28. Callum

28

CALLUM

I tried not to worry once Rhys fled my apartment, but that was much easier said than done. Fuck me, I probably should have waited for a better time to just drop the L bomb like that. Rhys had finally opened up to me about his traumatic past, and like a jackass I unloaded on him in his vulnerable moment. I hadn’t meant to scare him or make him uncomfortable. I just couldn’t go another second without him knowing how I felt. His story had shredded me and all I had wanted was to let him know exactly how much he meant to me. How fundamental he was to my life now.

The Callum I was before Rhys felt like a prototype, an experiment until I found the key that unlocked who I was meant to be. For a long time, I tricked myself into thinking I was happy, or at least as happy as I was allowed to be. I went on feeling fine, believing my happiness was just the absence of bad shit. Meeting Rhys proved to me that I wasn’t as happy as I thought. I was just surviving. I was sucking oxygen each day and going through the motions, but then he came along and destroyed every belief I held about myself. He showed me how much fucking better my life could be with the addition of a single person. Rhys was my happiness. The one who brought color and light to my world, renewing my hope that things could get better.

I fought with myself not to fall back into shitty habits and spiral. Rhys may not know it yet, but I knew he loved me too. I felt it in the way he cared for me, kissed me, looked at me. I could be patient until he figured it out. He was worth it.

I fixed myself some coffee, thinking of ways to distract myself until I heard from Rhys again. I collapsed on the couch, about to pull up Netflix when someone rapped on the door. My brows scrunched together, wondering if Griffin had left his key here last night and couldn’t let himself in. The face that greeted me when I opened the door was the last one I expected.

“The fuck are you doing here?” I blurted, staring dumbfounded at Uncle Jack. He rubbed his hands together, lips rolling inward with an apprehensive expression.

“I’m sorry for dropping by unannounced, but can I come in?” He asked, nerves coating his tone. I begrudgingly stepped aside to let him in, his entry bought only because he’d come through for me with the tuition incident. Jack surveyed my apartment with a small, sad smile on his face and I realized why. He had never been there before. He’d been so removed from my life the last several years that I was essentially a stranger to him now.

“You gonna tell me why you’re here on a Friday morning?” I grumbled, going back to sipping my coffee if only to give my hands something to do.

“I’ve been thinking about you,” Jack started, fidgeting with his car keys. “I’ve been trying to give you space like you wanted, but we really need to talk, Callum.”

I shook my head, a mirthless laugh escaping me at the thought. “Talk? Seriously? You and I haven’t really talked in years. You haven’t been around. I can’t imagine what we have to say to each other now.” I circled around him, sitting on the edge of the couch since I was too keyed up to relax.

“Believe me, I realize how shitty of a father I’ve been?—”

“Don’t,” I bit out harshly. “You don’t get to use that word.” A flicker of remorse hit me when Jack winced at my words, but I ignored it. Calling himself anything but my uncle would earn him a one-way ticket on the Fuck Right Off Express.

“I want to be in your life, Callum. I want to do whatever it takes to repair our relationship. I know I have a hell of a lot to make up for, but I’m willing to do anything. Please give me a chance,” Jack implored. Anger sparked in my gut, indignant that he would want anything from me after so long. I put my coffee mug down with a loud thud, shoving up from the couch.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” I snapped. “You want me to give you a chance when you basically left me to be raised by Blair? Do you have any idea what your bitch of a wife did to me? You heard her admit it that day I came to the house, but do you know the extent of the shit she put me through?”

“Callum—”

“When you started traveling for your job, Blair made it her mission to make my life miserable,” I growled, cutting him off. “She threw out anything that belonged to mom and wouldn’t let me talk about her ever. And when I did? She’d scream at me, call me a worthless, pitiful mistake. She’d call me every name in the book to make me feel like absolute shit about myself. If I talked back or argued in any way, that bitch would hit me with whatever was nearby. A wooden spoon, a TV remote, a shoe, anything she could reach.”

Jack’s eyes never left mine, his face wet with tears that streamed down his cheeks. He didn’t say anything, only listened as I finally unleashed the torrent of pain I endured. Adrenaline coursed through me, shaking my voice as I fought to continue. The memories were stifling, pulling me under in a suffocating wave, but I couldn’t stop.

“It only got worse from there,” I grated out. “One time when I wouldn’t stop screaming back at her, she got fed up and dragged me to the guest closet. She shoved me in and left me there for over an hour. You know the one? The one with no lights and the fucking lock she put on it? I lost my mind panicking in there. She figured out pretty damn quick that I was claustrophobic and it became her number one weapon. For years, she found any excuse to lock me in there and scare the ever-loving shit out of me. Just because she could. Just because you weren’t there to protect me!”

A sob wrenched from Jack’s throat, his hand flying up to cover his mouth like he was going to be sick. That makes fucking two of us…

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry,” Jack cried, his blue eyes showing me the depth of his distress. “I swear to God, I didn’t know she was hurting you! I…I believed her when she said that you were angry and hurting because of your mom and that you were lying about what she did. I didn’t want to believe that she would ever do something so disgusting…I can’t ever ask your forgiveness, Callum. I don’t deserve it.” He stumbled back into the couch, crashing down as though his knees gave out on him. He was a blubbering mess, but I wasn ’t much better. My eyes stung from the tears that couldn’t be contained.

“You’re right. You don’t deserve it,” I choked out. “That’s why I didn’t tell you when it continued. You proved to me very quickly that nothing I said would matter because no one would believe me. So tell me again how you want to be a part of my life when you let me down over and over again.”

“I know you hate me, Callum,” he croaked through stuttering breaths. “But not as much as I hate myself for failing you. I promised Leana that I would take care of you, that I would be the father you deserved and I let her down too. I am so fucking sorry for not being good enough for you,” Jack wept. I turned away, too close to breaking from the turmoil I saw in him. I didn’t want to feel bad that he was so distraught. I didn’t want to have that tiny, needling urge to let him back in so I could have a parent again. But something he said had a question crawling up my throat before I could force it back down.

“What happened with you and mom?” My voice was barely above a whisper, but Jack’s gaze lifted to mine and I saw a watery smile break through.

“I loved her,” Jack breathed. “I loved her so damn much, even though I knew it was wrong. You have to understand, Leana and I didn’t plan to have an affair or betray anyone. We fell in love and…”

“You made a mistake,” I intoned, ice seeping into my blood. “Meaning I was a mistake.”

“No!” Jack barked, standing swiftly and closing some of the distance between us. “You were never a mistake. I told you before, I loved you from the second I found out about you. You were the love of our lives, Callum. You still are to me, no matter how you may feel about me.”

“Then why leave me? Why leave us ?” I asked angrily. “If you loved us so much, why stay with Blair and never tell me who you really were?”

“That was Leana’s decision. I hated it. I wanted to do right by her and divorce Blair, but she begged me not to,” he explained adamantly.

“You expect me to believe that?”

“It’s the truth. When Blair and I were in our first year of marriage, things were really bad between us. Leana and I had always been friends, but we grew very close during that time. The first time we slept together was done in the heat of the moment and we both regretted it. Despite how she is now, I did love Blair and I hated that I cheated on my wife. But after that we couldn’t stay away from each other. We fell for each other and continued to be together for almost a year. I had been planning to talk to Leana about getting a divorce, but then she got pregnant with you...” Jack trailed off, taking a steadying breath. I was rooted to the spot, unsure how to take in the full story after so long of being kept in the dark. Mom hadn’t told me anything beyond Jack being my father, and I had been too heartbroken and pissed to hear anything else.

“Being pregnant changed everything for Leana. Your grandparents found out and she couldn’t lie to them about the affair any longer. They were so livid with us and wanted her to…terminate the pregnancy, but we both told them that wasn’t fucking happening. They agreed to keep the truth from Blair, but cut all ties with Leana. Then she decided to drop out of UT even though I fought with her not to. That was when I told her of my plan to divorce, to take care of you both, but she turned me down. She…she said that she had been too selfish with me already and had betrayed her sister for too long, and we had you to think about. You were the only thing that mattered and she had to do right by you. She didn’t want you to be born into a wrecked family and a broken marriage because of what we’d done.”

Hearing how mom had always put me first, even before I was born, made my heart twist painfully. I rubbed at the phantom ache in my chest, trying and failing to choke back the godforsaken tears that wouldn’t dry the fuck up.

“So you just let her go?” I whispered, unable to look at him.

“I fought her on it as much as I could, but you knew how Leana was. You get your stubbornness from her,” he said, his lips tilting up faintly. “And I thought she was right at the time. I had loved Blair once and I owed her enough to give our marriage a real shot. So Leana and I ended the affair, but I tried to be there for her as much as she’d let me. Blair knew nothing except that her sister had gotten pregnant with a man who didn’t want to be involved, so I made the excuse that Leana needed family to help her. It allowed me time to be there for her doctor’s appointments and financially support her.”

That tidbit had my head snapping up to his. “You…you went to the appointments?”

Jack smiled at me softly. “Of course I did. You were my child and I wanted to be as involved as I possibly could with the…horrible ci rcumstances. I still remember your first sonogram. I remember looking at that monitor and bursting into tears because there you were. The result of everything Leana and I had shared. You made us so damn happy, Callum.”

I was quaking, emotions hitting me from each direction until I didn’t know what the fuck I was feeling. “Then why did you leave me after she died? Why were you always gone?” I demanded, my voice growing louder with each word.

“Please understand, I was devastated when your mother died,” Jack rasped. “I never stopped loving her. I didn’t know how to deal with losing her. Then there you were…this beautiful, perfect reminder of my Leana and it hurt to look at you sometimes. I know how that sounds, but I was destroyed by her death. It changed me. I had finally gotten to be your dad full-time, but it came at the cost of the love of my life. After that it was so hard to be home with you with all that grief and guilt that I took the easy way out. I thought about quitting to be home with you so many times, but…I was a fucking coward.”

That word crumbled me. Rhys had called me a coward once and it gutted me that I actually understood where Jack was coming from. How many times had I run away from Rhys when I felt too much? My sins were different from Jack’s, but they were two sides of the same coin. We’d both hurt people we loved because we were too scared to face the possibility of hurting ourselves. Jack had been a fucking terrible father for so long, but there were also many years that he was one of my favorite people. He had shown his love with all the time he spent with me while I was growing up and being a strong presence in my life. Annoyingly, I also believed him when he said he’d loved me since mom’s pregnancy. But it didn’t erase all the hurt that was inflicted over time.

“This doesn’t change anything,” I cried, fighting like hell to hold onto my bitterness and anger to steel myself. “You still fucked up and because of that, I am fucked up . I don’t have it in me to forgive you. And how do I know I can trust you on any of this? I’m the living, breathing proof of yours and mom’s lies, so why should I believe anything you say?”

At that moment, my phone vibrated in my pocket and I pulled it out on reflex. I could barely read the message through my tears and the headache pounding against my skull, but I saw it was from Rhys. My sweet Rhys. Fuck, I would have given anything to have him there with me. I needed his calm, comforting presence to anchor me as I struggled not to come apart at the seams.

“I would never lie to you about this. You deserve the truth of what happened in the past, but you don’t just deserve it from me. I know Leana left you a letter before she died. Have you ever read it?”

My eyes slammed shut as pain washed over me. I had tried so fucking hard to forget that letter existed because I wasn’t strong enough to read it. I knew I probably never would be. If I wasn’t such a coward just like dear old dad, I would have burned it ages ago, but I couldn’t let go of mom’s words. I kept it safe, hidden with the last two photos of her I had in that children’s book. I had looked at it so many times over the years, tracing over her handwriting of my name and trying to squeeze out even a fucking ounce of courage to read it. I never could.

“I can’t read it,” I admitted in a hoarse whisper.

“Why? Leana deserves to give her side of the story as much as you deserve to hear it. Son, please…”

“You are NOT MY DAD!” I shouted, losing all composure. “You haven’t earned that right! You left me to her! You believed her! I lost my mother, my best goddamn friend in the world, and you abandoned me just like she did! You proved that bitch Blair right! I’m a worthless, piece of shit mistake! You never should have let me be born!”

Jack looked horrified and shattered at my outburst, but I was shattered too. “Callum, how could you say that? You are the farthest thing from worthless and you could never be a mistake! You are my son and I would have sooner died than give you up, your mom included! You have every right to be furious with me, but please read her letter?—”

“Don’t you understand that I can’t do it?! I already hate you, I can’t hate her too! It’d fucking end me!” I bellowed.

The door to my apartment flung open, Rhys stumbling in breathless and panicked. The instant my eyes crashed with Rhys’ worried, violet gaze, I completely and hopelessly broke. My knees shook and gave out, and I sank to the floor with a hard thud. I couldn’t see past the deluge of my tears and my own sobs drowned out every noise. In the next second, I was surrounded by a warm body and a sweet coconut smell that I inhaled like it was the only air I could breathe. Rhys’ arms around me had me falling apart even more, but somehow also held me together.

“It’s okay, baby. I’m here, I’m right here. It’ll be okay,” Rhys murmured in my ear, his hands running in circles on my back. “I love you, Cal. I’m so sorry I wasn’t here.”

My heart felt like it would explode hearing those words falling from his lips. I told myself I’d be patient until he was ready to say it back, but fuck, those words were everything to me. Somehow I cried even harder and I hated that I was such a wreck. But it didn’t matter because Rhys was there. Like he said, everything would be okay with him there.

“Callum…” Jack started, but it was like he didn’t know what to say. I didn’t even know what he could say at that point. I had no capacity left to do anything but try to breathe, let alone talk to him. Either out of protectiveness or this innate sense of what I needed most, Rhys stood up to deal with Jack.

“I’m really sorry, but I think it’s time for you to go, sir,” Rhys told him firmly, ever my polite good boy.

“Who are you?” Jack asked, but his tone wasn’t rude, merely curious.

“I’m Cal’s boyfriend, Rhys. I’m assuming you’re his Uncle Jack?”

“I’m…yes,” he answered softly. I was shocked that he’d taken what I’d said to heart about not being my dad. Part of me was pleased he’d kept that to himself, but the other part of me was confusingly sad to hear him deny it. Jesus, this was such a fucking mess.

“Well, I’m sorry we’re meeting under these circumstances, but you should go. I don’t mean to be rude, but Cal clearly needs some time,” Rhys reasoned with him.

“Please, I just want to help and be here for him...”

“With all due respect, it’s not about what you want. It’s about what Cal needs. Give him some space and time, and I’m sure he’ll reach out when he’s ready.” Rhys’ steadfast support of me had me falling even more in love with him, and I didn’t think that was humanly possible.

It was silent for several beats, no one moving or talking. I kept my gaze trained on the floor since I couldn’t face Jack again like this. I was emotionally drained and hanging on by a thread. Finally, I heard footsteps heading toward the door.

I looked up at the sound of it opening, seeing Jack staring down at me with a myriad of emotions crossing his face. Remorse, despair, concern, fear, and even love. The longer our eyes stayed connected, the more I saw the undeniable love he felt for me. It was the same look in his eye when I was just a little kid who worshiped his uncle. But it was more than that .

As I sat there crumpled on the ground in the wreckage of our revelations, I saw him as my dad.

“I’ll give you time, but I’ll always be here for you. I’ll find a way to make things up to you. I swear on my life,” he promised, plastering his hand over his heart. “I love you, Callum.” And then he was gone.

Rhys sank back down on his knees beside me, catching my eyes. We sat there not saying a word, our gazes locked while the air shifted as it always did with us. But it wasn’t our usual charged, sexual energy. This was something softer and even more magnetic drawing us together. I didn’t know who moved first, but our lips met and bodies collided, a gentle crash that was just as powerful as our unrestrained lust.

I clung to him, cementing him to me as much as I could while we were on our knees. I could taste the salt from my tears coloring our kiss, his tongue erasing the flavor and replacing it with his own. My head clouded over, every sense heightened and fixed on him and the magic we created. And it really was. There was no other explanation for how he healed me from the inside out with every swipe of his tongue, every press of his lips on mine, every beat of his heart in time with my own.

We broke apart, breathing in each other’s air. Without a word, Rhys stood and pulled me with him, leading me to my room. He stripped me down slowly, brushing kisses over each inch of flesh he exposed. When he was naked too, we crawled under the covers of my bed. We held each other tightly, foreheads connected and legs tangled, but it wasn’t enough. I needed more. I needed that connection with him that I felt down in my black, bruised soul.

I gently turned Rhys to face away from me, tugging him back into my chest and curling around him. I stroked my cock between us, readying it for him. Rhys picked up on my intention quickly, grabbing the lube and prepping himself with two fingers as I slicked myself up. Then I was pressing into him, both of us releasing a sigh of contentment and pleasure.

I thrust forward, working myself deeper in small increments, not in any rush. When I was finally buried in him, I took a second to just feel him against me, my throbbing cock surrounded by his incredible heat. It was like burying myself in his soul, filling all the dark, empty parts of me with his essence. It was all-consuming and my chest felt tight with emotion that threatened to drown me. But it was everything I needed.

I fucked him slowly, each drive of my hips angled to perfectly hit his prostate. Our soft moans and husky breaths permeated the silence of the room, driving up the intimacy of the moment. Rhys intertwined his fingers with mine, our joined hands resting against his heart. I felt his tight walls gripping me and I knew his release was close. I wanted us to fall together. Wherever he went, I wanted to follow. I reached around for his swollen length, pumping it in time with my hips.

Rhys gasped and cried out softly as his climax hit, his cum drenching my hand as my orgasm crested. It washed over me like a wave crashing on the beach, overtaking me and spreading to every molecule in my body. My cum poured into his channel, jets of it pulsing into him over and over until I thought I’d blackout from the endless euphoria. Our breathing synced up as we came back down, the intensity of our fucking enveloping us. I was even more drained than before, yet somehow feeling so full of him that my eyes stung with the gravity of it. I moved to pull out, but Rhys reached back and grabbed my hip firmly, holding me in place. I pushed in deep, staying inside him and savoring the ardent connection I craved.

And even after the overwhelming events of the last hour, I fell into a blissful sleep still cradled in Rhys’ heat, right where I belonged.