Page 47 of A Wrench in the Plan
I’d seen the ugly side of life. It had touched me. Scarred me deeper than the cuts they left me with on my face.
Underneath the relief and happiness that it was over was this rage and darkness that was slowly consuming my soul.
I didn’t know how to stop it.
Or if I even could.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Wrench
All the guilt was welling up inside of me. It was eating away at me, stinging more than the hole in my side.
I shifted on the extremely uncomfortable hospital bed. My hand brushed over the worn leather of my cut, which was sitting on my lap since I couldn’t exactly wear it right now. They’d found it in the truck and brought it back to me.
This was the first time I’d been awake and didn’t feel like I was immediately gonna drift off again since I got out of surgery. Things had apparently been touch-and-go as they tried to extract the bullet from my insides. It hadn’t hit anything major, but they’d said it was close. Here I was, needing to rest and heal, but all I could think about was getting back home. Of being at the compound, in my tiny room, spread out on my bed with Evan beside me. His head on my chest. His fingers drifting mindlessly over my body. His soft words in my ear.
No, I didn’t want to be here.
I didn’t want to be alone with my thoughts.
The damn guilt. It was eating away at me. And the shame.
Fuck!
It slammed into me then.
I was in love with Evan.
How had I not realized that before?
Seeing it now wasn’t helping me out one bit. It only made me hate myself more. I may have loved Evan, but I hadn’t done right by him.
When death had felt like it was close, I’d chosen to take comfort in another.
My eyes had been opened to so many things. I guessed that was what nearly dying did to you. I cared deeply about Evan, but I’d kissed Cat. I’d seen things that I’d either been ignoring for years or had no clue about. I was trying really hard not to figure that part out. Even still, I saw Cat now. Saw her for her strength. For her determination. For her… softness.
Saw her for who she really was. All the looks she’d given me over the years. The hurt I’d caused her when I kept my distance. The hope that had been there when I didn’t. Sure, things had changed throughout the years. She’d grown from being a kid into a beautiful woman, and with that, she’d done her best to hide those looks of hope, but they were still there. If you looked hard enough, you’d see them.Iwould have seen them. But I’d let myself be blind to them. Somehow my memory must have caught onto something, because as I thought back, it was all right there, saved up like a reel of missed moments playing out in my mind.
The floodgate had been opened. I saw her, truly saw her. And I’d tasted her. It had been wrong and the worst kind of timing to kiss her, but there was a huge part of me that had no regrets about it. If it was the last kiss I ever got, it would have been worth it. At least she would have known that I finally…
What?
Honestly, I had no idea.
I might not have been in love with Cat like my sister had been all her life with my best friend, but… I’d always been drawn to her. Always felt when her eyes were on me. Always been aware of the moment she entered the room.
The things that were shared should have never been shared. That kiss probably shouldn’t have ever happened. But those things couldn’t be taken back. And I was unsure of how to go on.
What the fuck did it matter now?
As I’d been there, drifting in and out while feeling like I was dying, I’d thought of two things. Cat and Evan. Hadn’t thought about my sister. Or Travis. Or my parents. Or the club. No. It was those two that I cared most about. The two of them that I tried to hold on for. That was another thing that was fuckin’ with me. Made me think that I didn’t deserve a place in anyone’s life. Made me think I didn’t deserve to wear the colors on my chest and call myself a brother.
The perfect image I’d had of my life exploded, and was now scattered around me in shattered bits. It had been an illusion all along, and I didn’t deserve any of it because I was a fucking fraud.
“Chry?” Evan said as he slowly pushed the door to the room open.
His eyes met mine, and then he was taking wide steps to get to me. I reached for him, needing his touch more than I should have. I had no right using him like this, taking his comfort that he so easily gave, but I couldn’t fucking make myself stop.
