ONE

Jake

Owen didn't know who he was really running from when he took off from Coral Pines. In his mind he was probably escaping the police and his imminent incarceration for the shooting of my daughter.

What he was really running from was his imminent death.

I'd been up for three days straight but felt as if I could've bench pressed a semi-truck and rowed across the Coral Pines River and back and still not have fully exerted myself.

I was fucking elated.

I was also scared out of my mind.

Over the years it was that lack of fear that helped me to be able to carry out my work, and do it well.

But when I stood on the rickety front porch of Bee's Nan's house with one hand on the doorknob, I couldn't bring myself to turn it. I was frozen in fucking fear, unable to face what might happen behind that door once it opened.

What would Abby think of me when she came face to face with the blood that was literally still on my hands? When the reality of what I'd done, what I did, and what I would do again was right in front of her. What happens when 'Jake kills people' is no longer just an abstract idea?

Bee knew I was going to find and kill Owen, she encouraged me by showing me the pictures of the aftermath of Owen's vicious attack on her. She knew my blood would boil, and I would seek immediate revenge. When I turned that knob and Abby saw me, saw the bloody proof of who I really was staring her in the face and it all became real, would she still feel like she could accept that part of me? Would she still want me in her life? In Georgia's?

Abby loved me, for exactly who I was, fully knowing the devil lived inside me. Knowing of the brutality that was part of the deep seeded makeup of who I truly was.

It was easy to live with a theory, something that almost wasn't real because it wasn't something she had to deal with. It was entirely different to come face to face with the truth of it all.

Fuck.

I could've washed off the blood and pretended like I didn't murder the motherfucker who'd almost killed the only two people I would die a thousand times over for, that the evidence of what I'd done wasn't dried on my skin. It would have been easier that way, but only in the short term. My plans for Abby and Bee were long term. I didn't want to be clean when she saw me. I wanted to rip off the band-aid and take whatever was coming so we could move forward as a family.

My family.

Over and over again, Bee told me she loved me, But I needed her to see it.

I needed her to see me.

No matter who I'd killed in the past I'd never felt even the slightest bit sick about it, never even given it a second thought, but just the idea of losing Bee again made my fucking stomach roll.

I never should've left her.

But I was a fucking coward.

I never should've come back for her.

But I was a fucking coward.

I'd used a weak-as-shit rumor as my excuse to leave Bee because I was nothing but a weak, weak man who convinced himself whole heartedly that there was a possibility that it was true, that after our one perfect night together, she could go and fuck Owen, the boy next door/psycho rich kid.

What I was really doing was pushing Bee away before she got too close. Before she could really understand what made me tick and made the decision to leave me, I left her.

I’ve regretted it every second of every hour of every day since then.

For four years, I lived my life with my eyes closed and without Bee, because for the first time someone had the capability of actually hurting me instead of the other way around. So I used the bullshit rumor Owen's friend told me about Abby and Bee as my way to leave Coral Pines as quickly as my bike would take me before Bee had the chance to tear me apart at the seams.

The problem was that Bee was so fucking deep under my skin that every day she wasn't with me was a torture all it's own. But at the end of the day, I'd always thought that I'd done the right thing by her, by leaving, no matter the reason, because I knew she was better off without me.

I was positive I'd done the right thing for once in my life.

After four years, of the need to see her, talk to her, touch her, hadn't faded. It became stronger. So strong that my need for her was stronger than my need for anything else.

When it came down to it, I didn't come back because I thought she needed me. I came back because I was a selfish prick who couldn't stay the fuck away from her.

I loved her. Always had. Never thought I would be capable of that kind of love, but from the very moment I'd ripped that hoodie off her head in that junk yard and a beautiful pale faced red head stared up at me from the wrong side the barrel of my gun, I knew my life would never be the same.