Beneath the Scars (41 page)

“You made that obvious.”

I frowned at her, not understanding. “Did Megan not tell you my past?”

Karen leaned forward, almost sneering at me. “Listen, Zachary, and listen well. Until a very short time ago, I knew nothing about your past—about who you were. Megan kept it all private.” She sat back, her eyes drifting to the table. “Until this moment, I didn’t realize how well she wrote it.”

“Wrote what?”

She stood up and picked up Megan’s journals. She held them in her hands, as if making a decision. She withdrew the red colored one and placed it on the table, then handed me the rest of the books. “She wrote your story.”

I was shaking as I took the books. “Why?”

She sat down again. “Partly to get the memories out, I think. Mostly though, to heal. She wanted to remember all of it. She didn’t plan on doing anything with them, except to write them out of her head. It was better than her sitting here, staring into space, which is what she did for a few days. I got up one morning and found her writing, as if her life depended on it. I knew she’d be okay—it would take some time, but she would recover. If she could write it out, she’d get through this.” Her eyes narrowed. “And she has.”

“She’s moved on.” My voice sounded clogged, almost choking as I spoke.

“How long are you staying here?” she asked abruptly, ignoring my statement.

“I don’t know.”

“You need to read those books.”

“Why are you keeping one?”

“It’s the last book. The ending, if you like. Once you read those, we’ll talk. I’ll decide if you get the last one.”

“Why are you giving them to me at all?”

The room was silent as she mulled over my question. “I don’t really like you, Zachary. I don’t understand what Megan sees in you that inspired the love and loyalty she feels toward you. I don’t know why my husband thinks so highly of you—even now.” Her fingers traced over a pattern on the arm of the chair, back and forth, almost hypnotically. “But I love both of them, and he asked me to give you the information on Jared. Megan still feels something for you, although I don’t understand why. Their opinions have to be counted, so I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt—for their sakes.” She stood up, signaling she was done with me. “Read the journals. Then we’ll talk.”

I walked to the door. “Does Megan know I’m back?”

“No.”

“Will you tell her?”

“We’ll talk after you read the journals.”

I knew that was all I would get from her for now.

Without another word, I opened the door and headed across the beach, the journals feeling heavy in my hands.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Four days. I waited four days—hoping, praying Megan would return. I wanted to see her again on the beach and go to her; hear her voice, and see her sweet face. I yearned for her more every day.

The days passed, though, with was no sign of her anywhere. Maybe she had decided not to return once she found out I was back in Cliff’s Edge. I had no doubt Karen told her I’d come back, since she promised me she would. For the first two days, I read Megan’s journals. I relived moments I hadn’t allowed myself to remember, smiled at the way she saw me through her eyes, frowned at how often I’d caused her tears. The tenderness, only she could trigger, raged again, as she described reading my moods when my eyes changed color—something I wasn’t even aware happened. I blinked away the moisture when she compared my smile to a morning sunrise—slow and warming the air around me. I rarely smiled before she entered my life, feeling the scars made that gesture look twisted and wrong. She saw only good and beauty.

Twice, I had begged Karen to tell me where Megan was, but she refused, saying the decision was up to Megan, not me. Despite my assurances of how much I loved her, Karen’s opinion of me still remained skeptical; her protectiveness was fierce. I had to respect her for that above all else. The morning she left, I found the last journal on my doorstep, but I had yet to finish reading it. The pain it contained was so raw and overwhelming I hadn’t read past the day I fled from Megan and Cliff’s Edge.

The morning of the fifth day, I was attacking the canvas in front of me, all the rage and bitterness toward myself splashing on the stretched material in angry, bold swipes of black, indigo, and gray. The storm on the painting was bleak, dark and massive; overtaking everything in its path—much like the burning pressure in my chest.

The pain hadn’t lessened; in fact, it had gotten worse since I returned. I hadn’t slept and barely eaten—Karen’s words and Megan’s writing playing repeatedly in my head. I had read and reread everything Karen gave me. The proof staring me in the face, the truth I knew all along, and refused to admit, ashamed at my actions. The things I’d done, the assumptions I’d made, the pain I’d inflicted. All done because once again, I believed in what I saw, not what I felt. I failed to trust the one person in the world I should have listened to.

I stepped back, feeling the great weariness from lack of sleep cover me like a thick blanket. I dropped my brush into the jar beside me and wiped my hands on the rag as I stared at the chaos on the canvas. The picture I looked at was void of anything but pain—much like my heart.

Elliott’s head snapped up, a low whimper happening in the back of his throat as he stood, his tail moving side to side in agitation while his huge eyes looked behind me toward the beach. Slowly, I approached the window, reaching out a hand to steady myself on the frame.

Megan.

Standing motionless on the packed sand, just out of reach of the shallow surf.

She was wearing a long, thick coat clutched loosely around her body. Her shoulders were hunched against the wind that blew strong and cold, while her glorious hair streamed out behind her, the sun catching the color, and turning it bright copper. She seemed so small amid the vastness that stretched out before her, yet it was only her that my eyes could see.

Dixie ran around on the sand, sniffing and exploring, her excited barks barely rising over the swell of the waves and the wind. Behind me, Elliott paced, knowing Dixie was there. He was as anxious to be reunited with her, as I was to see Megan.

Unlike the reunion they would share, though, I had no expectations of a joyous reception from Megan. Her journals were vast and rich—our story laid out in all its sweetness and horror. I saw us falling in love, and felt my walls crumble in those pages as I opened myself to her. I felt her elation and read her pain, the pages bearing the evidence of her emotion as she wrote about the last awful day, a few new ones added of my own as I read her words. All of the journals showed the tears that had fallen as she wrote, the watermarks appearing more often as the story grew to a close. I had no idea what the end part of the last journal contained. I still hadn’t read it; every time I picked it up, a wave of nausea would rush through me, knowing I could very well read Megan’s final farewell to me in it. I knew I would read and live her pain of the past few months she’d been alone. Her words would convey the same loneliness and longing I’d felt all this time, as well as the hurt I caused both of us by leaving. As much as I admired her strength before, now I dreaded reading how she used it to move past me.

Slowly I walked down the stairs, Elliott ahead of me. Shrugging into my coat, on impulse, I slipped the last journal into the pocket. I hesitated, my hand gripping the door handle, knowing once I opened the door there was no turning back. Elliott would be out like a shot and within seconds, Megan would know I was coming. There was a chance she would turn and walk away.

Nonetheless, it was a chance I had to take.

Elliott was out of the door and on the beach before I even got to the top of the stairs. I stood watching as Dixie and he raced toward each other, the barks of welcome ringing out, echoing loudly. A smile tugged on my lips, watching the two furry friends reunite. Megan turned, watching as well, her head lifting, looking my way as I stood on the steps. Deliberately, she turned back to the water, her shoulders now straight. There was no doubt what emotion she was feeling at the moment.

Wrapping my coat tighter, I crossed the beach, stopping before I was too close. The urge to wrap myself around her was almost overwhelming. All I wanted was to reach out and touch her, but I knew that wouldn’t be welcomed.

She spun around, the movement so abrupt and unexpected, it startled me and I stepped back. Emotions I’d kept buried, memories I refused to allow to surface, broke free, tearing though me like a tornado.

Her eyes—swirling, deep pools of brown so rich and vibrant stared at me, filled with a thousand emotions. Her sweet face was pale, the freckles standing out on her skin like flecks of wet sand on a bleached seashell. She was thin and tired looking—yet so very beautiful.

How could I have forgotten how beautiful she was? How much she made me feel simply by being close to her?

I stepped forward, but her hand flew up, halting my movement.

She was also very angry.

I held up my hands in supplication. “Megan,” I breathed.

Her eyes dropped, but she didn’t move, instead pulling the coat she was wearing closer around her like armor. “Why are you here?”

“I had to come back.”

“Why?”

How did I explain it to her? There weren’t enough words for what I wanted to tell her. “Please, look at me.”

Slowly her eyes lifted, my heart aching with the pain and hurt I saw in them. Pain and hurt I caused. Her hands tightened on the coat, the material twisting in her fists. “You believed him. You believed his disgusting, terrible lies,” she spat.

“I’m sorry.” Two words that weren’t anywhere near adequate, yet the only ones I could think to say.

“You’re sorry?”

“I have so much to say, Megan. I don’t know how to start.”

“Why don’t you start with where you’ve been for the past few months, Zachary? After you left me here! Alone—facing that sea of reporters who were screaming and yelling questions, calling me names, while he stood there, fucking smirking as you walked away—no—ran away like a coward! You arrogant, selfish, asshole! You just left me there!”

Her voice had steadily risen until she was screaming at me and I flinched at her words, but didn’t stop her diatribe. Everything she said was true.

“And then I come back here to find you gone! You disappeared without a word, the whole time believing his lies!”

“I did believe them. It made so much more sense than you really loving me.”

Her shoulders sagged, her voice now weary. “I never did anything but love you.”

“I know that now.”

“How did it feel when you realized I wasn’t lying? That everything I said was the truth? That we were real? He used
me
. He used
you
to get to
me
. Not the other way around. How did that feel?”

“It made me ill.”

“How do you think I felt?”

“I have no idea, Megan. I can only imagine you were devastated.”

She nodded. “I was. And, I was alone again and had to start over.”

I closed my eyes at the sound of her pain. “I’m so, so sorry.”

“So you keep saying.”

“I don’t know what else to say. I want to take you inside and talk to you. Sit down and hash this all out. Listen to whatever you want to tell me. Maybe get you to listen to me.” I inhaled sharply. “I know it might not mean anything now, Megan, but I love you.”