Chapter Three
“HERE’S SOME CARROT GINGER PUREE and a peach and honey milkshake.” Elizabeth handed Scott two plastic pitchers full of liquid. “They’re at room temperature if you wanted to drink them now, or you can stick them in the fridge, and they’ll keep until tomorrow.” She blushed furiously when Scott set the pitchers down on his kitchen counter and caught her hand, lifting it to his lips.
“You’re way too good to me, Liz. Thank you.”
She smiled at him. “I like having a young man to take care of again. I miss my son.”
“Well, he’s lucky to have you as a mom. Without you, I’d be living on that horrible, chalky Ensure stuff.”
Elizabeth shuddered along with him. “Oh, that stuff is awful.” She looked him over with a critical eye. “It’s been almost three weeks. Looks like you’ve lost about ten pounds so far?”
Scott grimaced. “I’ve been avoiding the scale because I don’t want to know, but it feels like at least that.” He plucked at the waistband of his cutoff sweatpants to indicate how loose they were. “My ribs are showing and everything.”
She gave him a sympathetic smile and patted his arm. “Hang in there, honey.”
Scott walked her to the door before heading back to the kitchen to pour himself a glass of carrot puree. He wandered into the living room with it and sank down onto the couch not far from where Rylan was sprawled out with his laptop.
“Hey. Have a good walk on the treadmill?”
Scott put his straw in his mouth and slurped in some puree, pulling the liquid in between his tightly wired teeth and letting it trickle into his throat. He swallowed it before saying, “Yeah. Actually ran a little, too.”
“You do okay with that?” Rylan’s voice held a note of concern, and Scott shrugged.
“Couldn’t do it for long because of the restricted breathing, but it felt good to try.”
“As long as you’re careful.” Rylan watched as Scott took another sip of his drink. “How’s that stuff taste?”
“It’s not bad, actually. Everything Elizabeth makes has been pretty tasty.” Scott set down his glass and slumped back against the couch cushions. “The problem is there’s just no way to ever feel full on a liquid diet, and I’m so fucking hungry all the time.”
A rueful expression flitted over Rylan’s face. “You don’t know how guilty I feel whenever I eat something in front of you.” He set his laptop aside and picked up Scott’s glass, taking a cautious sip, and Scott was amused when his eyes widened. “That’s really good!”
“I’d rather have the biscuits and gravy Elizabeth made you yesterday, but yeah, it could be worse. Without her, I’d have lost a helluva lot more weight than I already have.”
Rylan turned to face him, drawing up one knee so it just grazed Scott’s thigh. “You know who she reminds me of? Donna, that lady in Pace who ran the bar. The way she used to look out for you, just like Elizabeth does now. Surrogate moms.”
“I know, right? Two different women in two different states, totally unrelated to me, who’ve been better moms to me than my own mom ever was.” Scott could hear the bitterness in his voice, but at the moment he was just too hungry, too fucking tired, to give a shit.
Rylan pursed his lips and cocked his head, silent for a moment as if debating with himself. “Donna took in your brothers, you know,” he said at last. “They’ve been living with her for over four years now.”
Scott sat bolt upright. “What? Are you serious?”
Rylan smiled. “Yeah. Wanna see?” He didn’t wait for an answer, just pulled his laptop to him and clicked a few times before turning it around to show Scott. “You probably don’t even recognize the boys.”
Scott stared at the image. All three of his half-brothers were sitting at one of the bar’s high tables, Donna standing behind them with her arms around their shoulders. They were clustered close together, leaning on each other, beaming.
“Whoa, they’re so big. And they look really happy.”
“They are.”
“When was this taken?”
“Right before I moved out here. In fact, I stopped in Pace on the way just to see them.”
Scott tore his eyes away from the picture to stare at Rylan. “So you’re still in touch with them? With the boys?”
Rylan nodded. “I am, yeah. We’re friends on Facebook, and we text sometimes. They’re great kids.”
Scott was silent for a moment. “What about the baby? Cara? Is she—”
“Still with Heather? Yes.” Rylan’s voice was soft. “The picture you saw that first day in my apartment? That was the last time I saw them, when I went up to visit Cara before finals.”
“So you talk to—her? Heather, I mean.”
“Sometimes. Not often.” Rylan touched the scar on his cheek almost absently, and his eyes took on a haunted look. “When she and my dad split up, Scott, it was…ugly.”
Scott’s stomach roiled, and the puree he’d just drunk surged back into his throat. He grasped Rylan’s wrist, drawing his startled glance.
“Did Heather give you that scar?” he demanded. “That fucking bitch—”
Rylan gasped. “No!” he exclaimed. “She’s never, ever touched me.”
Scott released him, studying the scar before tracing it lightly with his thumb. It was high on Rylan’s cheekbone, small, but white and jagged.
“You can’t tell me that’s always been there, Ry. I would have noticed it before.” Would have noticed it back when he used to map every inch of Rylan’s face with his lips as they lay entangled together in his narrow bed. “Who did this?”
A pause. “My dad.”
The answer was so unexpected that Scott reared back in disbelief. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” he croaked. “Bob—hit you? Bob?” He couldn’t wrap his mind around it. Gentle Bob, who adored his son beyond reason, hit Rylan so hard he’d left a fucking scar? “What the hell happened?”
Rylan wrapped his arms around himself, hunching over. “While my dad was gone on one of his over-the-road jobs, Heather went out with her friends one night, got drunk, and brought home a man. But this time the dude didn’t fuck and run; he stayed for the weekend.”
“Holy shit. And your dad caught them.” Scott’s voice was hushed.
Rylan gave a jerky nod. “He walked in on them, in bed. I could hear them through the wall, and I’ll never forget the anguish in his voice as he demanded to know what exactly it was he was seeing. Heather was pleading with him, and the other guy was trying to tough it out. Lots of yelling, lots of crying—”
Rylan surged to his feet and started to pace. “The other dude finally left, and my dad and Heather kept fighting. I could hear them in the living room. I was gonna stay the fuck out of it until I heard Cara crying. So I went out there.”
Rylan’s chin trembled, but he pressed his lips together, breathing hard through his nose until he regained some control. “Heather was on the couch bawling, and Cara was wrapped around her leg. My dad was losing it, and when he saw me, he got up in my face. ‘Has this happened before, Rylan?’ I had no fucking clue what to say, and I guess my hesitation was his answer, because the next thing I knew, I was on the floor, my cheek on fire.”
He touched the scar, his eyes awash with the tears he was refusing to let fall. Scott ached to take him in his arms, but instead he jammed his hands in the loose pockets of his sweatpants, his fists clenched.
“My dad stood over me and screamed, ‘How many times? Why didn’t you tell me?’ He just kept saying that,” Rylan went on hollowly. “I had a cut on my cheek from a ring he was wearing. Blood was everywhere, dripping from my chin, getting in my mouth—” He licked his lips as if remembering the rusty taste on them. “—and all I could do was say, ‘I’m sorry, Dad.’”
“Jesus.” Scott’s curse was heartfelt.
“He was hurting, Scott, looking for someone to blame, and I was there. I was right there.”
“Why the fuck didn’t he blame the one who deserved to be blamed?” Scott snarled, taking his hands out of his pockets and slamming them down onto the couch cushions.
“He told me later that blaming her was too much like blaming himself, that he didn’t want to think about it being his fault. He wanted it to be someone else’s fault, even mine. After he hit me, he left and drove away. Heather helped me up, washed the blood off my face, and glued the gash shut with this liquid skin stuff she had. She wasn’t crying anymore, and she seemed really calm. It helped me calm down.”
His shoulders were so bunched and tense Scott couldn’t help but get up to put his hand on Rylan’s back, gratified when he seemed to take comfort in the soothing touch.
“What happened then?” he whispered, stroking the nape of Rylan’s neck with his thumb.
A quiver ran through Rylan’s body. “She put Cara to bed, and then we sat out on the porch together the rest of the night. Sometimes quiet, sometimes talking a little.” He heaved a sigh. “I think she really loved my dad, Scott, but for some reason couldn’t keep herself from sabotaging everything. She was devastated, but at the same time seemed almost relieved it was over, as weird as that sounds.”
When you don’t feel you deserve anything nice in your life, it scares you to death when you actually get it. It was a feeling Scott was all too familiar with, and he winced as an unwilling sympathy for Heather churned in his gut. He didn’t want to feel sorry for her, didn’t want to—understand her.
He shoved the thought away, concentrating instead on what Rylan was saying.
“We didn’t see my dad for about a week. Heather seemed okay on the outside, but I could tell she was slowly falling apart on the inside. I recognized the signs.” A shadow flitted over his face, and he clenched his hands into fists. “My own mom, you know? I couldn’t go through that again, and I felt so fucking helpless, so I went to Donna.”
Scott gave a quiet snort. “That woman is a force of nature.”
Rylan quirked his lips. “That she is. She drove over to the trailer, packed up the kids’ stuff, and took all four of them to her house. Told Heather they’d be safe until she got her shit together. She didn’t protest it, didn’t fight. When my dad came for me after a few more days, I left with him. Left her alone.”
“You’d done all you could, Ry. You know that, right?”
“I left without a backward glance,” Rylan said bluntly. “I was so fucking drained. By you, by her…”
Scott flinched, but Rylan went on, “My dad needed me. I walked away so I could save what was left of my strength for him.” His face was expressionless. “And for myself. I’d gotten a full scholarship to the University of Miami, but there was still a third of my senior year to go. I needed to concentrate on my grades and my own future. You were gone, the kids were safe with Donna, and there was nothing else I could do for Heather.”
The sun shimmered off the nearby buildings and bounced in through the windows, hurting Scott’s eyes and making him feel light-headed.
You should have been there, you stupid fuck.
As if reading his mind, Rylan murmured, “You being there wouldn’t have changed a thing, Scott. Heather would have still done what she did. You know that. It was only a matter of time.”
“But if I’d been there, maybe I could have deflected Bob’s anger onto me. Could have taken that blow for you, saved you that heartache at least.”
So much fucking heartache.
Rylan’s face softened. “It is what it is, Scott. Your mantra, remember?”
“Fuck mantras. I should have been there.” He slid his hand down to Rylan’s shoulder. “Were you and your dad okay, after what happened?”
“Yeah. He got us a tiny apartment not far from the school. It took a while, but we got everything sorted out. By the time he—died, we were more than okay.”
Scott relaxed a fraction. “Good,” he whispered hoarsely. “That’s good.”
Rylan patted Scott’s hand once before releasing him. “Ugh, I guess I’d better go take a shower, get ready for the club. There’s a big bachelorette party tonight, and Corey wants lots of pictures.”
“Yeah, okay.” Scott wiped a stray tear away with rough impatience. “If you need to go—”
“Can I take your car, or do you need it? I don’t mind taking the bus.”
Scott started to tell him to take the car, but the thought of the long, lonely night stretching before him made him say impulsively, “If you can wait a few minutes, I’ll drive you. Maybe stay for a drink.”
Rylan lifted an eyebrow. “Really? That’d be great. I know everyone would love to see you. People are always asking me how you’re doing.”
Scott didn’t know how true that was, given how silent his phone had been for the past three weeks, but he didn’t say anything, just headed for the shower. Afterward he pulled on a pair of jeans and an aqua-green silk T-shirt, standing in front of his full-length mirror and looking himself over, suddenly unsure.
“You’re beautiful as ever, Scott.” Rylan’s quiet voice came from the doorway.
“No. I don’t feel like myself at all.” Scott tugged at the loose material of his shirt, a shirt that used to mold itself to his ripped torso like it was painted on. “Maybe this isn’t such a good idea. People don’t need to see—”
Rylan came behind him and put his hand on Scott’s shoulder. “You’ll be the most gorgeous man in the room. Trust me.”
Their eyes met in the mirror, and Scott gave him a shaky smile. “I think you’re biased.”
Rylan chuckled. “I’m a photographer. I can’t be biased.” His voice was gently teasing. “Don’t believe me?”
Scott shrugged, and Rylan reached out and threaded their fingers together. “The camera doesn’t lie, Scott. Let me show you.” He turned to walk out of the room, tugging Scott after him and making a quick stop to snag his camera from the couch before leading him to the balcony.
The sun was low in the sky now, bathing everything around them in a soft, golden glow.
The camera whirred, and Rylan glanced at the screen, making a few quick adjustments before starting to shoot in earnest. Scott lost himself in Rylan’s quiet directions, first leaning back against the railing and then turning to prop his elbows on it while he gazed into the distance.
“Here, come see.” Rylan beckoned to him, and Scott walked over to gaze down at the digital screen in awe. The waning light kissed his face, throwing his cheekbones into sharp relief, the light scruff on his chin emphasizing his full lips. The soft green of his T-shirt reflected the fading radiance of the sun and made his eyes stand out like jewels.
“No filter, Scott. Just you. And you’re fucking gorgeous.”
Scott quirked his lips in a rueful smile. “You probably think I’m the vainest son of a bitch you’ve ever met, don’t you?”
“Never. There’s nothing wrong with needing some reassurance, especially after the trauma you’ve been through.” Rylan held up the camera. “I can tell you you’re beautiful, but sometimes you just have to see the words. See what I see.”
The lump in Scott’s throat threatened to choke him. “Sweet Ry,” he whispered. “Thank you.”
They smiled at each other, and Scott leaned in. Rylan lifted his face for the kiss, his lips parted, but Scott turned his head so his mouth grazed Rylan’s temple instead.
“Let’s go to the club.”