you to be a part of it somehow.”
“It’s not silly,” she whispers before launching herself into my arms. “It’s amazing. I’m so touched that you would do that.” Her lips are on mine before I get a chance to reply. “I love it. I love you,” she says against my mouth. My hands slide around her waist, drawing her closer. I love that she loves me, because I love her so fucking much.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Indiana
“Thank you for making me part of your shop,” I say when I pull back from the kiss. I got all choked up when I first saw it. I thought maybe he’d changed the name recently, but the fact he named it after me, even when I wasn’t in his life anymore, means so much more. It confirms everything I hoped all those years ago—that he hadn’t forgotten about me after he left, and that I did mean something to him.
“You still held my heart the whole time I was gone,” he admits, making me melt. The sincerity in his words brings a lump to my throat as my hold on him tightens. I can’t believe we wasted five long years of our lives apart. In saying that though, I know it will only make us more appreciative of what we have now.
“Can we go in and take a look around?” I ask with excitement. I want to see what it looks like inside. I want to see him in all his glory. I’m so proud of everything he’s achieved. Even though my heart was broken after he left, the hardest part for me was not knowing what had become of him. He was all alone. A teenager with a huge chip on his shoulder and a mountain of anger inside him. That’s what worried me the most.
My main concern was that he’d get himself into trouble. Or worse, turn to alcohol or drugs to cope. I’m so grateful that wasn’t the case. Even back then, as much as he tried to hide it, I knew his heart was good. He was just tainted by a stupid word.
“Really? You want to go inside now?” The disappointment in his voice doesn’t go unnoticed. When he pulls me back against him and I feel his hard on pressing into my back, I know why. “I was hoping to take you upstairs first.” The hopeful look on his face almost has me agreeing. But I want to get this out of the way so we can lock ourselves away for the rest of the night. I’ve been busting to see it.
“Just a quick one. Then you can take me upstairs and ravish me.”
“Deal,” he says grabbing hold of my hand and dragging me towards the shop. He unlocks the door and flicks on the main switch lighting the place up. My eyes dart everywhere as he disables the alarm system. I love it already. It’s nothing like I imagined.
“Okay. You’ve seen it, let’s go.” He reaches for my hand to drag me back out the door, but I pull away from him. Nice try buddy.
“Let me look around first,” I say with a small laugh as I pull out of his grip and step further into the reception area. I hear him sigh behind me, but I ignore it. It’s huge. It doesn’t look so big from the street. The floors are tiled in a dark charcoal grey. There are two long, black leather sofas right in the middle of the room, sitting on a turquoise blue shag pile rug. A black coffee table sits in the middle of the sofas. There are four large black albums stacked on top.