Page 24 of Forbidden Dreams
Pushing myself from the table, I walk over to the window at the side and look out. Brady spots me and says something to Wyatt, who nods at him and starts running to the front door.
The front door swings open, and I see Wyatt coming in, his cheeks pink as he pants out, kicking his shoes off. “Brady has to go to work,” he announces, and I get up from the table as he storms into the kitchen to grab something to drink.
“Mr. Thatcher,” I remind him, and he looks over at me while Brady fills the doorway.
“He told me to call him Brady.” He grabs the iced tea I made this afternoon.
“You okay?” Brady asks from the front door, and I look over at Wyatt before walking to him.
“Yeah, she said the retainer was taken care of,” I ask him, and he puts his hand in the back pocket of his jeans while my eyes go to his meaty thighs. “What did she mean by that?”
“I have to get to the bar.” He avoids answering the question. “See you tomorrow,” he says. “Later, Wyatt!” he shouts to the kitchen.
“Later, Brady!” Wyatt hollers back as if he’s been doing it his whole entire life.
Brady takes one more look at me, his eyes staring into mine, leaving me breathless as he walks out the door and closes it behind him. I watch him walk across the lawn to his house, getting into the truck and taking off. My chest squeezes when it comes to me that no one except for Mr. Mendelson has cared about what has happened to me in the last six months. Not since my father has passed away has anyone really fucking given a shit. The thought alone makes the tears fall over my lower lids.
“You okay, Mom?” Wyatt asks softly from beside me. I was so lost in my thoughts that I didn’t even hear him come out of the kitchen.
“Yeah, baby,” I confirm, wiping the tears away from my face and smiling at him. For the first time in a long time, I think I am okay. “You hungry?”
“Yeah.” He watches me, smiling and skipping to the kitchen. He eats two plates of chicken and potatoes, and bedtime is quick tonight. It always is quick when it’s a full day of school, plus he played outside before and after dinner.
I sit on the stoop in my shorts and tank top, telling myself I need to get my ass back into the house. There is no fucking way I should be sitting on my front porch waiting for Brady to come home. My life is complicated enough without dragging him into it, but nothing will stop me from talking to him tonight. The clock turns nine on my phone when the headlights come down the street. My eyes watch, waiting, then I see the red truck drive by. I can see his head looking at me as he pulls into his driveway.
I hear the truck door close before I see him walking around the truck and stopping to stare at me. “Hey.” I get up, holding up my hand. “Do you have a minute?”
He doesn’t answer me. Instead, he just walks over, and the sound of the grass under his boots fills the night. “Everything okay?” he asks when he gets close enough.
“Yes,” I say, “I was just…” I put my hand on my stomach to help with the jitters. “I feel like I owe you an explanation.”
“You don’t owe me anything.” His voice is husky.
“Okay, fine, I don’t owe you an explanation.” I rephrase the sentence. “But I want to explain it to you.” I watch him at the bottom of the steps, and I sit down, knowing my legs will probably give out on me when I tell him what I’ve been practicing to say to him for the past two hours since I’ve put Wyatt to bed.
“Okay,” he agrees, walking up the steps and taking a seat beside me. I wonder if this is better that he did this since I won’t have to look him in the eye. But then he sits down, and I feel him beside me. I can feel the heat of his arm near mine, and all I want is for him to put it around my shoulders and pull me to him. I shake my head to stop that picture from staying in my head. “Talk.”
“I met Winston when I just turned eighteen,” I start. “Two months later, my father died. My mother was never really in the picture.” I look out into the darkness as I tell him, “He was perfect. A little too perfect, if you ask me.” I chuckle. “That should have been his first red flag,” I try to joke and look at Brady, who is staring at me. I wish I had kept the light on the porch on so I could see his eyes, feel the warmth from them. “He was seven years older than me. Too old for me, but I was in love with him. He supported me when I was in school and helped me with rent. He was everything you would want in a man. Until he wasn’t. I knew I had made a horrible mistake when I found out he was cheating on me six months after we got married. He promised me it was a onetime thing. Said he would never do it again. Being me and being stupid and naïve, I believed him.
“By the time I had Wyatt, it was over. Literally. He fucked one of the nurses while I was in labor. In fucking labor, giving birth to his son, and he’s out in the hallway closet fucking the nurse. The nurse thought I was sleeping, so she flaunted it all for everyone to hear.” I feel the disgust fill me. “Then it was like he didn’t even try to hide it. The women were on every single fucking corner. I went to his mother after six months. Sat down with her and poured my heart out to her. Thinking, I don’t know, she would be disgusted by her son. But she laughed it off and said she would talk to him about being more discreet.” I look over when I hear what sounds like a growl coming from beside me. “It lasted a whole two weeks. Then the whispers would start again. I mean that, along with the fact the women who would literally come to our house looking for him. Wyatt was a year old, and it was his birthday when the doorbell rang, and an eighteen-year-old was standing at the door, telling me she was having his baby.”
“Harmony,” he says my name, his voice cracking.
“I don’t know what happened to her. I don’t know if she had the baby or not, but I never saw her again. For the past six years, I’ve been planning my escape from him. It had to be slow, and I had to be smart about it. I had no job, and all the money was in our joint account. I couldn’t just take it and leave. So I started to save, spent money on clothes because he wouldn’t question it, and then returned them, pretending I forgot my card so they would give me the cash back. Six fucking years, Brady, I had to pretend to be a loving wife. I had to listen to them plot their revenge on everyone but themselves. I had to sit at the table with them spewing hate, hoping like fuck Wyatt would not hear it or fall for it. Two years ago, I went to visit them less and less, but at that point, Winston was a full-blown alcoholic and too busy getting his dick wet to notice.” I turn to him, the tear hitting my bare leg. “I just want to be free of them.”
“Harmony,” he murmurs my name, and this time, he pushes the hair away from my shoulder to my back. His finger then trails from my ear to my collarbone. “Baby.” My stomach flutters when he says that, “Harmony,” My name is on his lips in a whisper. My body comes awake as he bends and kisses my neck. It’s the softest kiss I’ve ever gotten, and it’s a kiss I’ll never forget.
CHAPTER 15
Brady
Listening to her tell her story of the hell she endured over the past years leaves me speechless. It also leaves me so fucking angry. “I just want to be free of them.” The desperation in her voice cuts me to my core.
I vow to do whatever is in my power to make that happen for her. “Harmony,” I say her name as if I’ve said it my whole life, as if I was born to say her name. Pushing her hair behind her ear, I then trail my finger from her ear to her collarbone. Trailing my fingertip down the side of her neck. “Harmony.” It sounds like a plea more than anything else. When my finger gets to her collarbone, my head leans forward, placing a kiss on her neck, right under the hinge of her jaw. The feel of her heart beating as fast as mine makes me kiss her again softly. Her hand comes up to my cheek. My cheek now rubs with hers as we move our faces so our mouths meet. The kiss is soft, the need to pull her into my lap and bury my hands in her hair and kiss the ever-loving shit out of her is more than my need for my next breath. Her tongue slides into my mouth for a split second, and I feel more alive than I have in my entire life. The need to taste her fills me. The need to take her makes my body come alive. The need to have her and only her is something I’ve never known I needed, and I haven’t even had her.
“I can’t do this,” she murmurs. My heart sinks to my stomach as I move away from her. “I can’t drag you into this.” She gets up to stand, my hand falling from her, and the cool air hitting where it was just resting on her warm skin. “I refuse for them to take anything more from you.” She turns to walk to the door but then stops, and I watch her walk back and bend so quickly that if my eyes weren’t open, I would think it was my imagination. “Thank you for the most beautiful kiss of my life. I’ve never wanted to be kissed so badly in my life,” she whispers before her lips softly touch mine. The tingle is still on them when she walks through the front door and softly closes it behind her. The sound of the lock almost makes it final. I want her so fucking much my whole body aches for her.
I exhale, getting up and walking back over to my house. Every single step feels like torture, especially when I shut my own door. Knowing she’s so close, knowing I wanted to do so much more than just kiss her. I’m so screwed is the only thing that goes through my head. I’m ready to claim them both, Wyatt especially. Every time I’m with him, it’s like a piece of me is woken up. It’s like a piece of me can breathe a little bit lighter now that he’s there. Being with him, I know why she wants to keep him away from those people. He’s wholesome and pure, just like his mother. I’ve never felt this connection or this pull to someone else in my life. I’ve also never wanted someone as much as I want her, and it has nothing to do with her trouble. It has to do with the fact that every time she looks at me, something shifts inside me.