Page 6 of Dancing With Doubt

She walked right up to him, her face coming up to his to make him look up from the floor he’d been staring at, clamping down on his anger the whole time. He looked into her eyes, eyes that had brought his heart back to life, and saw something he never thought he’d see - disgust.

“Piss off with your money, your trips, your everything, okay? Just fuck off and leave me the hell alone. I don’t need your bullshit drama in my life, not when I have enough of my own to deal with. It was fun for a while, but whatever it is you think we’ve been doing? It’s done now.” She finished with a raised eyebrow, a quirk that asked if he dared to contradict what she’d said.

He didn’t respond, she was too angry to listen to him right now. Instead, he left, closed her door, walked over to Tanya’s car, and got in.

“What did you do, Mr. Young? I could hear her shouting out here! Damn, you pissed her off good.” Tanya said, letting him know the whole block had probably heard Roxie shouting at him.

“I didn’t do anything, my sister did.” He answered without thinking, shaken by the bitter anger Roxie had thrown at him, though he knew why she was angry.

It wasn’t just June showing up, it was how he’d left her without much contact since they came back from a trip that had changed them both. That might have pissed her off even more than his sister taking his place at his house. But yeah, leaving June there without him had definitely not been a good idea.

“Keep an eye on her for me, I’m going home.” He said what he’d meant to say when he first got in her car and left her there without another word.

He went back to his car, got in, and started to drive. How was he supposed to fix this? Did he want to fix it? Lincoln wasn’t sure about either one but decided giving her some time to herself was the best idea.

June had said something about a conference so he knew the house should be empty now. He’d go back and let the ocean pound his body until his brain was numb. By the time the sun had set, and the moon came up, it was late, and June was back. She’d waved at him, tried to speak to him, but he barely mumbled two words at her. He was kind of pissed at her for just showing up like that.

It was only after she left, her head hanging down in defeat, that he admitted to himself that it wasn’t really her fault that he had a secret he’d kept from her for a very long time. He’d hinted at it when she stopped eating and became so depressed, she’d lost weight she couldn’t afford to lose, but he’d never answered another question about Chloe since then. She’d deserved to know the truth, but Chloe had disappeared on all of them, even him.

Besides, he’d been contemplating ending things with Roxie. That was why he’d agreed to go to New York with Kai, why he stayed in the city when he should have come back to Myrtle Beach. That was why he waited so long to ask to see her. His realization about how much he cared for her had shaken him and it was only now that he could really see that every step he’d taken had been to distance himself from her.

June had done that much better than he could have and he should probably thank her for that. If it didn’t make him the world’s biggest asshole, he probably would have. He couldn’t hurt his sister like that though. He cared about her, in his own way.

He should probably go up, apologize to her, and explain things. She was sensitive, the most sensitive one of them all, she didn’t deserve the way he’d treated her. She probably had a million questions about Roxie, but if Roxie had been as angry with June as she’d been with him, then she didn’t get any answers at all. And she’d been giving a speech at that conference.

“I’m a shit brother and a shit whatever I was to Roxie. Fuck me.” He mumbled and went back to the kitchen to get a beer out of the fridge. He’d spent long enough swimming to work off that hot dog, he’d do more tomorrow and get rid of any calories he’d consume from alcohol tonight.

It probably wasn’t the best idea in the world to get drunk with Roxie at her old apartment, but he knew if he showed up at her place, or if she spotted him with Tanya outside her place, or spotted Tanya at all really, she’d blow a fuse. It was best to stay put and let Petey and Tanya do their jobs.

He found a remote and turned the music on outside. He didn’t play it loud, he didn’t want to bother his sister, but he did want to hear something besides his own breathing while he drank a beer on his deck. The sound of the surf mixed with the music to soothe him as he swung in a hammock that had been installed while he was in New York.

Life had become entirely shit lately and he didn’t appreciate it a bit. He’d showered after his swim and changed into a white linen top with a pair of soft gray shorts, so he wasn’t too hot, especially when a breeze kicked up.

This part wasn’t so shit, he decided, but the rest of it? Complete and total shit and with no clue how to fix any of it. He’d deluded himself when he thought he could walk back his relationship with Roxie to something a little more platonic. That wouldn’t happen, not because of her, but because of him.

He couldn’t look at her, even when she was angry and hurling hateful words at him, without thinking how beautiful she was. Yeah, he’d heard what she said, knew what she meant, but even then, his thoughts had been about how amazing she was. He’d wanted to calm her down and the only way he could think of to do that was to take away the focus of her anger - and that had been him.

Walking away wasn’t weak, it was the only thing he could do. She might cool down, might forgive him at some point, might even let him explain things, but not when she was that much on fire.

He put a foot down on the deck, kicked a little to keep the swing of the hammock going, and replayed every moment he’d known her in his mind. From the moment he’d met her she’d been a star in his sky. Even when they were kids her smile had lit up a room unlike anybody else he’d ever known. And now? That smile could set hearts racing and blood pounding around the world, his included.

If only he could make it work. If only she wasn’t so mad. But all the if onlys in the world wouldn’t change their lives. Her parents had been murdered, as she’d long suspected, and those people were probably still after her. All he could do was try to protect her from those enemies, and the new enemies her ex-boyfriend had burdened her with. He’d do that, even if he had to do it from afar.