Page 41 of Crossed Up

I called Aidan Daddy. In an airplane bathroom. While I was completely delirious from dehydration after puking all night.

I’ve always been intrigued by that sort of dynamic in some deep, dark corner of my mind, but I’ve never acted on it with anyone. At first, it felt too taboo, then I didn’t want to bring to light my obvious daddy issues, and then Sebastian was an absolute nightmare and would use anything he could against me.

Burying my burning face further into Aidan’s chest, I try to will the ground to open up and swallow me whole. “Jesus, Aidan. I’m so sorry! I can’t believe I called you…that. Do you accept verbal resignations, or do I need to write one up and slip it under your bedroom door before I run as far as humanly possible in the opposite direction?”

His husky chuckle rumbles through his chest, and one muscular arm tightens around my lower back as he lifts the other to cup my cheek, bringing my face to his.

“Lyla, if you really want to quit, you already know you have my support and a letter of recommendation. And if I’ve made you uncomfortable, I’m truly sorry. But if you’re embarrassed by what you said, you don’t need to be. It was a surprise, yes, but not an unwelcome one.”

Peeking up at my boss’s sparkling blue eyes, I see nothing but honesty and desire staring back at me. My teeth dig into my bottom lip as I think about how to respond. “Aidan…” I trail off.

There’s so much sadness hiding behind his smile, and I don’t want to add to it with my drama, but I think I was right before, and he’s going to make resisting this pull between us nearly impossible.

“There are things you need to know about me, but I don’t know if I’m ready to tell you yet. In the interest of transparency, Copeland is using some of his legal contacts to help me resolve the situation, but it could be another three weeks before things even begin to iron out. I want you, but I don’t want to add any stress to your life when you already have so much going on.”

His eyes widen when I mention Copeland, but he quickly schools his expression into something neutral. I expect Aidan to question me about the secrets I’m keeping from him, but instead, he surprises me by pivoting completely.

With a nervous look on his handsome face, he grips my hand in his and attempts to smile reassuringly. “Will you come somewhere with me? And then we’ll swing by and pick up Crew on the way home.”

I don’t even have to think about it before nodding in agreement. If there’s one thing my life has taught me, it’s that truly good people don’t come along often. Yet somehow, I’ve managed to find myself an entire family of them here in Charleston. And I think it’s about time I allow myself the grace to carve a permanent place here in this little slice of happiness just for me.

Fifteen minutes later, we’re turning onto a dirt lane that’s so overgrown I never would have seen it if Aidan hadn’t made the turn. It looks like nobody has been down the road for months, if not years.

Sending a questioning glance to my left, I see tension written into every line of Aidan’s face, and it puts me on high alert. Whatever we’re about to do isn’t something he wants to do, and that has every nerve ending in my body standing at attention.

After a few hundred feet, he pulls his truck into an even more overgrown clearing of sorts, only this one has a clearly marked footpath right in the center, leading to what looks to be a set of headstones rising out of the tall grass.

I unbuckle and grab the door’s handle, thinking we’re visiting someone’s burial site, but Aidan takes my hand in his and squeezes it tightly, not saying a word.

Sensing he needs a few minutes, I release the handle and wrap both of my hands around one of his, offering whatever comfort I can. When he’s still quiet several minutes later, I raise the center console and slide across the bench seat so I can press myself to his side.

If being here didn’t feel so ominous, I think I’d be enjoying myself. It’s a dreary, overcast day, but a storm is coming, and you can feel it in the atmosphere. It’s like the air is electrified, charged with endless possibilities, and the knowledge that the coming storm has the potential to wash away anything unwanted.

It’s more than ten minutes later when Aidan finally speaks. “When I was eight years old, my father told me I would never go anywhere in life. That I would end up just like him because we were one and the same.”

I stifle my noise of surprise and wrap my hands around his bicep, clinging to him. My mouth opens to speak but he gently shakes his head and uses one finger to close it back.

“My father was a bastard, Lyla. He was a mean drunk who couldn’t hold down a job and took his anger issues out on his kids and wife. When I was eight years old, he told me I would grow up to be just like him, and then when I was eighteen, I watched him die in front of me, and I didn’t do a damn thing to stop it.”

Tears cloud my vision for a young Aidan who was dealt such a terrible hand in life. “Aid…”

He shushes me. “Please, let me get this out.”

I nod, and he continues.

“My father was notorious for driving home from the local bar when he was too drunk to function. We lived in a shitty, run-down, one-bedroom trailer on the opposite side of town that only had enough hot water for one shower a day. And that hot shower never went to me or my younger brother, Wesley, unless our dad was passed out drunk. He drank so much it’s a wonder the alcohol could still have any effect on him by the time I was eighteen, but it did. He still had awful anger issues, and by that point, he knew he couldn’t get a hit on me or Wes because we’d fight back, so he’d taken to beating up on our mom when we were at school or practice when we couldn’t do a damned thing to stop it.”

Aidan takes a deep, shuddering breath before continuing his story, and my heart cracks straight down the middle. He’s mentioned his mom on several occasions, so I know she’s still alive and well. But it’s obvious that whatever he still has to tell me is tearing him up inside, even after so many years.

“One day, I came home early from a two-day baseball tournament to find him slapping my mom around. Wesley was still at his own tournament, so he thankfully wasn’t around to see it go down. But the image of my mama on the floor curled in on herself while her husband beat her black and blue is so burned into my damn brain no amount of alcohol could wash it away. I lost it, Lyla. I got so fuckin’ angry I attacked my father. One good hit sent him to the ground, but it was like eighteen years of pain just bubbled up and finally overflowed.”

I squeeze his hand hard as he talks to remind him that I’m still here, and he sends me a grateful look.

“He came to a few minutes later mad as all hell and took off for the bar. I helped Mama patch herself up and settled in for what should have been just like any other night. Only it wasn’t. You see, the bartenders in that part of town didn’t give a shit what their patrons did after last call. One of those ‘you don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here’ type of establishments. Little did I know the sheriffs had been cracking down on this particular bar for letting their patrons get behind the wheel after being cut off, so the bartender took dads keys and called me to come pick his drunk ass up.”

His voice lowers to a whisper, and the more upset he gets, the more his accent thickens.

“Maybe if I’d refused, the sheriff woulda brought him home, and he’d still be alive. But that’s not what happened. We didn’t have a second car, so I walked the three miles to the bar, and when I got there, he was drunker than I’d ever seen him. Slurring his words and stumblin’ all over the damn lot, rantin’ about his miserable life. I got the car keys, loaded him up, and took off like a bat outta hell. It was three in the morning, I had school in just a few hours and was exhausted. We lived on a deserted back road in the middle of nowhere, South Carolina, so you really had to concentrate on navigatin’ the road safely, especially at night.”

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