23. Chapter 23

I was sitting on the top step of the deck stairs wearing nothing but a loose pair of gray sweatpants and looking like I'd lost my new puppy when I heard subtle movements behind me followed by hesitant steps. I glanced over my shoulder to see if it was Ray making good on his threat to come drag me to the recording studio or maybe someone else with equal ability to maim me. It wasn't Ray standing in the shadows cast by the house and I didn't need to fully see the face to know who it was. I closed my eyes and inhaled slowly, then dropped my walls into place to protect myself from more hurt.

"You're back," I said to Cain. It was more of an observation than anything. He'd been gone two full days—not that I was keeping track, but I guess I kind of was. His absence felt more like a year to me and I hated myself for missing him so much. The point being, I didn't expect to see his gorgeous face ever again.

Or his sexy mouth.

None of it mattered because he was a liar.

The fucker.

But the biggest emotion I felt was relief that he'd returned and I wanted to kick myself for feeling like that, too. For the briefest of moments, hope bloomed inside my chest until I kicked it back down. No way was I going to allow him an opportunity to hurt me a second time. I was still reeling from the first. Why was it so fucking hard for me to remember that I was still choking on his deceit from two days ago?

"I, ah, Ray called and asked if I'd check on you," Cain stuttered. "But I was also hoping while I was here we could talk a bit because I owe you an explanation."

"Hmm. . . well, it looks like you wasted a trip because I already told Ray to go fuck himself. There's no need to check on me," I said and set aside my guitar to rest it safely against the stair railing. I glanced over my shoulder to sneak a peek at him, then allowed myself a brief head to toe appraisal before my gaze swung back to focus on the perfectly landscaped backyard. "Plus, I'm quite certain we have nothing to discuss. I know I've said all I needed to say and I thought I made that clear two days ago."

Cain shook his head. "I'm not expecting you to say anything, Gage. All you need to do is listen," Cain said and cleared his throat. "I didn't want to leave things the way they were between us and I wanted it to be me who told you the entire truth about my past."

"What I need to do?" I snapped and stood up to my full height with my hands on my hips. My gaze zeroed in on his and that's when his disheveled appearance hit me. He looked as wrecked as I felt with more than a day's worth of beard growth, unkempt hair, and clothes that looked like he'd worn them longer than a day—maybe slept in them, too. I could also see fatigue marring his normally serene facial features, with dark circles under both eyes. He was always so put together but not today. He looked tormented. "I don't need to do a goddamned thing for you and the time to tell me the truth was two months ago! The only reason you want to purge yourself of the truth now is to ease your guilt for fucking stabbing me in the heart and I'm not feeling the need to sooth your fucking conscience."

I turned away from Cain and rested my forearms on top of the railing. We remained silent for far too long but Cain showed no signs of leaving anytime soon. I knew he'd moved closer to where I stood because I could smell the delicious spice of his body wash and could almost feel his warmth seeping into my bare skin. I hated him for it—hated how my body reacted to his presence and I hated loving him. It made me feel weak.

Having him here again annoyed the fuck out of me but if I'm being honest, I was also happy to see him and that made me angry at myself all over again. It was a conundrum I never thought I'd see myself in because this wasn't normal behavior for me. The last two days changed me—Cain changed me. I was seeing things differently and feeling shit that confused the hell out of me but the fact I even had emotions about this situation was new and unfamiliar. I had no personal experience to feed off of and that had me feeling a bit lost in how to act.

"My parents died in a car accident when I was a freshman in college," Cain began. "I was barely twenty years old and scared about my future. They were paying for me to go to college but after they died, there wasn't a lot leftover once I finished paying off their bills, mortgage, and their funerals. I had to secure student loans before my sophomore year began which was only a couple of months away. I wasn't able to swing it all, so I answered an ad and. . . "

"You started selling your ass to survive," I finished for him.

"The man who owned the agency was really good to me," Cain continued. "He dealt exclusively with high-end clients and only sent me to his best. In the beginning I hated it. After the first time, I vomited in the guy's bushes as soon as I got outside to leave. I wasn't sure I could continue doing it but Tino—he was the owner of the company—he gave me a five thousand dollar bonus. I was able to put that money toward the debt I was incurring. It felt like my only option was to do this job if I ever wanted to get ahead of the money I owed. Six months later I felt better about the job but I felt empty on the inside. For me, it was just a weekend job but not necessarily every weekend. When I did work, I only saw one or two clients. It wasn't always about sex either. I had several lonely, rich men who paid me to hang out with them and just talk or be his date at a party. The money was lucrative and I didn't have to work outside of the weekends which meant I could attend classes and study during the week. In one weekend I'd easily earn twenty to thirty grand or more. After one year, I was up to date on the debt, I'd paid for my college education, and I had managed to save a lot of money as well. It's the only reason I did it but it's a soul-crushing job.

"After two years I had to quit," Cain continued. "But Tino understood and went out of his way to make sure there was no paper trail of me ever working for him. I was only paid in cash and it was Tino's idea to create another name and persona for me to work under. Tino had a side company which on paper I worked for as an assistant to him. He ran my cash through his accounts and paid me for assistant work through his secondary company. I honestly thought no one would ever find out. Most of my jobs were done up in San Francisco. I only worked in LA for a few months before I quit. Every year after I quit I felt safer and safer about my secret being kept hidden. Until Alan Gerskin—whom I don't even remember. . . "

"Listen, Cain. This conversation isn't necessary. I know the story. It's the same one told by a million other young kids who come to LA with stars in their eyes only to realize it costs a lot of money to live here."

"I want to tell you," Cain said softly. "I want you to hear this from me and not anyone else."

"And I don't want to hear it," I all but snapped.

"It's just a piece of my past," Cain went on. "I'm not the same desperate twenty-year-old living from week to week hoping I can afford to keep a roof over my head. What I did wasn't much different from being a normal college age kid who slept around a lot."

"Except you got paid for it, Cain!" I yelled.

"Are you trying to tell me what I did was any different from the hundreds of women you've fucked over the years—and one way or another paid for them to be with you? Whether it was an expensive dinner, fancy jewelry, an exotic weekend away, great seats at a show, or whatever. We all pay for the things we want, whether or not cash is exchanged. At least there was a level of honesty between me and my clients as to what they were paying for."

"I'm not denying I've slept with a lot of women!" I seethed. "But I am definitely disagreeing with your definition of a paid sex worker versus a partner for the night and I'm quite certain the women I've been with would say the same."

"I guess it's tough luck for the women in your past," Cain said. "At least I financially benefited from my hard work. Maybe in the future you should consider compensating them for their time."

Cain turned toward the side stairs on the deck by the kitchen and started to walk away and my heart sank. As angry as I was to see him arrive, the pain of watching him walk away again was ten times worse.

"Cain!" I hollered after him and I saw his feet falter on the deck. Then he glanced over his shoulder at me. Uncertainty creased his face and I swear I saw tears shimmering in his eyes from the sunlight. I took a couple of cautious steps closer to him, hoping like hell he wouldn't turn away and leave. I desperately wanted to reach for him, touch his face, wrap him up in my arms, but I was afraid of the hurt that could follow. "I've already told you I'm not pissed off you were an escort," I said. "I'd be the last person to judge anyone for doing that, and as you pointed out, what I've done isn't much different."

"Then why did you shove me away like I was garbage instead of talking this through after the party—like we're doing now?" Cain asked.

"It was the lies you told to my face and the blatant omissions you offered about your past!" I screamed. "I asked you more than once if you had secrets I should know—and you lied each time. I thought I meant more to you than that—that you respected me enough to share it with me."

"Can you understand now why I lied—and continued to do so for all these years?" Can asked.

"Yes, of course I can, but. . . "

"But, what?" Cain asked. "Is there something else I did that hurt you?"

My shoulders slouched and I looked down at my bare feet.

"Gage, tell me what I did," Cain pushed. "I never meant to hurt you, and out of everything that's happened and been said, hurting you is the worst feeling of all."

I exhaled loudly and rubbed a hand over my face. I was beyond exhausted. Every muscle in my body was protesting the fact I was still awake and on my feet, when I should be in bed trying to sleep. But Cain was here. He'd come back for me, to try and give us both some closure. More importantly, he told me his truth. I supposed I should show him the same level of respect by revealing a little bit more of myself with him. I lifted my head and met his gaze.

"I've never been a jealous man," I began. "When I was with a woman, I didn't give one flying fuck if I saw her the very next night with someone else. They simply didn't mean enough for me to care. But you. . . I cared about, and when Alan shared the intimate details of when you were with him—I lost my shit. I wanted to shred him into pieces right where he stood. I'd convinced myself my emotion was because of the circumstances of why you were with Alan and taking money for it. It wasn't until yesterday that I forced myself to look deeper and that's when I realized the emotion I was feeling was pure jealousy. The idea of anyone touching you makes me see red, whether it's something that happened a hundred years ago or last week."

"Jealousy is a normal thing to feel," Cain said.

"Not for me," I answered and then scoffed. "It meant. . . it meant. . ."

Cain stepped closer and I felt him touch the back of my hand, so tenderly at first, until I squeezed his fingers, and then he laced his with mine.

"What did it mean?" Cain almost whispered his question to me. I felt his breath ghosting across my flushed cheeks.

"It meant that at some point over the last two months the love I felt for you had deepened to a point where it left me too vulnerable. It gave you free range to utterly destroy me—which you did at that party," I confessed. "I've been in so much pain these last two days and it's because I allowed you to get too close and suddenly all my insecurities were exposed."

"And you've never allowed that to happen before," Cain said.

"Fuck no—never have, and for good reason," I said. My breath hitched when he tugged on my hand and pulled me a little closer to him. "It's why I've always kept people at arm's length. Allowing people to get close opens you up to feeling things like betrayal and jealousy. I can't afford to be weak like that."

"Allowing people to love you doesn't make you weak," Cain said. "It makes you stronger because you opened yourself up to the possibilities love can give you."

"I'm not sure I see it that way, Cain. You fucked me over with the lies and I can assure you that doesn't make me feel stronger."

"I was only twenty when the bottom fell out of my life," Cain said. "I had to learn ways to survive the pain of losing both parents and how to keep myself alive for another day or a week. I didn't have the luxury to think further ahead than that and it made me infinitely stronger. I had no other choice. It was either choose the possibility of making a better life for myself or living on the streets fighting to live another day. If I'd chosen that path I wouldn't have survived long. I'd be dead and long forgotten by now."

"I'm sorry you had to make such adult decisions so young," I said. "That wasn't fair and I hate that you went through that. I understand why you went the route of being a sex worker. But it still doesn't explain why you had to lie to me. I gave you every opportunity to share your truth and I never would have judged your choices. It's what you did to me after I opened myself to you. You based our relationship foundation on a fucking lie, Cain. No relationship can survive the fractures that come from that."

"There really is no chance for us to find each other again, is there?" Cain questioned.

"I'm hurt—and you hurt me. I wouldn't survive another betrayal from you, even the smallest one," I admitted. "I just can't allow an opportunity for that to happen again. Can you understand that?"

He nodded and I could tell he was fighting back tears. I felt it, too, the burn of emotion and the thickness clogging my throat. This was the hardest conversation I'd ever had. I loved this man—even after he cut my heart out and stomped on it, but I was being honest about not surviving another slice to my heart. I simply couldn't open myself to it again.

"I understand and I can't say I blame you," Cain said. "I'd probably do the same if the situation was reversed. But I absolutely wasn't lying when I said I was in love with you—I still am, and probably always will be. That part and every moment we spent together was me being as real and honest as I've ever been in my life. Thank you for showing me something like what we had was possible." Cain wiped his eyes and turned around to leave. "Go finish up that album. You're sitting on another Diamond record."

I nodded at his back and swallowed around the lump in my throat. A couple of seconds later I heard the engine of his car roar to life by my garage and I squeezed my eyes tight. His betrayal fucking hurt but watching him leave and knowing I might not see him again was agony. I couldn't let him go.

My feet were moving before I knew it was happening and I managed to jump in front of Cain's car while he was turning around to head out of the driveway. He slammed on his brakes and put his car into park. A moment later, Cain pressed the button to lower his side window. I hesitated just slightly before I approached him.

"I'm in love with you, too, Cain, and that has to mean something," I said in a soft tone. "Possibly something we can build on, so I'm thinking we should at least try and rebuild what was broken."

Cain covered his mouth and I heard a sob being muffled behind his fingers. "I'd really like that," he said.

I stepped closer to his car and reached inside the open window to dry his cheeks with my fingers. "Shut your car off and leave the keys in it," I said. "Gentry can move it if it's in the way." Then I stepped back and held out my hand for him to take. He slid out of the front seat and stood up in front of me. Hope and trepidation warred with his facial features. I'd never seen him look so unsure of himself and I hated the fact I'd made him feel like that.

Could I forgive him for lying to me? Forgiveness was a huge thing to offer someone who wounded you so deeply, but I really did love him. He'd proven he wasn't perfect—so fucking what. I certainly couldn't lay claim to being perfect either. But the best parts of us worked. We understood each other almost on a molecular level, and damn, did we love hard and fierce at every opportunity we found. I couldn't let that go—couldn't let him go.

Not now or ever.

My arms loosely wrapped around his waist while I stared into his eyes. After a beat Cain curled his hands around my neck but it was me who finally closed the tiny gap separating our mouths. I covered his and like always, our response to the touch was overwhelming. Every piece of me came back to life, firing off like tiny explosions through my veins. He opened for me and my tongue quickly began to play. I walked him over to the side of his car and pressed him against the cool metal, but we never stopped kissing.

Until we heard applause and wolfish whistles.

I quickly broke the kiss with Cain to see Gentry and Langley clapping at us where they stood about fifteen feet away with ridiculous smiles plastered on their faces.

"It's about damn time you two kids made up," Gentry teased in his deep baritone.

"Maybe now peace will be restored at the Tennison Castle," Langley added.

"I'll see what I can do about the peace," I replied to them.

Cain and I both laughed. I pressed my forehead to his and breathed him in. "I know we still have a lot to talk about, Cain, but I'm not ready to give up on us," I said quietly.

"Neither am I," Cain replied. "But there's one more thing."

"Jesus, fuck. Are you about to reveal another secret?" I asked.

"Nope, all of my skeletons are officially out of the closet," Cain teased.

"Then what is it?"

"Ray was expecting I'd convince you to get back to the studio to finish the album," he said.

"Damn it," I said and stole another kiss from Cain. "Will you come with me?"

"I absolutely will," Cain admitted, "but I'm strongly suggesting you put real clothes on and perhaps some underwear before we leave."

"I thought you liked the commando look on me," I said.

"I do, but I'm not thinking your band wants to see your swinging dick at work."

"Nor at any other time," I said and laughed. I kissed him again and then froze. "Wait. I have a question."

"Okay, what is it?" Cain asked.

"Is Cain your real name?" I asked and held my breath.

Cain's fingers caressed the side of my face and I leaned into the warmth of his touch like a cat seeking affection. "Cain Bennington is my birth name," he explained with watery eyes. "He's the Cain you met in the Adirondacks and he's the only version of me who matters. That other guy? He died the day I retired almost fourteen years ago."

"It's nice to meet you, Cain Bennington," I said breathlessly. "My name is Gage Tennison and I love you with everything I am."

I consumed his mouth again, tasting every corner and paying great attention to sucking his tongue like it were his cock. Cain melted into me and I held on to him for dear life, like he was something precious that I never wanted to let go of—because it was the truth.

And isn't that what life is all about?

You're damn right it is.