“Don’t be stupid. Lake loves you.”

“I did a lot of fucked up shit to her. No amount of love can just erase it.”

“It got pretty intense at times, but I’m sure none of it matters to her now.”

“I raped her.”

“Excuse me?”

“Lake.”

My fist whipped out before I even knew what was happening and hit him hard in the eye. His head snapped. “You sack of shit.” I swung out again, but he caught my wrist in a tight grip.

“Enough,” he growled and looked around pointedly. The other patrons were watching with horrified expressions. I sat back against the booth and looked out the window, unable to stand the look of him. “I didn’t hurt her.”

“Allow me to not believe you. You raped her,” I cried.

“Talk louder, please.”

“You should be in prison.”

“I didn’t force myself on her, but I blackmailed her into letting me have her, and I didn’t give her much choice to say no.”

“She never told me.”

“She wanted to protect you.”

“From you.”

“From me,” he confirmed.

“I knew you were cruel, but I never thought you would go that far. You tortured her for years and for what cause?”

“I never thought I would go that far either. Some days I wish I had an excuse to hate her as much as I did just so I could live with the guilt.”

“Should I feel sorry for you?”

“I’m not asking you to do anything but listen.”

That shut me up. Begrudgingly, I nodded and folded my arms, appearing to have authority, but really, I was terrified of the truth.

“Twenty years from now when someone asks how we met and fell in love, what am I supposed to say? The truth? Our story is fucked up, and it’s all because of me.”

I grabbed his hand and squeezed. Surprisingly, he squeezed back. “But it’s still being written. You can’t change your past. The only thing you can do now is to learn from it. Make her happy and more importantly, always make her feel safe. She needs it.”

We both became lost in mutual silence as we retreated into our thoughts.

“You realize we almost died together,” he pointed out after some time.

“Yeah, so?”

“I think that makes us friends now.”

“We’ll see.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

DASH

TWO HOURS WAS all it took for me to become fully rabid. After Simon had confirmed that Willow, my Willow, was his daughter and that she was engaged to some prick, I rushed home with her father in tow only to find her gone.

I worried and pulled at my hair while calling around in search of her until I found that my car keys were also missing, which meant she left willingly.

No one had heard from her. I even became desperate enough to show up on her mother’s doorstep. I wondered how she could have slipped away. Keiran, the person, I trusted the most with her safety had been guarding her. After many unsuccessful attempts to contact him, I realized my missing person list had been updated to two.

I had just been convinced we needed to get the police involved when a call came through from Keiran.

I couldn’t answer fast enough.

“Where the fuck are you?”

“Grady Hospital.”

“Fuck… Willow?”

“She’s fine. Just a little banged up, but she’ll survive. Just get here.”

“I’m on my way.” I hung up and notified everyone who mattered to get to Grady Hospital. Before long, the waiting area was crowded. My parents, Willow’s parents, Keenan, Sheldon, and Lake were all in attendance. However, the only people they were letting back were immediate family.

Everyone was causing an uproar, but it didn’t matter. Not even two minutes later, Keiran, and Willow came strolling down the hallway side-by-side, looking pretty banged up but alive.

“Oh, my God. What the hell happened to you,” Willow’s mother exclaimed.

“I’d like to know the same,” her father stepped forward as well. I gritted my teeth against the reminder that I had the key to Willow’s location in my grasp for months now.

“Dad?” she asked, sounding every bit as confused as she looked. “What are you doing here?” Her eyes flitted in my direction before she nervously cast them away again. “How did you find me?”

“Young lady, you were due back over a week ago. I was worried.”

“Wait a minute. This is your father,” Lake asked. It sparked everyone to start asking questions as tension rose higher than before. I stood off to the side, holding on by a thread as her parents interrogated her.