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“There’s a lot of things you don’t do. Although, you have dated a lot, never have I heard that you were caught kissing in public. And never have you taken any woman to meet the family. Would you like me to continue with the list? Because I have more,” he said.
“No. I know things appeared to be different with Crystal, but we all knew she was here on...vacation.” The word vacation still bothered me. But there is no reason for anyone to know why she was really here.
Fuck. I wish I didn’t know.
“I’m sorry.”
“Can you stop saying that?” I snapped.
“Okay. Let’s change the subject,” he said, knowing that I was at my breaking point.
It wasn’t his fault. “Maybe we can just call it a night. I’m tired and you have a family waiting for you at home.”
“I know you don’t want to talk now, but if you change your mind, I’m here for you. You are my family too. Don’t forget that.”
He got up off my couch and I just nodded as he left. It was my chance to tell him that our mother was still alive. That she was trying to reach out to us, well to me, and how I let the one link to her, leave this morning.
I’d spent the entire day thinking about that damn letter. It was just words on a piece of paper. Her actions were what mattered. For more than thirty years, there had been neither from her. I was okay with that. So why is it that I’m not okay with it anymore?
If she had just sent the letter, I’d have torn it into pieces and never gave it a second thought. But Crystal had flown all theway here to deliver it, and if that damn hawk hadn’t grabbed her purse, I know I couldn’t have denied her request to read. I might not like it, but she would’ve accomplished what she set out to do.
Crystal held a power over me that I never knew existed. Even from thousands of miles away, she still held it. If she didn’t, I’d be out right now, moving on. But I didn’t want to think about any other woman. Just her. Maybe it was because I’d never met anyone like her. Most Tabiqian women have long dark hair like her. Dark eyes as well. She could easily pass for a Tabiqian woman, even though she wasn’t one.
That just proved that this wasn’t purely physical. But there was no denying, that chemistry between us was explosive. I thought it would be even the first time we were together, but it only kept getting better each time. I could only imagine what it would be like to spend a lifetime with her.
I needed to stop with those these thoughts. I was only twisting the knife myself. She was gone. We didn’t even say goodbye. That was probably my doing, because the last words we exchanged weren’t very nice.
Did I owe her an apology? Yeah. I just didn’t know what to say. Sorry didn’t feel right. I was sorry, but then again, I wasn’t. I had the right to be angry. She was caught in a lie. A big one. Why should I feel badly about losing my temper? It’s not like I left her on the ledge and made her find her own way back to the resort. All I did was...shut down and put my walls back up. Not all the way, just enough to get through the night.
I had every intention of seeing her off. Even drove to the resort early this morning. But I couldn’t bring myself to get out of the car or call her. I wasn’t ready. I needed time to think. I mean, what was the point of talking to her, just to say goodbye? It wasn’t going to change anything. What we had was over.
I just don’t want it to be.
What I needed right now was sleep. Tomorrow my head would be clear, and I could decide then what I wanted to do.
I wasn’t in the mood for dragging my ass to bed. Grabbing a throw pillow, I laid down on the couch and placed my cell phone on the coffee table. It wasn’t even eight o’clock. The sun was just setting. That wasn’t going to stop me from closing my eyes and sleeping. The beer was helping with that.
Moments later, I felt myself dozing off. But before I could go into a deep sleep, I sat straight up.
Grandmother!
Why didn’t I think about this when I first met Crystal? Grandmother said we were going to have a visitor that was going to change our lives forever. She wasn’t talking about something horrible that was coming our way. She was talking about Crystal. She’s the visitor.
I needed to know how she was changing our lives. Was it because I fell in love with her and were we going to work out after all? Was it because of the letter? Did I need to find my mother after all?
Why does it have to be one or the other? Why can’t we have it all?
I grabbed my phone and realized that it was very early in the morning in the States. She probably only just got home and went to bed. Calling Crystal now was out of the question. And that was probably a good thing. I still had no idea what to say, and I couldn’t tell her she was in my grandmother’s dreams. Hell, I wasn’t sure she was. It just made the most sense to me.
Since when do I believe in her dreams?
I was probably just grasping at straws trying to find anything that explained why things got so intense between me and Crystal so fast. Blaming the universe was as good of a reason as anything else I came up with.
But since I was exploring the option, I might as well go visit my grandmother tomorrow. If the topic of her dreams just so happened to come up, and we talked about her latest one with the mysterious visitor, maybe I would get my answer.
Goodness knows I don’t need any more questions.
CHAPTER 17
