Cowboy Up(77)
“Is that . . . Are you . . . to Clay Davis?”
“Why does it even matter to you?” I sigh, shaking my head. “You have no say in my life, John. You haven’t for years. Why now, after all this time, is tellin’ me you’re sorry so dadgum important?”
He keeps shaking his head, not looking away from my ring. He mumbles something I can’t hear under his breath before looking up at me with worried eyes. “I loved you, you know,” he finally says. “I don’t know what to do now.”
Clayton’s words about John being on drugs filter through my thoughts when I realize how odd he’s acting. Knowing what I do about his past here in Pine Oak and having firsthand knowledge about just how violent he can be, I should be blind with fear. Heck, months ago I would have been. But I’ve come too far to let him push me right back into that person who was afraid of living.
“I want you to leave me alone. I want you to leave Clayton alone. And if you’re goin’ to be livin’ in Pine Oak too, then I want you to avoid us at all costs. I survived what you did to me, John. I made it through that, and even though it took me a while to find my reward, I have it, and I’m not goin’ to let you try and dirty that up with everything that is you.”
He opens his mouth to say something, but I release my arms and hold one up to stop him silently.
“I don’t want to hear your apologies, because they mean nothin’ to me. Just like you. Do you understand that, John?”
He shakes his head sadly, looking down. “I loved you.”
“No! No, you didn’t. You loved owning someone who feared you. You loved the power of breakin’ me. You loved you!”
“You’re wrong, Caroline. I’ve done everything for you.”
I snort. “You must be delusional.”
“Don’t marry him. I won’t be able to save you.”
This time I laugh in his face. “You? Save me? You’re a riot.”
“I tried,” he says, but stops and shakes his head.
“You inflicted pain. Don’t get that mixed up. It’s been years, John. I’ve finally moved on and I’m so happy, it’s ridiculous. You’re sorry? Great. If it’s my forgiveness you want or need, then you’ll be waiting for a while. You can’t give forgiveness to someone you’ve forgotten. And you, John, are just a forgotten memory.”
I turn my back and load the last four bags into my trunk before shutting it and walking the buggy back to the return. When I start walking back to my car, I don’t see him anywhere.
The first thing I do when I climb into my car is grab my phone and call Clayton.
“You on your way, darlin’?”
“I just ran into John.”
Silence.
“Clayton?”
“I heard you,” he answers with venom in his tone. “He touch you?”
“What? No, Clayton.”
“What did he want?”
I sigh, then tell him what happened, trying to remember what John had said, but knowing I probably got some of it wrong. Still, even though it was pretty harmless, I can tell Clayton is about to lose his mind.
“He wanted to apologize. It doesn’t make any sense to me, why he’d feel that’s somethin’ to be done so many years later, but nevertheless, he did. He startled me only because I wasn’t expectin’ him, but Clayton, I didn’t feel anything but done. I don’t fear him or what he did to me anymore.”
“He could’ve hurt you,” Clayton finally says, letting me know what’s really upsetting him.
“He didn’t. And I’m not the weak little girl who won’t fight back. I’ve got all the reasons in the world to fight, and if he had been stupid enough to try and touch me in the middle of Main Street, I guarantee I wouldn’t have been fightin’ by myself for long.”
He grumbles under his breath.
“We’re gettin’ married tonight, Clayton Davis. Don’t you dare let this put a cloud over our weddin’ night. It happened, it’s done, and you know about it because I didn’t want you hearin’ it from someone else. I’m fine, and in just a couple of hours, we’re goin’ to be husband and wife. No one can stand in the way of that kinda happiness.”
“Get home, Linney. Get home and no more of that shit about me not seein’ you before tonight. I need to see with my own eyes that you’re fine.”
I smile, leaning my head back against the headrest. “I’ll see you in our spot tonight, and not a second earlier.”
I laugh outright when I hear him bellow out his complaints before I can disconnect the call. Not wanting to make him suffer too much, I quickly take a picture of myself and text it to him, happiness and love written all over my face, my smile big and my eyes dancing. I place my phone on the passenger’s seat and back out of the lot to head over to Leighton’s place, ignoring the chimes announcing texts that don’t stop coming in the whole way to her house.