Straddling the Line(92)
She had no more answers today than she had yesterday when she’d arrived. She was still smarting from Trevor asking her to leave and didn’t know what to do about it. Her heart hurt, and it was an awful feeling she simply didn’t want to have. She wanted it all to go away.
She had to get back to work. She’d already spent way too much time mourning her father. She wasn’t going to let herself live in this state of hurt again. Burying herself in work was the solution to all her problems.
“So now that you know Trevor’s secret, what are you going to do about it?” her mom asked as they stood side by side at the kitchen counter.
Haven paused, knife in her hand. “What am I going to do about it? Nothing.”
Her mother slid her a look.
“What? He threw me out of his house. I begged him over and over again to talk to me. I offered to help over and over again, too. And still, he told me to leave. He threw me out.”
“Haven. He’s hurt. And obviously scared.”
She wasn’t buying it. She was hurt, too. “He had ample opportunity to talk to me, Mom. The bottom line is, he doesn’t trust me.”
Her mother laid down the paring knife she’d been using and leaned her hip against the counter. “I know you’re hurt. You care about him, so you’re lettin’ your emotions cloud your judgment. You worked with people like Trevor when you were in school. You know how defensive they got when forced to face what they felt were inadequacies. Don’t you think that’s exactly what Trevor did when you backed him up against the wall and forced him to face the truth about himself?”
“I didn’t—” But she had. She’d pushed him and pushed him until she’d made him admit a secret he’d held on to for his entire life. He’d been angry and upset and he’d lashed out at her. She’d seen it time and time again during her undergraduate studies, when she’d worked with people who had literacy issues. They got angry and defensive, a lot of times with the people they cared about the most who were only trying to help them.
Haven sighed. “This is hard. I care about him. But I can’t help him if he won’t let me in his life.”
“Do you want to help him?”
“Of course I do.”
Her mom picked up the knife and resumed chopping carrots. “Then you’ll figure out a way. If anyone can, Haven, it’s you. I’ve never known anyone more tenacious.”
She thought about it as they prepped and then ate dinner, and long after her mom had gone to bed.
She’d let her own hurt and her own needs get in the way. She loved him, and she hadn’t told him that. Would it have made a difference? She didn’t know, but she should have tried. She’d walked away when she should have stood her ground and stayed. She should have been a support system to him, not a hindrance.
But maybe this break was good for both of them. Not for long, though.
She had to go back, had to make him understand that she would be there for him if and when he decided he wanted help. Because she could help him.
If anyone could, she could.
She wasn’t going to give up on him.
And this time, she wasn’t going to let him push her away.
THIRTY-THREE
THE GAME AT DALLAS HAD GONE OKAY. THEY’D WON, but only by a field goal. And they hadn’t won because of anything Trevor had done. In fact, he’d downright sucked balls in this game. He’d dropped two passes, caught one for short yardage, and otherwise would have done better acting as the water boy on the sidelines for all the contributions he’d made to the team.
Fortunately, his teammates had more than made up for his deficiencies, allowing them to at least stay in the game.
He felt like shit. He’d felt like shit before the game started, and the two days before, when he’d come out of his room to find that Haven had left.
Not that it should have surprised him to find her gone. He was the one who’d asked her to leave. No. He hadn’t even asked. He’d told her to leave. Hell, he’d tossed her out, so what had he expected her to do? And then, like a little boy, he’d run up to his room and locked himself inside, scared and afraid that the world was going to find out his secret.
He was such an asshole. For someone who always claimed to be big and bad and fearless, he hadn’t shown any of that when he’d told Haven his secret. Instead, he’d hurled accusations at her and hurt her.
He’d blamed her, as if his problem had been her fault. And then he’d hidden away like a goddamned child.
Some big and bad he was.
He missed her. Just like it had been since she’d first shown up in his life to do the interview, whenever she was gone, he missed her absence. It was like there was a part of himself missing whenever she wasn’t around.