Total pages in book: 141
Estimated words: 128812 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 644(@200wpm)___ 515(@250wpm)___ 429(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128812 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 644(@200wpm)___ 515(@250wpm)___ 429(@300wpm)
"I was working," I explain. "Well, I was deep in the middle of the investigation that brought ninety percent of my team down in Oregon. I couldn't swing a trip to Connecticut and back at the time."
"I'm pretty sure Sheila and Edwin Jenkins forgot about me the second I decided to swing a hammer instead of going to law school," he mutters, shaking his head gently.
The familiar way he's reacting to this news makes my heart ache for him. He's hurting, and it's the same hurt he felt when we were teens. It's easy for me to sit here and think that he should get over it already, in the nicest way possible, of course, but some pain cuts so deep the wounds never have a chance of healing.
I pull in a deep breath, trying to decide the best way to help him. But instead of telling him to get in the truck and let me suck his cock, something that would've worked over a decade ago, I simply shift my hand on the tailgate and cover his with mine.
Surprisingly, Zeus keeps his hand in place for a few seconds. The only thing that saves my heart from more pain, where this man is concerned, is that when he does pull his hand away, it's a slow slide rather than a quick jerk.
He turns his head, giving me a soft look I translate as gratitude rather than disgust.
Oh, the small favors I'm awarded in life.
Chapter 16
Zeus
Moonlight slides through the room, highlighting the back of my hand and making it glow in an almost ethereal sort of way. I've stared at the damn thing for hours, wondering just when a simple gesture ever made me feel a little less alone in this world.
If I focus long enough, I can still feel the warmth of Zayne's hand over mine when he touched me at the overlook.
It wasn't a sexual touch, but one that spoke of friendship and care, something I know I don't deserve from him after the way I treated him all those years ago.
He mentioned women being expendable and tools, and disrespected, and it eats away at me, realizing that's exactly how selfish and hateful I was where he was concerned. I hated that I ached to be around him. It was a weakness I always battled, and instead of self-reflection, I took that pain out on him.
I have no right to his care and concern. The man is more gracious than I ever deserve.
He forgave me over and over. There were times it felt like pity, as if he were like an abused dog that still licked the hand of the man who had beaten him with the hopes that maybe one gentle touch among hundreds of bad ones would be offered.
I yelled at him, cussed him out to no end, and yet he always opened his front door to me without hesitation.
I ignored him at school, and had it come to the risk of people finding out what was happening between the two of us, I'm sure that with my state of mind at the time, I could've resorted to violence to not be discovered. My parents would've turned their backs on me long before they actually did if they ever got wind of what was happening behind closed doors at the Harmonds' house. I couldn't risk it.
At the time, they were the only people I felt cared about me, even though I knew they only did the bare minimum because it was expected of them, and they couldn't risk not looking like loving and devoted parents. I was so starved for attention when I was younger that the crumbs of affection they offered on occasion felt like a four-course meal, and I devoured every speck of them.
I was terrified, as a younger child, that they would send me back in exchange for a kid they could stomach a little more easily, and that made me try with everything I had to be the best son they could find. But the anger that it was never enough for them had to go somewhere, and I used Zayne as the outlet for all that pain and heartache.
I treated Zayne the same way they treated me. They knew I'd be there until they decided I shouldn't show my face. Zayne would always let me back in, no matter how much I hurt him. The realization that I'm no better than the man and woman who raised me is lodged in my throat, threatening to suffocate me.
The imagined sound of my deceased father's throat clearing is enough to make me want to bolt from the bed. The noise spoke of his disappointment, something I learned early on as a child to avoid at all costs. The sound of others still doing it, all these years later, still makes my skin crawl.