Lex and Lu(91)

Walking to him she got right in his face. “Is that what you needed to know, Lex? Did I stroke your ego enough? Does it make you feel better to know that I’ve loved you the whole time? That I never stopped? That my dreams, which I’ve buried but held on to, are filled with images of us being a family? Does that make you fucking happy, Lex?” Seething, with tears she couldn’t feel coursing down her face, she held her ground. “Don’t you dare call me the Ice Queen, you son of a bitch. You fucking left me. So any ice around my heart is on you.”

He reached out for her, trying to pull her into his embrace, but she fought him, arms flailing as her strength was no match for his. He held her stiffly in his arms, with her still pushing him away.

“Lu, I’m so sorry.”

Pushing against him with a force that surprised both of them, she flew back from his body. “Don’t fucking touch me. I don’t want your pity. I don’t want anything from you.” She turned and ran from the room.



He tried. She’d asked him to leave her alone and he did. For about fifteen minutes. Fifteen slow, agonizing minutes. Sitting heavily on the couch, his head resting in his hands, he fought the good fight. Then he followed her. Opening the door to her room, he found her standing at the window, arms wrapped tightly across her chest. He silently closed the door and walked to her. Engulfing her tiny frame, he slid his arms around her and pulled her against him. This time, she didn’t fight.

He’d expected tears, but her silence spread through him, a chasm between them.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered as he bent his head to her ear. Without meaning to or even being conscious of his actions, he kissed her below her ear, on the spot he’d claimed at seventeen.

Lu drew a long shuddering breath that rippled through both of them. “What are you sorry for?” she asked, no hint of her earlier anger present.

He didn’t mean to, but he smiled against her neck. “A lot. Mostly for the funeral.”

He felt her stiffen.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

Without relinquishing his hold on her, he tried to comfort her with his body, hoping to soften his words. “My relentless pursuit,” he said simply.

“Of everything—that’s what you are sorry for?”

He knew that if he’d been looking at her, her eyes would have been wide with questions. “Yeah. We’d be in a different place if I’d stayed away from you.”

She shrugged. “Perhaps.”

He lifted his head from her neck and rested it on hers. Standing together, they were quiet for a long time, both lost in their thoughts, not ready to share. Lex attempted to reconcile his part in the sequence of events that had brought them to this point. He’d been slowly maneuvering the pieces in his mind, trying to get a clear picture. He chalked up his laissez-faire reaction to Lu’s supposed abortion and his subsequent radio silence to the category of immaturity. At nineteen, with his dream within his reach, he’d taken the out that was offered. Even with hindsight, blah, blah, blah, he thought the outcome would have been the same. What he could have changed, the thing he wished they could do over, was his relentless pursuit of her when they met at the funeral. He was so accustomed to sex without strings that he’d blown their chance. If he’d listened to her, her plea for him to give her time to talk to him after the funeral, maybe this outcome could have been different.

Or maybe not, he thought as his body began to react to her nearness. He wasn’t sure when the embrace of comfort began to change. He’d wanted her then and he wanted her now. But that’s exactly what had gotten them here—separated by their past. Kissing her on top of the head, he let her go.





39





Lex expected Lu to bail on their Christmas Eve activities. He’d expected it and almost welcomed it. After their fight, he’d been unable to sleep. He’d hoped that if he pushed her hard enough she’d let go of some of the tightly held control. Fairly certain that she’d held on to all of that anger and angst for the last nine years, he couldn’t help but experience a myriad of emotions. She’d needed to say all of those things to him years ago. He’d robbed her of an outlet. Who did she have to talk to all of those years? Even Willa seemed to play some inadvertent role in their saga. While he felt sorry for all the pain he’d caused her, she’d admitted to him that she still hoped they could be together. He didn’t know if she still held on to that dream, but he knew midway through their fight he wanted that.

He’d assumed that their coming together at the funeral had all been about familiarity and comfort. But being with her he experienced emotions he’d been unable to replicate during his years away from her. The night they’d spent together at his father’s funeral haunted him—that and their last encounter. He didn’t know if he would be able to convince her, but he wanted another chance. But he was stuck. He couldn’t ask her to take another chance on him. He knew he could coerce her, but he didn’t want to have to. So for the day, he left her to her own devices and did his best to provide her with the space she seemed to want.