SIENNA
They hadn’t let me out of my bedroom since my doctor’s visit. I had been throwing up so bad for two mornings in a row that my mother had taken me to the doctor. She’d thought I had a stomach virus.
But we had both been surprised when the doctor informed us that I was pregnant. Not sick. Pregnant.
Mother hadn’t spoken to me the whole way home, and then she’d sent me to my room and ordered me to stay. My dad never once came to see me. Mother showed up with food at my door three times a day. I even had to open the door and ask to go to the bathroom.
I knew they were upset. I was terrified. Dustin was gone, and I had no one I could tell. No one to share this with, and now my parents were shutting me out. That scared me more than anything. The one thing I could be sure of was that this baby was safe. My father was too religious to make me have an abortion. For once I was thankful for his strict beliefs.
But I had questions, and I had no one to ask. My mother refused to speak to me when she brought me my meals. I didn’t have a phone in my room, and no one had stopped by to see me. That wasn’t too surprising. Dustin’s friends had accepted me, but they had never really been my friends.
So I sat here in my window seat and watched the world outside. I watched the people who came and visited the Falcos. People were still bringing them food. It was what we did here in the South. If someone died, you took their family food. I never understood that. I hadn’t been able to eat for days after Dustin’s death. I had cried and slept. That had been all I could manage.
At his funeral, what little strength I had to keep it together was gone the second I saw Dewayne Falco’s shoulders slumped, jerking harshly from crying. I never even imagined that Dewayne could cry. He was so tough and larger than life. But in that moment, seeing him broken, I lost it all over again. I hated seeing him in so much pain. He loved his brother, and Dustin had worshiped Dewayne.
At night whenever I closed my eyes, the image of Dewayne sobbing over his brother’s grave haunted me. I had wanted to hold him even though I knew he wouldn’t welcome it. No one could console him. No one could bring back Dustin.
We had all lost him.
Including the little life inside me.
I touched my stomach reverently, closed my eyes, and dreamed of the child inside. What would he or she look like? I wondered if it would have its father’s smile and charm. If it would grow up a Falco or a Roy. If the Falcos would accept this baby. I knew my parents were upset, but surely Tabby would love this baby.
I opened my eyes just as Dewayne walked across the street toward my house. Quickly I moved back behind the curtains and watched as he stepped up onto my porch. The doorbell rang, and I hurried over to my bedroom door to crack it open so I could hear him. Why was he here? I hadn’t seen him leave his parents’ house much over the past few weeks.
“Hello, Dewayne,” my mother said in a gentler tone than I’d expected. At least she respected the fact that he’d lost his brother. She didn’t have to be angry at him because I was pregnant. I was just glad my dad was at work.
“Is Sienna here?” he asked.
He was here to see me. Someone to talk to. Someone else who was hurting and lost without Dustin. Someone I trusted above anyone else.
“No. She isn’t here any longer. She’s been sent to a . . . facility up North. She had issues dealing with everything, and she wasn’t right emotionally.”
What?
“Oh. Uh, I didn’t realize she’d left. I . . . When is she coming back?”
“I don’t know. Not anytime soon,” my mother replied.
What? Was she serious? I was right here in my bedroom like I had been for a week now. Did she honestly plan to keep me locked up like this? Wasn’t that illegal? I had to see a doctor at some point.
“Is there a number where I can reach her?”
“No. She can’t communicate with anyone here. It upsets her. Talking to you will upset her. She needs time and medication.”
Holy crap! My mother was making me out to be a crazy person.
“Well, when she’s ready to talk to someone again, can you please have her call me? I can leave my number. I’d like to check on her. See if she’s doing well. I don’t want her to think we don’t care. We know she lost him too.”
I got a funny tightening in my chest that only Dewayne Falco managed to inspire. How could someone like Dewayne, with his party-boy ways, be so incredibly sweet? He’d been like that my freshman year. He always seemed to be there when I needed him.
“Sure. I’ll give her your number,” Mother said in a clipped voice. I’d never see Dewayne’s number. She’d burn it first.
“Thanks. Tell her that I came by and that I’m thinking about her.”
“Okay. Thank you, Dewayne. Tell your parents they are in our prayers. You all are.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said.
I closed my door quietly, then ran back over to my window and watched as Dewayne walked away. I would find a way to see him and talk to him. He’d made the first move, and now it was my turn to make a move. He would love this baby. It was part of Dustin. If my parents wanted to lock me up, he could help me escape. He was older. He would know what to do. I just had to find a way to get to him.
* * *
The next morning before the sun came up, my mother woke me and hurried me out to my father’s station wagon, then handed me a suitcase before she climbed into the passenger seat. My father was already in the driver’s seat. I looked over at him, but he didn’t say a word. He didn’t even turn to look at me.
“Where are we going?” I asked, almost afraid she was about to make good on that story she’d told Dewayne. I wasn’t crazy. Surely they couldn’t get doctors to keep me if I was perfectly sane.
“Your aunt Cathy’s. She’s agreed to take you in until you’ve had the baby.”
That was the last thing my mother said to me. We rode in silence the eleven hours it took to drive to Fort Worth, Texas. My father never once acknowledged my existence. When we arrived, they unloaded me and handed me my suitcase. Spoke in whispered voices with my aunt Cathy, who I had never met before, then drove away without a good-bye.
Present day . . .
DEWAYNE
Micah lay sprawled out over me, fast asleep while Darth Vader kicked ass and took names on the television. The original plan had been to watch Pirates of the Caribbean. But then Micah said his mother liked Captain Jack and that we had to wait on her to start the movie.
Hell no was Sienna going to sit here and look at Johnny F*cking Depp. I had ejected that DVD really damn fast and stuck in one of the Star Wars discs. I didn’t even care which one it was. Just so Sienna wasn’t thinking about some other man.
Sienna walked into the room with that silky little wrap around her and her hair in damp curls, her face scrubbed free of makeup. “Is he asleep?” she asked, moving toward us.
“Yeah,” I said, wondering if she had anything on under that wrap.
“Let’s get him into bed,” she said, bending down to scoop him up.
“I got him,” I told her.
“Okay.” She stepped back and let me stand up with him, and then she led the way back to his room and pulled his covers back so I could tuck him in. Tonight we’d made sure he was bathed and in his pajamas before movie time.
She bent down and kissed his little cheek.
“Love you, Momma,” he muttered with his eyes closed.
“Love you more,” she replied.
When she turned to leave the room, I bent down and ruffled his hair. He was such a little thing. So much like his daddy at that age.
“Love you, Uncle Dewayne,” he said in that same little groggy voice.
My throat closed up, and I had to swallow hard to loosen it up before I could speak. “Love you, kiddo,” I told him.
He pulled the covers under his chin and snuggled deeper into his bed.
This moment was all because of Sienna. She’d made this possible.
I f*cking loved her. Not just because she’d given me this kid to help heal what I’d lost, but because she’d stolen a piece of my soul with those big eyes and that sweet smile when she was fourteen. I’d wanted to be close to her and keep her safe. I hadn’t exactly known why then, I’d just known I wanted her happy. It was important to me.
But I knew why now. She was special. The kind of special that is hard to find in this life. The kind of special most people don’t get to touch. It’s the rare kind that, when you find it, you know it’s worth fighting for.
Her hand softly touched my arm. “Today went well.” Her voice was a whisper.
I wrapped my fingers around her small hand and walked out of the room with her by my side.
When she closed the door behind her, I was able to peek down the front of her wrap to see that she was in fact naked under there. Hell yeah.
“I hope he’s a deep sleeper, because I got some plans that involve you naked with those long legs of yours over my shoulders.”
Sienna glanced back up at me with wide eyes. “Tonight?”
“F*ck yeah, tonight. I hope you don’t think I’m going home without you. I told you I wasn’t going anywhere and, baby, I was speaking real literal. If you’re here, then I’m here.”
“Oh,” she said as she swayed toward me slightly.
“Yeah, oh. Get your ass in that room and let me unwrap my present,” I said, turning her toward her bedroom door and walking her inside, then locking it behind me.
The double bed that sat in the middle of the room was so damn small. Sleeping on that was going to be tough, but I’d have my king-size one moved in tomorrow. Tonight we could deal with a double.
“Dewayne?”
I tore my eyes off the small bed and my plans and focused on the almost-naked beauty in front of me. “Yeah?”
She fidgeted with the satin belt, keeping me from seeing all her creamy pale skin underneath. “You staying here is moving fast. I don’t want Micah to get his hopes up if in a couple of weeks you realize this isn’t what you want.”
She didn’t get it. Of course she didn’t. Sienna Roy didn’t understand that she was special. I had a lifetime to show her just how special she was.
“This ain’t something I’m trying out, Sienna. I don’t f*cking try shit out. I either want it or I don’t. And I’ve wanted you since I was seventeen years old. Admitting that shit ain’t easy. It felt wrong for so long because I love Dustin. I’ll always love him, and I’ll miss him to the day I die. But he had what I desired, and more than anything I wanted you to be happy. I thought Dustin was who would make you smile. He was who you loved. So I made sure you got what you wanted. But he didn’t see what he had. He wasn’t careful with it. He didn’t cherish it, and in the end he lost it all too young. So I won’t be changing my mind in a few weeks. I don’t do this shit. I never did this shit. Because they were never you.”
Sienna inhaled deeply as she stared at me. I waited on her to say something, anything, to assure me that I wasn’t alone here. That she felt something more. That this was different for her.
She reached for the belt on her wrap and tugged it open, letting it fall and giving me the view I’d been wanting. “Show me,” she said softly.
Confused, I looked up from her tits to her eyes. “Show you?”
She nodded. “Show me with your body just how different this is for you.”
Oh, f*ck yes. I could do that.
“Challenge accepted,” I said, closing the space between us and shoving the wrap off her arms and letting it fall to the floor in a heap.
She shivered as I ran a finger from the valley between her breasts to her navel, then back up again. So soft. So perfect. “Mine,” I told her.
Her breathing hitched, and it made her tits jiggle. F*ck, that was nice.
SIENNA
When I pulled into the driveway, my father’s station wagon sat in the driveway right behind Dewayne’s truck. I’d only been at work four hours, and Dewayne hadn’t called me to let me know my mother was here. Because that was the only person it could be. I hadn’t seen her in six years, and those last memories weren’t happy ones.
And she was in that house with my baby. I didn’t even grab my purse before I bolted out of the car and took off running. When I reached the door, it was locked. The keys were in my hands. I’d at least pulled them out of the ignition in my hurry. Unlocking the door, I ran inside.
“Micah?” I called out. “Dewayne?”
No answer. I couldn’t call her name. What did I even call her? Mom? She hadn’t been that when I needed it most. I walked through the house, but it was empty. No one was here. Could they be at the Falcos’?
The front door opened, and I hurried back to the living room. But the sight of her made me stop. Her hair was gray now. Completely gray. I had been born to my parents late in life and my mother’s hair was already starting to gray when I lived at home. Seeing it completely gray now was startling. Her face looked like it had aged ten years instead of six, and she was thinner.
“Sienna,” she said with an uneasy smile. “You look beautiful.”
I looked different too. She’d sent off a sixteen-year-old girl. I was a woman now. A woman with a child.
“Where are Micah and Dewayne?” I asked.
She looked hurt, but she covered it up quickly. I would not feel guilty for that. She had abandoned me. I could never hurt her as badly as she had hurt me. Nothing compared.
“I don’t know. I knocked and no one answered, so I walked around back, then heard a car drive up. I didn’t recognize the fancy car, but it seems you’re doing well now, from the looks of it.”
That meant Dewayne and Micah were at the Falcos’, and the moment Dewayne looked outside and saw my father’s car in the drive, he’d be over here fast. I wanted him here. I just wanted Micah to stay there. She’d given us this house and given Micah that room, but seeing her now and remembering, I wasn’t ready to forgive her.
“You never called. I had hoped you would call,” she said.
“I know what that feels like. I had hoped you would call once too. Or at least give a shit.”
She flinched. Again, I would not feel guilty. She did this to us. To me.
“The Falcos know about Micah now, I take it? Since Dewayne is with him.”
“Yeah. They missed five years of his life because letters I sent never made it to them. Aunt Cathy says I need to talk to you about that.”
Mother looked as if that didn’t surprise her. She must have gotten a call from her sister about it.
The door behind her opened, and Dewayne filled the space. A fierce, protective glare was on his face, and his body was tensed and ready to defend me. He stepped around my mother and stood in front of me just slightly. “You okay?” he asked, his gaze softening for me.
I nodded, then reached for his hand. His large one engulfed mine.
“I should have figured this would happen. I knew when you came to see her the day before we took her to Texas that it was more than just checking on her.” Mother’s voice wasn’t condemning or judgmental. More like relieved.
“You told me she was already gone,” Dewayne said, turning to look back at my mother.
Mother at least looked apologetic. “I had a pregnant sixteen-year-old daughter, and the father of her child was dead. I didn’t know what to do. I was trying to save her future. She was too young to make the right decisions.”
The right decisions? Hauling me off and trying to force me to give up my baby was not the right decision.
“Keeping Micah was the best decision of my life,” I yelled, unable to control the anger burning inside me at the idea of her not wanting my son.
She nodded. “Yes, it was. You knew better than we did. You knew you could be a good mother. A better mother than I was to you. You showed us all that you would fight to give him a life. And you’ve done a wonderful job. I’m proud of you. I didn’t make you the woman you are, but I’m still proud of you.”
My eyes stung with unshed tears, and I gulped down air to keep from sobbing. “You have no idea what it was like. Loving him all on my own. Trying to be enough for him. Trying to be mother and father to him. Telling him how special he was and that he was my world while he asked questions about not having the family other kids had. You don’t know! You don’t know what it was like! He needed you. I needed you.” The sobs stopped me from saying any more. Then Dewayne’s arms were around me, holding me.
I had imagined this moment a million times since the day she drove out of my life. Never had it been like this. Never had I broken down like this. I was always resolute and strong. I was always proud of myself and would show her I hadn’t needed them. I hadn’t needed her. But never did I break down and cry.
The lost girl who didn’t know how she was going to do it alone was back. She hadn’t been gone. Not really. All along she’d been there underneath the surface. That girl was a fighter, but she was also hiding so much pain. So much betrayal.
“Your father . . . he was devastated. We had tried so hard to protect you. To keep you safe and away from bad decisions. We trusted Dustin. We trusted you. But then Dustin was gone, and you were pregnant. We couldn’t see another way.”
I wiped at my eyes, and Dewayne soothed me with slow strokes down my head and back. I had to pull it together. I had to get through this. I was strong. I had grown up fast, and for a moment I needed to be that girl again. I needed to tell her what she had done to me. And tell her what I had done for myself.
I moved, and Dewayne eased his hold on me but kept his hand on my back, letting me know he was there. He wasn’t leaving me, and I wasn’t alone. He would have been there back then, too, if he’d only been given the chance to know. To be there. He would have been. How different Micah’s life would have been.
My mother and father had taken so much from him. I didn’t know if I was capable of forgiving that. Hurting me was one thing, but hurting Micah was another.
“Micah deserved to know the Falcos. He was robbed of that. They were robbed of that for five years. What did you do with the letters, Mother? Where did they go if they didn’t go to the Falcos? I wrote at least a hundred. I sent photos. For years I tried to reach them. And all along my letters never got there.”
Mother sighed wearily and crossed her arms over her chest in a defensive posture. Then she looked up at Dewayne. “I didn’t want them to use you and your baby. They had lost Dustin, and then they’d suffered the blow of that Bart girl aborting Dustin’s baby. I didn’t want the world to know you were pregnant with his son too. If they knew, then everyone else would know. You’d not only be a teen mom, but you’d be one of Dustin Falco’s many. I couldn’t let that happen to you. You deserved more.”
I heard what she was saying, but . . . it wasn’t sinking in. It didn’t make sense.
“Kimmy?” I asked, trying to understand why she thought Kimmy Bart had aborted Dustin’s baby.
My mother’s eyes flared with something I didn’t understand as she looked at Dewayne. “You didn’t tell her,” my mother accused.
Dewayne didn’t speak.
He wasn’t talking, and my mother was angry. She was angry at Dewayne.
About Kimmy Bart. And a baby.
“Kimmy was pregnant too?” I asked, still trying to process this.
My mother’s eyes softened with sympathy and something close to sorrow. “I’m sorry, Sienna. I thought by now you would have heard. I didn’t know they’d kept that from you. You’re old enough and it’s been long enough that you can handle the truth. Dustin Falco wasn’t sleeping with just you. Kimmy Bart was pregnant with his baby too. Except she was further along than you, and Dustin knew about it when he died. Kimmy made sure everyone in town knew he was hiding it from you.”
Something inside me died too at that moment. Something I would never get back.
DEWAYNE
Sienna shut down right in front of my eyes. All emotion left her face, and she just stared straight ahead. The one thing I never wanted her to know, her f*cking useless excuse for a mother just tells her without warning or preparation. I’d tried to stop her, but the horror of Sienna knowing robbed me of words. I’d been frozen in this awful reality.
“Baby, look at me,” I said, reaching for her, but she stepped back. She didn’t look at me, and instead she moved away. That was worse than someone slicing me open with a blade.
“You were better than Dustin. He was weak—” her mother started, but I turned and glared at her.
“SHUT THE F*ck UP!” I roared. She’d said enough. I never wanted to hear her speak again.
“Don’t defend him. He used her,” she said.
“I’m not defending him! I am protecting her. Shut up! She didn’t need to hear it this way. She never needed to f*cking know. He’s gone. That’s over. She had her memories, and she was happy. Don’t you see that? What is your problem, woman? Do you enjoy seeing her in pain?”
At least she had the decency to flinch.
“Stop,” Sienna said, drawing my attention back to her. “She was right. I should know. That’s something I should have been told a long time ago. I don’t crumble. I’ve proved that. It makes sense, really. He was always near her. She was always around. I trusted him. I did. But it makes sense.”
There was only emptiness in her voice. I f*cking hated it. I preferred her tears. Or even her screaming. But not this. It was like she was shutting down and shutting everyone else out. I wasn’t leaving. She wasn’t pushing me away.
“I wanted to keep you from being hurt by the Falcos. So I had your aunt check the mail daily and send me all the letters you sent them. I have them all if you want them. I did keep the photos, though. I want them, if that’s okay. It was how I watched Micah grow. But the letters, you can take those to Tabby. I have them in the car.”
She’d taken the letters because she was punishing us for my brother’s cheating. How f*cked up was that? My parents lost their son. Then they found out he had gotten Kimmy pregnant, and she’d had an abortion the day after his funeral. It had spread through town like wildfire. A year later Kimmy moved away with a guy and had never returned to Sea Breeze.
Not having to see her had helped. When I saw her face, all I saw was the girl who’d killed my brother’s kid. I hated her. I couldn’t forgive her. I didn’t even want to. She disgusted me.
“Go. Both of you, go. Leave the letters on the porch. I’m not ready for this. Maybe one day I can find a way to forgive you, Mother, but today is not that day.”
She didn’t look at either of us. Her eyes were still unfocused as she stared off at nothing. “Give me an hour, then please bring Micah home. But I need you to go.”
She was talking to me. She wanted me gone.
F*ck no. She wasn’t pushing me away.
“I’m not leaving you,” I told her.
She sighed, then finally turned to look at me. “Did you know?”
I wanted to lie. I wanted to lie so damn bad.
“Yes.” I admitted the truth because I refused to lie to her.
“Then you need to go. I want you to go.”
“Sienna, I had my reasons. I was protecting you—”
“I don’t care. I want you to go. Leave me. Both of you.”
Then she turned and walked away, locking herself in her bedroom.
I stood there staring at her door, wanting nothing more than to pull it off his damn hinges and make her let me hold her. Explain to her what I was doing. Why I did it.
“She needs time. Don’t do anything stupid. You never were as stupid as your brother. You were the smart one. Don’t let her down, like we did.” Then Nina Roy turned and walked away.
I stood in that living room waiting for sobs, or something to give me an excuse to burst into her room and hold her. There was nothing but silence. She wanted time alone. I would give her that. But this wasn’t over. It was the beginning. She just had to see that.
Six years ago . . .
DEWAYNE
“Slow down, man. You gotta calm the hell down. You can’t kill her. You’ll do life, dude. She’s a kid. A dumbass one, but still, she’s a kid.” Preston’s words were falling on deaf ears. I didn’t give a f*ck. If Kimmy Bart had aborted my brother’s baby, I was going to f*cking murder her with my own hands.
“Get your ass to the Alpha frat house,” Preston said into the phone. “Dewayne’s going after Kimmy, and word is she’s here. I can’t hold him back.” I knew I had about five minutes before Rock got here. Because if someone was going to stop me, Rock was the only person I knew who had the strength. I had a slut to find.
I’d lost my brother, and Sienna was just f*cking gone. Vanished. And now this shit. I had reached my breaking point, and I didn’t give a f*ck anymore. Bring on prison. This was all my fault anyway. Fighting with a drunk sixteen-year-old boy had been stupid. He was a kid, and I had threatened him while he was drunk—with the one thing I knew he didn’t want to lose. Sienna.
All of this could have been avoided if I’d just walked out of that house and dealt with him when he was sober. Maybe he had been ready to let Sienna go. If he’d been sober and made that decision, then I’d have let him. If he didn’t know how lucky he was, then he didn’t deserve her. But he didn’t have to die over it. That was all me. F*cking me.
“Kimmy’s slept with most of the basketball team. Hell, I’ve slept with her, I think. That could have been anyone’s kid. We don’t know it was Dustin’s. Just because she was claiming it was his don’t make it his,” Preston said.
I knew this. But I also knew I’d seen my brother f*cking her bare. Chances were good that baby had been his. All that was left of my brother, and she’d murdered it. She deserved to die too.
“What if she wasn’t even pregnant? Ever thought of that? She was jealous of Sienna. Dustin wouldn’t break up with her. He loved Sienna. He just wanted to f*ck Kimmy. Girls do that shit when they’re desperate. She could have been lying. Don’t do life because of a lying teenage girl.”
I wanted to blame someone, someone other than me, because the pain and regret were too much. If Kimmy had aborted Dustin’s baby, then I could lay all this hate and blame on her. She would deserve it. And I needed to be free of it. I just wanted to take a deep breath again. I wanted to be able to look my parents in the face and not feel like a bastard for being the reason sorrow filled their eyes.
So much pain.
“Where’s Kimmy?” I heard Preston ask some guy who stumbled outside.
“Don’t know,” he slurred.
“Go find her and tell her to hide her sorry ass before Dewayne finds her.”
Preston was determined to stop me any way he could. I’d find her, though. I was running out of time before Rock showed up, but I would find her. If not tonight, another night.
“Shouldn’t have let you drink so much damn whiskey. Always makes you mean,” Preston said, still right beside me. He wasn’t helping. All his yakking.
“Hey, Dewayne, sorry about Dustin, dude,” a guy called out. I didn’t even look at him. His drunken words meant nothing. He didn’t know Dustin. None of them knew the real Dustin. They knew the kid with too much pressure to be the best. The kid trying to find himself. They didn’t know his heart. None of them did.
“Find Kimmy Bart and tell her to f*cking run and hide,” Preston called out to him.
Dumbass wasn’t helping.
“I’ll find her. Keep it up. I’ll find her and she’ll pay,” I swore.
“Don’t doubt it. I just hope Rock gets here first,” Preston replied.
I put both hands on the double doors to the frat house and shoved them open, then stalked inside.
Kimmy came walking down the stairs, looking right at me. Her hair was stringy, and her clothes were wrinkled like she’d just pulled them back on quickly. What the f*ck had my brother seen in her?
“You looking for me?” she asked, then stumbled a step and giggled before grabbing the rail. She was f*cked up.
“Save yourself and go hide your stupid ass,” Preston yelled, purposely drawing attention to the situation.
“Not scared of a Falco. You just tame ’em with p-ssy,” she said, then leered at me. As if I’d even touch that nasty shit.
“Not going anywhere near your nasty snatch,” I said, disgust dripping from my voice.
She snarled at me. “What, not as good as sweet little Sienna Roy? You’re as bad as him. Can’t-do-no-wrong Sienna. Screw that. The bitch sucked at f*cking. Dustin hated sex with her. He just did it ’cause she wanted it. But she was awful at it. He came to get the good stuff from me,” Kimmy spat angrily.
“I think I just threw up in my mouth,” Preston said beside me, and several guys laughed.
“Was that baby Dustin’s?” I asked. I didn’t want to hear her talk about Sienna again. She wasn’t worthy of saying Sienna’s name.
She threw up her arms. “He’s the only one I f*cked bare, and he was the only one I had f*cked in months. He and I were going to be an item soon. He just had to get rid of Sienna first.”
He was never planning on getting rid of Sienna. He’d killed himself trying to get to her before I could.
“And you killed his baby,” I said, needing to hear her admit it.
She shrugged as if what she had done meant nothing. “I wasn’t gonna have a baby without a man to help me take care of it. I have my life ahead of me.”
That was all I needed to know. I took two steps toward her as the blood roared in my veins. Then arms that could only belong to Rock wrapped around mine and hauled me back against his chest. “Not gonna let you do this,” he said in my ear. “You’re gonna sleep this shit off, and then you’re getting counseling. She’s high as a f*cking kite. Do you think she would have stopped that while she was pregnant? I can answer that. No! She wouldn’t have. That baby didn’t stand a chance. It would have been born an addict if it had even been born at all.”
I glared at her. I hated her. I hated everything she stood for. But he was right. She’d have killed the baby one way or another. She was trash. My brother had made mistakes, and a girl willing to meet his every sexual whim had been his downfall.
“Let’s get the f*ck outta here,” Preston said.
“You gonna walk out of here, or am I gonna have to haul you out? We can fight right here, but I’m sober and I’m gonna win. I won’t let you throw your life away over revenge. You have your parents to think about. They need you.”
My parents.
I was all they had. Me. The son without the golden halo. The screwup. Me. That was all they had left.
Present Day . . .
SIENNA
Had I always known? I sat in the middle of my bed, staring at the wall. Even back then Dustin had been weird when Kimmy was around. And she’d always hated me. I knew she went to the parties he went to. I always thought if they ever did anything, Kimmy would make sure the world knew. But maybe they all knew and no one told me. Because Dustin was their god. They kept his secret.
But why keep it a secret? Why not just break up with me? If he was sleeping with Kimmy and wanted her, then why was he staying with me? Had it always been a friendship between us? Was there ever love between us? Because it certainly wasn’t what I felt for Dewayne.
Dewayne.
I wrapped my arms around my stomach as the pain started again. He had lied to me. I’d trusted him and he’d lied to me. Did everyone lie? Was that the way life was? I couldn’t trust anyone but myself.
Dewayne had made me happy. He wanted me, but would I be enough for him? I wasn’t enough for his brother. It was possible I wouldn’t be enough for anyone. There had to be something wrong with me.
My parents had walked away from me. They’d betrayed me. Dustin had betrayed me in the worst way. And now Dewayne had kept it from me. I expected it of the others, but what hurt the most was Dewayne not telling me.
I wanted to be more important to him than Dustin was. That was selfish and wrong, but it was true. I wanted to be the most important thing to him, because other than Micah, I had been willing to put Dewayne before everyone else. He hadn’t felt the same. He had protected his brother’s memory. He hadn’t wanted me to know the truth about Dustin.
Not to mention all those letters my mother kept away from the Falcos because of this. She didn’t want me to be another girl Dustin Falco had left knocked up. In a twisted way I understood her logic. But I had made that decision and, unlike Kimmy, I had been Dustin’s girlfriend. Not his secret f*ck buddy. It made more sense that I was the one pregnant.
She’d had an abortion. She had aborted Dustin’s baby. Images of Micah as a newborn when they’d placed him in my arms flashed before me, and my heart broke. He’d been so beautiful and perfect. He’d looked just like Dustin. Would Kimmy’s baby have looked like Dustin too?
Did she ever wonder? Did she care? Or was Dustin Falco and every memory of him a part of her past she rarely thought about? I would remember Dustin every day of my life. My son was my reminder. And I was thankful for it. Even if my memories were tainted. Even if I hadn’t been enough for Dustin and he had never really loved me. I had loved him. Maybe not real love, but a pure, young love. And I loved our son. Enough for both of us.
There was a knock on the front door, and I knew Dewayne was here with Micah. I had to pull it together and spend time with Micah until his bedtime. Standing up, I walked to the front door and opened it. Without saying anything, I reached for my son, pulled him into my arms, and hugged him tightly. The feel of his little heart beating was like a balm. He was here. He was my world. I had him. Thanks to Dustin Falco, I had this precious boy.
“I missed you too, Momma,” Micah said as he patted my back with his little hands.
I eased my hold on him and pressed a kiss to his head before standing back up. “Go on inside and clean your room. You left it a mess this morning. We’ll play Monopoly when you’re done,” I told him.
He beamed up at me, and I realized it wasn’t his father’s smile. It was his smile. His own unique smile. One that was a mixture of Dustin and me. He was part of me. I was a good person too. I had good qualities. Things I hoped Micah got from me.
“Sienna,” Dewayne said, and I looked up at him, wishing I didn’t have to do this. I wasn’t ready to face him yet.
“You lied to me. You protected your brother’s memory. I understand that, but I also understand that you chose protecting his memory over me. I need more than that. I need to know I can trust the man I’m with. That he’ll never betray me. Maybe that man doesn’t exist, and if he doesn’t, that’s fine. I’m good alone. But I can’t do this with you.”
Dewayne’s face went pale, and the desire to wrap my arms around him and comfort him was strong. But I wouldn’t. Today I would protect me. I would comfort me. It was time.
“I was protecting you. If you’d let me explain. You’ll see it was you all along.”
No. I wasn’t listening to any more. I knew the truth now.
“Leave, Dewayne. You’re welcome to visit Micah. He needs you. But for a while it’s best you do that at your parents’.”
Then I closed the door and locked it.
Micah ran back into the living room and frowned. “Where’s Uncle Dewayne? Is he not playing Monopoly too?”
No, he wasn’t playing Monopoly. That dream was over.
“Just me and you, Ace. But we’re a good team, right?”
Micah frowned, then nodded. “Yeah, Momma. We are. But I like it when Uncle Dewayne is on our team too.”
* * *
Three hours of Monopoly up in the center of my bed, a big bowl of mac ’n’ cheese, and convincing Micah he needed a shower, and I was exhausted. It was bedtime. I had never needed a bedtime more than I did tonight.
Micah knew something was wrong. He kept kissing me and hugging me. I needed all those hugs and kisses, but it made me try harder to keep smiling.
“Momma, why is Uncle Dewayne sitting on a sleeping bag on our front porch? Can I go out there with him? I think he has cookies,” Micah called from the living room.
What? I dropped the towel I was using to dry my hair and walked into the living room. Micah had his face pressed to the window, waving at Dewayne. Who was sitting on a camo-green sleeping bag and eating cookies with a thermos beside him. Had he lost his mind?
“Micah, go to bed. I’ll be in there in a minute to tuck you in. I’m going to see if Uncle Dewayne got confused and thinks y’all are camping out tonight,” I said.
“Aw, man, that would be fun. I want to sleep on the porch.”
I bet he did. “Bed, Micah. Now.”
He hung his head and walked back to his room, looking back longingly at the window. Dewayne could not do this to him. He had to leave. This was messing with Micah’s emotions, and I wouldn’t have it.