He took a deep breath and held out an envelope. “Here. This is for you.”
As Alexandria demanded to know what was going on, I walked away with what I knew was a letter from Kane. My hands trembling, I opened the envelope and began to read his words, my heart breaking with each one.
Dear Abbi,
I wanted to come get you and take you home to our little house, but you and our child are better off without me. That first night we were together I told you I’d hurt you because I hurt everyone. All my life I’ve known I was born to hurt. I can’t change, no matter how much I wish I could.
I’m no good, and you and our child deserve better. I thought life had given me you to show me I wasn’t supposed to be alone, but I messed everything up and that will never change. I’m a murderer. A killer who can’t even say he feels bad about the men he’s killed.
I love you. I never meant to hurt you. It’s just who I am. I’m sorry.
Kane
“Abbi? What is it?” Alexandria asked as I stood stunned by Kane’s goodbye.
“He’s not coming.” I let the letter drop from my hand and covered my face as I sobbed the truth.
“He’s not coming for me.”
“Stefan, what’s going on?”
“I don’t know. All I know is that Cash found that letter under his door at the condo and told me
to come get Abbi and get her back to the house as soon as possible.”
“Where’s Kane?”
“We don’t know. His rooms at the club are locked up. I banged on the door, but got no answer.”
“I want to go there,” I said as I scooped Angel up into my arms. “He’s there and he’s hiding
away from the world. I need to go to him, Stefan.”
“The club is closed, Abbi. The place is just an empty building now.”
“He’s there. I know it. I need to go there.”
I kissed Alexandria goodbye and as I rode off to find the man I loved, I silently promised Kane
I’d be the one person in his life who’d prove to him love didn’t have to hurt.
I SAT staring at the white cinder block walls of my rooms as the alcohol finally began to take effect after nearly a bottle of whiskey and prayed for some release from my mind’s racing about Abbi and the baby we were having. A tiny voice in my head screamed for me to go to her, but I knew better.
She didn’t need someone like me. I only brought pain, and she didn’t deserve that. And no child deserved a man like me for a father.
Not that I had any real frame of reference for what a good father was. Cassian March III wasn’t exactly the kind of role model a man wanted. A selfish bastard, his claim to fame seemed to be his skill in getting women to fall for his game. I never wanted to be like him.
All I wanted at that moment was to black out so at least I wouldn’t have to feel the pain of not having Abbi by my side or think about all the shit my mind wanted to use to fuck with me tonight. I didn’t need to beat myself up again over the mess my parents had been and why I was like I was. Closing my eyes, I especially tried not to think of my father, but the few memories I had of us together had different ideas about how I should spend my time drunk off my ass.
He stood by a black Mercedes dressed in a grey three piece suit that likely cost more than what my mother made in a month at the diner. Tall with black hair and blue eyes just like me, he’d likely have a hard time convincing anyone he and I weren’t father and son.
“Kane,” he said in a deep voice as he waved me toward him.
I didn’t know what to call him. Father sounded wrong, as did dad. Dads tossed baseballs around with their sons in the backyard on sunny Saturday afternoons and taught them how to ride a bike and how to swim. Dads sat at the head of the table for dinnertime and stopped in as you were falling asleep to check up on you.
Cassian March III had never done any of those things with me. He’d never done anything with me in the seventeen years I’d been alive.
I stopped about three feet from him and stood silently, unsure why I was even there with him. We were strangers, brought together by my conviction and my mother’s impending death. Neither was a good reason to start any kind of relationship since neither would lead to anything. For the next four years, I’d be locked up and the woman he’d once loved enough to have a child with would be dead.
Maybe he was hoping for me to say thank you for paying for my lawyer. I had to admit the guy was good. Four years for premeditated murder. I wondered what he’d gotten Cassian March out of if he could do that for me.
“Kane, I’m glad you came, son.”
I felt my eyes grow big at that word. Son. I was that, not that he’d ever noticed much.
“What did you want to see me for?”
My terse answer surprised him, and like mine always did, his eyes grew big for a moment before he regained his composure. “I’m sorry to hear about your mother. I hope she’s not suffering.”
“They have her on strong drugs, so she’s not much of anything anymore.”
His blue eyes so much like mine stared at me, and for a second, I was struck by how much he reminded me of myself. Did my eyes ever look that cold?
“Well, I’m sorry. We may not have been on good terms for a long time, but…”
His sentence faded off, and I couldn’t stop myself from asking, “But what? You loved her? If that was the case, I think you would have wanted to see me before this, or is it that you loved her but didn’t want anything to do with me?”
“Is that what she told you?”
I shook my head in disgust. I didn’t come here to do the whole true confessions I loved you from afar bullshit with him. “She never told me anything other than the night she told you she was pregnant with me, you left her and she knew she should name me Kane because I caused pain from the very beginning.”
He couldn’t hide the horrified look that came over his face at hearing the truth, but I saw those cold blue eyes soften as he said, “I didn’t leave her because of you. It’s hard to explain, but it was never because of you. When you were born, I offered to take you, give you my name, and bring you up with my son. She refused. She said you were hers. Even if I wanted to go back to her, I couldn’t, but I’m not going to lie to you. I didn’t want to.”
“Nice. At least I don’t have to wonder anymore if her hatred of you is deserved. Thanks for answering that question.”
He took a deep breath in and let it out slowly. “I didn’t want to go back to her, but I wanted you to have the kind of life I could give you. That should count for something.”