“Look at me, Liv.” His tone firm, but words soft, I take a deep breath in. Hesitantly, I lift my eyes and find his. Our gaze locked, he’s quiet for a moment before he speaks. Eyes searching mine, I find my own sorrow and sadness reflected back at me. “Nothing happened with Summer.”
“But Summer said…”
His voice is low and calm, yet his tone is firmer, more commanding. “Nothing happened, Liv.”
I want so badly to believe him…my body aches to trust his words. He sees my internal struggle on my face.
“You need me to tell you the details?” The words sound cruel, but he’s offering them to me because he knows how I am. Even if I told him I believed him, visions of the two of them would consume me, subconscious doubt never allowing me to fully forget. I need the full story, so my imagination doesn’t make up its own.
I nod.
Vinny closes his eyes for a moment, reaching for strength. When he reopens them, I see torment and it breaks my heart. So badly, I want to reach out and hold him, make it better, take his pain away, but I can’t. I need to hear what he has to tell me. Pain in his words when he speaks makes tears sting my eyes, but I fight to keep them back. “Summer came to see me. Told me about the story you were writing. I told her to get out, I didn’t want to believe her. She left me her card, with her home address written on the back.”
Vinny pauses. The hope I had felt hearing him say nothing happened with Summer begins to flee.
“I was pissed, Liv. Angry. I wanted to hurt you back. I just couldn’t shake it, no matter how hard I hit the bag or how fast I ran. So I headed out to find some random woman to help me forget. And somehow I wound up at Summer’s.” I flinch at his words. Releasing me from his gaze, Vinny bows his head. His expression one of shame, he continues, “It’s what I’ve always done, Liv.”
Unable to hold it all back any longer, a lone tear falls from my eyes, just in time for Vinny to look up at me and gently wipe it from my cheek. His hands cup my face and pull me closer to him. “Nothing happened. I went there and she let me in smiling. It would have been so easy.” He shakes his head, thinking back, remembering. “But I couldn’t do it. And her big gloating smile, just made me more pissed. She was enjoying hurting you. So I left. Didn’t lay a finger on her. Think I might’ve put a hole in the wall behind her door, I flung it open so fast to get the hell out of there.”
Vinny leans down to me, his face so close I can feel his warm breath on my cheek. “I didn’t touch her, Liv.” His thumb brushes my cheek tenderly. “Do you believe me?”
I nod my head, because I do. It’s the honesty in his eyes that makes me believe him.
Closing his eyes with a look of relief, he leans his forehead against mine for a long moment. There’s less tension and anxiety in his face when he pulls his head back, but some of it’s still there, lurking in the shadows of tranquility. “Why didn’t you just tell me about the story, Liv?”
I wish there was an easy answer. One that would take away the pain I see in the depths of his eyes. Pain that I put there. He trusted me and I let him down. Seeing the hurt on his face, knowing I put it there, hurts me even more than I ached thinking he was with Summer. But I know I need to be honest with him, give him what he just gave me, if there’s any chance of us ever getting past it all. So I start with the truth, because it’s where I should have started all along.
“At the beginning, I talked myself into that it wasn’t true. I think I thought I could prove it and I’d get both things I wanted…the job and you.” I pause, thinking back to the minute I realized I was only fooling myself. “Then I met Senator Knight. And Jax.”
Vinny’s jaw clenches. I’m not sure if it’s the mention of his father or if he’s remembering meeting Jax at the exhibition fight. “He put his hands on you, Mom told me.” He searches my face, fists clenching in an innate response, his protective instinct taking hold of him at even the thought of someone laying their hands on me.
“By the time I realized it was true, I couldn’t bring myself to tell you. I didn’t want to hurt you. You’ve always been proud of your father’s memory. Sometimes I felt like you needed it. I just didn’t want to take that away from you.”
“So you never used me for a story?” His voice is desperate, full of agony at even having to ask the question. He needs to know that it was real. Needs to understand I could never betray him like that.
“I wanted to protect you. I never meant to hurt you.”