Hard as Stone (Passion in Paradise: The Men of the McKinnnon Sisters) (12 page)

“He was Heaven’s
father, wasn’t he?” Jake prompted aloud, offering her wrist a supportive
squeeze.

“He was Heaven’s
sperm donor,” Harmony correctly sharply.  “That man was
never
her
father, and he never will be,” she declared vehemently.  “I’ll never willingly
allow that man anywhere near my child or give him the honor of calling her his
daughter.  He contributed some genetic material to her existence.  That’s all
he did.  Heaven is
mine.
”

His thumb swept
gently against her skin.  “Sounds like you hate him.”

“Hate isn’t a
strong enough word,” Harmony replied in a shaky voice.  “Loathe, despise,
abhor…none of those words do justice for the feelings I have for Tanner.  The
word hasn’t been created yet that describes just how much I’d like to dance
across his grave.  He’s a life-ruining bastard and if there’s a God in heaven,
then He’ll make sure that Tanner Suarez burns in a hot, fiery hell.”

“Sounds like this
man left quite a mark on you,” Jacob murmured, moving the hand of the arm he
had draped around her to rub the tense muscles in her shoulder.

“Oh, Tanner left several
marks on me,” Harmony muttered as she thought of all the bruises she’d endured
from that monster’s fists beating her body.  “He was good at that.”

Jacob stiffened at
that remark, his jaw clenching.  “He beat you.”  He already knew that Tanner
had, but saying the words aloud made it feel so much more real.  Even worse,
knowing Harmony had endured it hurt him more than he’d ever expected.

It wasn’t a
question he was asking her, Harmony thought to herself, more like a statement
that he waiting for her to verify.  “Yeah,” she acknowledged softly.  “He beat
me.”

Jacob inhaled
deeply at her grim confirmation, pulling her unique scent into his nostrils and
letting it comfort the beast pacing inside him.  Right now, she needed to
unload this baggage that she’d been carrying around for years, and he knew that
she’d never do that if he reacted now.  “Tell me about him, Harmony.  Make me
understand.  How’d it start?” he prodded gently.

“What does it
matter how it started?  It happened.  I lived through it.  I survived.  I
divorced him, and then I went on with my life,” she replied as her heartbeat
thundered in her chest.  She didn’t want to talk about this.  Examining her
past always led to weeks of nightmares and waking up drenched in cold sweat. 

“Is that what you
think?  That you went on with your life?  Sweetheart, you’re so wrapped up in
your past that you can’t see that you’re missing out on your present.  If you
aren’t careful, the future is just gonna pass you by.  You’re allowing one
man’s actions in your past to dictate every move and choice you make.  That
much is obvious by the way you avoid life, Harmony.  You surround yourself with
your little girl and your sisters and your jobs and try to convince yourself
that it’s enough, but it’s not.  There’s more to life than that.  You just
won’t let yourself reach for it.”

“I don’t need it,”
she argued, ignoring the concern she heard in his words.  “I’m satisfied with
the way things
are
for me!  I don’t
need
any more than what I’ve
got right now.  I don’t want those kinds of complications in my life.  As long
as I have Heaven and my family, I’ve got everything that matters.”

“Bullshit!”  He
countered flatly.  “You expect me to believe that a woman that’s made it a
second career to give couples a perfect wedding day doesn’t want to find a
piece of that kind of happiness for herself?   That she doesn’t want a partner
to share the good times and the bad?”

“I tried that
happily-ever-after thing once, Jake.  It sucked for me.  I went into my
marriage with my head in the clouds and my heart on my sleeve, believing that
we’d both live out the fairytale.  Then, reality hit me between my eyes.  And yeah,
even with my past, I still believe in the sanctity and beauty of marriage –
for
OTHER people.
  Yes, I think people can find their ‘one and only’, and I get
a huge kick out of seeing them do it.  I get an even bigger high when I’m part
of that perfect moment when they join their lives together, but I
had
my
shot at marriage.  I
failed
.  No offense intended, but I’ve got zero
desire to try a relationship again with anybody after what happened to me the
first time.”

Her words hung hard
between them before Jacob objected stonily, “You weren’t the one that failed,
Harmony; he was.”

Harmony rolled her
eyes as she pushed against the edge of the couch, her lips pressed tightly.  “You
know what?  This is all none of your business, Jake.  Thank you for a nice
dinner, but I’d really like to leave now.” 

Jake shook his head
as he narrowed his eyes.  “I told you once already, Harmony, I’ve made
you
my business.  You can bite, claw, kick and scream at me, but you’re not leaving
until I hear everything there is to hear about this asshole.  I refuse to try and
battle the unknown with you.  I wanna know my enemy, and believe me, just from
the little bit you’ve told me, your ex-husband definitely qualifies as my public
enemy number one.  Tell me, when did this shit start between the two of you? 
Was he abusing you from the beginning?”

Her earlier
steadfastness faded in that second, and Harmony closed her eyes as tears filled
her eyes, blinding her for a moment.  “You’re just not going to let this go,
are you?” she whispered.

“I can’t, baby.  I
need to know this as much as you need to share it with somebody.  Maybe once
you see that nothing you can say is gonna chase me off, you’ll get the idea
through your head that I’m about to be a real permanent kind of fixture in your
life,” he murmured, lifting a hand to stroke the back of his fingers against
her cool cheek. 

“It’s an ugly
story, Jake, with a really shitty ending,” she tried to warn him, unconsciously
leaning into the calloused palm caressing her face, her tears caught in his
strong fingers.

“I can handle it,”
he assured her calmly.  “Just take a deep breath, baby, and start letting all
the poison out.  You’re strong, Harmony.  This bastard injured your spirit; he
didn’t break it.  It’s time you told this story to somebody, and I’m sitting right
here beside you.”

Maybe he was right,
she thought silently as she studied the harsh angles of his face.  Maybe she
had carried around this agony for way too long.  He seemed strong enough to
bear the burden she suddenly wanted to unload.  And hell, he was asking her for
it – begging even.  Licking her lips, she inhaled deeply, gathering her
courage. Turning to look him in the eye, she huskily admitted, “I was stupid. 
Naïve and young and so
incredibly
stupid.”

Watching as his
lips parted to speak, she quickly pressed her index finger against his mouth. 
“If you wanna hear this, you have to listen and let me say it,” she warned. 
She noted the unhappy flash in his dark eyes, but nevertheless, he nodded
against her finger.  “Just remember, you wanted to hear this.”

Lifting his hand,
he captured her fingers and laced them together with his.  “Fair enough,” was
all he said as he settled back against the couch and pulled her by their joined
hands against his chest.

Swallowing the lump
that had formed in her throat, she steeled herself to continue and fixed her
gaze on the darkened television across the room. 

Harmony began
slowly as she attempted to mentally prepare for this road trip down Memory
Lane.  “Everybody always says that the truth will set you free, but those
people are idiots, or maybe, they just haven’t had to face a really
ugly
truth.  The truth has done a lot of things for me, Jake.  The truth has tied me
up in knots.   It’s made me wish that I had listened to all the people that
tried to warn me about Tanner. It’s given me nightmares.  It’s done lots of
things to me.  The one thing tellin’ this truth hasn’t done is make me feel
free.”

“Maybe this time
will be different,” Jake murmured from beside her, his free hand settling over
the back of her neck and squeezing gently.

“I met Tanner
Suarez when I was a fresh-faced, completely clueless sixteen-year-old girl.  It
happened at a party that one of my friends had thrown to celebrate the end of
the school year.  I felt so grown up that night; my Daddy had let me drive to
the barn where the party was by myself and told me that I didn’t have a
curfew.  He and Momma made the mistake of trusting my judgment; I’d made
straight A’s that semester and had done it while working almost full-time, so
they were impressed with me.  If they’d had any inkling what would happen that
night, they’d have locked me behind my bedroom door until I was eighty. If I
knew what I know now, I’d have begged Momma and Daddy to put chains across the
door. But they didn’t know what would happen that night and neither did I.  So,
off I went.” 

Harmony paused to
shake her head sadly.  “That party changed the entire trajectory of my life. 
Funny, I couldn’t see it then – I was so wrapped up in my teenage dramas - but
looking back, that’s the night my life went off the rails,” she said softly as
her eyes grew distant.

“I saw him before
he noticed me that night.  After all, everybody knew Tanner Suarez.  He was our
resident bad boy.  You know the kind – he was the one that every mother warned
her daughter to steer clear of and every father prayed he’d never have to
confront.  He drank.  He cursed.  Most importantly, he never met a rule he
wasn’t willing to break if it meant he got what he wanted.  He never let anyone
stand between him and what he wanted.  He was two years older than me and had
just graduated from high school.  He caught me staring at him and when his eyes
locked on mine, it felt like the whole world just came to a screeching halt. 
He was
that
charismatic.  When he started walking toward me and I
realized that somehow
I’d
captured
his
attention, it felt like I
was caught in some kind of weird tractor beam that pulled me toward him and
wouldn’t let go.  I swear, it felt like the earth had shifted beneath my feet. 
At eighteen, he seemed positively worldly to a girl that had never even been on
her first date.  He was the hottest guy in Paradise, and the fact that he
deigned to single me out for attention at that party skyrocketed my popularity
overnight.”

Harmony grew quiet
for a moment as she got lost in the memory of that night.  She’d been so
excited that the little Miss Nobody she had been had managed to turn the eye of
the most notorious boy in town.  Shaking her head at the actions of the girl
she’d been then, she forced herself to go on with the story, and she didn’t
fail to notice that Jake was honoring his promise to remain quiet. 

“He asked me out on
my first date that night,” she went on with a sigh, reaching for the glass of
wine she’d had the foresight to grab when they’d left the dinner table.  Taking
a sip, she savored the sweet, tangy flavor as she thought about how excited
she’d been that the boy every girl had wanted had set his sights on her.  “I
was thrilled.  Not only did I finally get to go on a date, but I was going out
with the guy that had ruled the school.  My Daddy hated him from the get-go. 
Looking back, I can see why.  Tanner pulled up to the house in his Camaro and
honked the horn.  He didn’t come to the door… didn’t meet my parents… he just
sat out in the car and laid on the horn.  And what did I do?” Harmony asked,
disgust heavily lacing her voice.  “Like a fool, I ran out to him as fast as my
feet could carry me.  I just ignored my parent’s hollering at me to get back in
the house and jumped in beside him.”

“You were a kid,
Harmony,” Jacob interrupted gently.  “All kids go through a rebellious stage
where they test their parent’s authority.”

“Yeah, but not all
kids run off the moment they get handed a diploma and marry their parents’
worst nightmare.  That’s what I did, Jacob,” she countered sadly, stray tears
forming in her eyes at the thought.  “My Momma and Daddy fought with me for two
years about Tanner.  They saw the way he treated me… the way he demeaned me. 
But I thought I knew everything.  He
loved
me.  He didn’t tell me that I
looked fat in my shorts to hurt me; he was
helping
me.  If he made me
wash the makeup off my face, it was because he’d been around enough to know
what whores looked like.  If he wanted me to meet him at eight o’clock on a
school night, he was a busy guy so I should make myself available.  He was his
own man.  He was older.  He was smarter.  He was self-confident enough to say
whatever he felt like to whoever he felt like saying it and screw the rest of
the world.  I swear, if I could go back in time and bitch slap myself, I
would.”

Taking another sip
of wine, Harmony blew out a long breath.  “At any rate, I knew my parents would
never accept Tanner willingly, so as soon as I graduated, off we went.  I felt
like such a grown up… going off to Gatlinburg, eloping in secret.  I was going
to live a real-life romance novel, or so I thought.  When we got home a couple
of days later, my parents were nearly out of their minds with worry.  I hadn’t
told anybody what we were doing.  I knew somebody would try to stop me if I
did.  So, when I showed up at the house with my cheap-ass Walmart wedding ring
that Tanner had complained about buying but I was soooo proud to be wearing on
my finger, my Momma cried.  No, she didn’t just cry.  She sobbed.  She begged
me to tell her why on earth I’d gone off and ruined my life like that?  I can
still hear her, Jacob.  
‘I raised you better than this, Harmony Pearl! 
Why?  Why would you do this to yourself?  Where did I go wrong that my child
would go off and do something like this?’ 
My father told me that I had two
choices.  The family or Tanner.  I couldn’t have both.  It had to be one or the
other. ”