Page 49 of One Last Time?
Chapter 15
Dylan
* * *
Less than one week to go and counting.
Not for the moment when I would end my relationship with Taylor. No, not that.
I had three days shy of one week to go and counting to speak to my father.
I must have met with him this past week nearly as many times as I’d seen Taylor, and that guilt was eating away at my insides. It kept festering like a damn wound that was left open and wouldn’t heal. It came from the lie that I was to him.
The guy who’d kept his promise.
I’d never set out to do anything other than that, but then she happened. Taylor happened to me, and I couldn’t resist her.
She was here again. At my place. She came last night and stayed. I was convincing her to stay again, but her mom was taking her and her sisters out for the day.
I held her in my arms as we stood on the steps leading up to my front door. I held her, kissing her and taking as much of her as I could. She was supposed to leave me ten minutes ago. Like every time, I couldn’t let her go, and I wouldn’t be seeing her until tomorrow.
That to me felt like torture.
“Dylan, you are going to get me in trouble with my mom.” She giggled against my lips.
“She’ll understand.”
“No, she won’t. She already complains that I don’t see her enough.” She tried to pull away from me, but I pulled her back to my lips, claiming her once again.
“Dylan, I’m serious. My mother isn’t like my father.” She winced. This time, I allowed her to pull away.
“Okay, I wouldn’t want to suffer your mother’s wrath. You call me when you get there?” I brushed my finger over her chin.
“I will,” she promised and moved back to me for one last kiss.
She skipped down the drive, got in her car, and drove away. I watched until the car turned the corner and for another minute as I got lost in my thoughts about her.
I never saw the car parked across the street or the man who got out of it until I turned back to go inside, and my heart slammed in my chest.
Dad.
The man was Dad, and he was watching. He was watching me and had seen the whole thing.
Me with Taylor Cartwright, his client’s daughter. My client.
Shit.
I stood frozen solid.
Frozen… unable to move. Unable to breathe.
The disappointment in myself overtook me because I should have manned up days ago, a week ago even, or shit, well before that and told him I was seeing Taylor.
When he walked up to me, it felt like he was walking in slow motion. Like one of those nightmares where everything seemed slowed down. Really, he was walking at a normal pace. The look on his face made me feel worse.
When he got to me, he stopped paces away and narrowed his eyes.
“Dylan, please don’t tell me that girl was who I think it is?” He pointed to the road as if Taylor were still here. “Shit, why am I even asking? I saw her with my own two eyes. Maybe the question I should be asking myself is, why am I surprised?”
