Unforgivable Read online

  Her clothes had started going stiff from the blood. She didn’t know if it were hers or Wendy’s, but she wanted a hot shower, clean pajamas, some ice packs, and her bed. Everything hurt. She was already purple with bruises.

  “I just want to go home.” Alice turned her head to look away from the doctor who was poking and prodding her.

  “You have a ride?” the doctor asked.

  She hesitated. “I called my . . . a friend. To come and get me. But he hasn’t answered me yet.”

  The doctor gave her a sympathetic smile. “Do you have any other friends who you can call?”

  She did, but she didn’t want any of them. She wanted Mick. She needed him.

  “Do you want to give your friend some more time to answer you? Or we can call you a cab.” The doctor was already looking harried, not that Alice blamed him. The ER was overflowing with patients in worse condition than hers.

  Alice checked her phone, but Mick hadn’t returned her call. She took a deep breath that hurt everything inside her and shook her head. “Yeah. A cab would be great.”

  Chapter 33

  “Mick. It’s me. I’ve been in an accident, a car accident. They’re keeping my sister, she’s banged up pretty bad, but they’re letting me go home. I’m okay, but . . . I need you. . . . Can you come get me? Please call me back. I need you.”

  He’d listened to the message ten times, at least, each time feeling sicker and sicker inside. It had come in around two thirty on Sunday afternoon, while he was driving home from his parents’. He hadn’t listened to it until just before he went to bed. Not on purpose. Not to be a dick. Just because he hadn’t noticed it until then.

  He’d called her back as soon as he’d listened, but had gone straight to voice mail. Three times, though he hadn’t left a message after the first. At a loss, he’d called Jay, but he hadn’t answered, either.

  Monday morning, exhausted from being unable to sleep, he’d missed the alarm. Got to work late. He’d called Jay again, this time at the office, but got an out-of-office voice mail. Useless for anything, Mick canceled his onsite visits. He logged into his computer, but Alice’s name didn’t appear in his list of contacts.

  He called her again. “Alice. Call me, please. I’m sorry I didn’t get your message before. I really am. But please, call me back, okay?”

  She didn’t call him back. Not all day, and by five o’clock, Mick couldn’t stand it anymore. With rush hour traffic it took him close to two hours to get to her place, and by the time he did, he was starving. Worried. Anxious and a little angry, too.

  When she opened the door, all the breath left him. She looked like . . . shit, she looked like she’d been hit by a truck. He wanted to take her in his arms, but the way she stood so stiffly, as though merely looking at him hurt her, kept him from touching her.

  “Can I come in?”

  Silently, she stood aside to let him pass, then closed the door after him. Without a word she went into the living room and settled onto the couch, where it was clear she’d been for a long time. Blankets, a bowl of half-eaten soup, ice packs. The TV was playing something in black and white, but on mute.

  “Alice . . .”

  She looked at him, her expression completely blank. She’d done nothing to cover the bruises on her face, and they stood out starkly in shades of purple, blue, and even black. It broke him to see them, along with the railroad track pattern of stitches on her forearm and the back of her hand.

  It broke him worse the way she looked at him. Not cutting her gaze. Flat and disinterested and emotionless.

  Mick knelt beside her, tried to take her good hand. She tugged it gently away and put it under the blanket. His insides twisted.

  “I’m sorry,” Mick said. “Baby, I’m so, so sorry I wasn’t there for you.”

  Something glittered in her gaze. “No. You weren’t. I called you, and you didn’t answer. And this time, Mick, it wasn’t about whether or not we were going to lunch. This time, I really needed you, and you were not there.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said again, helpless to do anything but repeat it until maybe she’d hear him.

  Alice only stared, silent. She’d heard him, Mick realized. But she would not listen. He got to his feet.

  “You want me to go,” he said, not a question.

  “If you can’t be there for me when I need you,” Alice told him, “then I don’t want you.”

  She swallowed, her mouth thinning. She blinked rapidly, and it killed him that she was trying so hard not to cry in front of him. He’d done that to her. Hurt her worse than that truck. Left her with worse than bruises. Worse than scars.

  It was over.

  Mick to Alice

  Don’t you believe in second chances?

  —Mick to Alice

  Chapter 34

  Time had passed, but could anyone really ever change? That was the question that came to Alice’s mind in the darkness of her room with Mick breathing soft and steady in the bed beside her. His declaration had led to an embrace, which led to a kiss, which had taken them to her bed. Toe bone connected to the shinbone, Alice thought and rolled to face him. Her fingertips drifted down the line of his bare shoulder and arm to rest for a moment on his hip before she rolled onto her back again. Mick hadn’t stirred.

  He’d always slept hard and deep. She was the one who tossed and turned and woke in the night to go to the bathroom. Now, though she really could’ve waited until morning, Alice got up and used the toilet. She rinsed her mouth at the sink, then looked at her own reflection, turning her face from side to side as though she’d find some answers in the slope of her cheekbones or the shadows under her eyes.

  What in holy hell was she doing?

  “I want you,” Mick had said. “Let me prove it to you.”

  If orgasms were proof of desire, he’d done as promised. Her cheeks heated. Time had passed, indeed, but Mick still knew her body better than any man ever had. Maybe ever would, she had to admit. She’d had a few boyfriends since breaking up with Mick, but none who’d turned her inside out and many who’d never even turned her on.

  In bed, she rolled over so he could spoon her. Eventually, she slipped into dreams. Fractured images of crashing waves and fields of flowers. She woke again to the first hint of light in the sky and listened to the steady in-out of Mick’s breathing, wondering how on earth she was ever going to give this up all over again.

  Now that she’d had him again, how could she go back to living without her Mick?

  “Are you awake?” he whispered against the back of her neck.

  She almost didn’t answer, not wanting to wipe away the brilliance of the night with the mundane morning. She wriggled against him after a moment, her ass pressed to Mick’s very impressive waking erection. She hadn’t meant anything by it, not really. More a silent acknowledgment of her wakefulness than a come-on . . . but that didn’t matter when his hand slid over her belly and between her legs.

  His fingers found her clit with unerring precision. Smooth circles, perfect pace. He had her on the edge in a minute or so, then eased off to tease her while his teeth found the back of her neck and the slope of her shoulder. They moved together, shifting until he was inside her. As always, in that first moment when he filled her, Alice made a low noise.

  Leisurely, they moved. Dreamlike. Her orgasm rolled through her; she cried out, wordless and breathless and gasping. Mick thrust once, twice more, and shuddered against her.

  They slept.

  Alice woke to the scent of coffee and frying bacon and toast—did she even have bacon in the house? Bleary-eyed and tousled, she threw on a robe and went to the kitchen to find a feast spread out on the table waiting for her. Cream and sugar had been set out by her mug, which Mick filled for her as soon as she appeared in the doorway. He kissed her when he pressed her mug into her hand. He wore jeans but no shirt. Bare feet, too. Clearly, he was trying to kill her with the sexy.

  “Wow,” she said. “You are really going all out.”