Page 27 of Remember When We
“Gio, please … it’s been a long day and I just want to get home. Nice seeing you though.”
“Nice seeing me? Really?” I shot back.
She stared at me in disbelief.
“What do you want me to say?” She looked me over long and hard. “Should I ask why you’re here? Should I ask you why you came back? Where you’ve been? What you want? I probably would ask all those questions if I cared for the answers. You and I have nothing to discuss so please excuse me. Thank you for defending me, it really wasn’t necessary though.”
Not necessary my ass.
But what was I really doing? Why was I pushing and forcing this?
I should leave her alone.
It was just that I couldn’t. Not like before.
Chapter 7
Lyssa
* * *
Icould barely contain myself. My heart had that feeling again. Beating so fast I was certain it would beat right out of my chest.
Twice this week now and for the same man. The same man who I allowed to affect me.
I rushed to my car in the parking lot behind the bar eager to get away; to get far, far away.
Get away from the unwarranted stir in my soul. I couldn’t stand it. That push and pull of emotion I shouldn’t be feeling for a man who had told me he didn’t love me.
Damn it still hurt. It still hurt like hell.
It was bad enough to see Gio up close and have him touch me. Bad enough to see that eight years older on him looked even sexier and gave him a rougher edge. Bad enough that my heart betrayed me and soared when I saw him walk up to me in the bar, looking at me like he used to.
But …
God, did he ever land me in more trouble by beating up on Tony, one of Frankie’s main guys. I didn’t know what you called them. I didn’t know what the guys were called in the mafia. I just knew Frankie was the boss and that was enough to keep myself in check. His guys came to the bar almost every night and that was how they acted. Grabbing me, trying to grope me, and more often than not succeeding.
Fucking free drinks on the house like I could afford to give the liquor away for free and then they wanted their way with me too.
“Lyssa,” Gio’s voice made me whirl around.
I didn’t expect him to come after me. I thought what I’d said was enough to tell him to stay away. I didn’t need him and I didn’t need or want to feel the way I did for him.
Everything was so fucked up and I just wanted to get home.
I continued walking and fumbled to get my keys in my purse. By the time I found them he was right there, right beside me.
“Lyssa, please. I just want to talk to you.” His eyes pleaded with me, but as I looked at him it just felt like this was just all too late.
If only he’d waited for another month. Stayed with me for one month longer he would have known that I was pregnant with his child. I was pregnant at nineteen and had to go through the grief of losing not just Marshall, but him too, and realistically Dad. Dad lost his mind and ended up having to stop working altogether. Dad was in therapy and bereavement counselling for over a year. In that year I had dropped out of college, had my baby, and had to not just face reality, but be a parent too. When Dad turned to alcohol, it being so easily available to him with the bar, the debt came. His health deteriorated and he turned to Frankie for money. Now Frankie wanted me. It’s what this whole thing was about. He wanted me to fail so I could live out the rest of my life as some kind of fucking sex slave.
Me …
So no, I didn’t want to talk to him. There was too much to say that I couldn’t say and didn’t want to either.
“Just leave me alone. That’s what you’re good at … Leaving. I don’t need you; I don’t need you and I don’t want to talk to you ever.” If he expected me to say anything else, it wasn’t happening.
“Lyssa, I’m sorry I left the way I did.” His eyes widened.
