Page 25 of Tracing Holland (The Hold Me NSB #2)

She covers her shock with a dismissive laugh. “Um…ok. Well, I can help you if you’re confused. I’m sure it’s like riding a bike.” She reaches for my jeans, and I catch her wrist, chuckling.

“No, that’s not what I mean. I’m pretty sure it’ll come back to me. I just meant…” I sigh. “Can we sit?”

She’s about to protest again, but then seems to sense there’s more standing in our way than a little insecurity. Her mood immediately shifts, and I love her dimensions, how comfortable she is navigating them.

“Sure.”

We don’t let go of each other and move to the small couch against the wall.

Once we’re seated, she wraps her arm around mine, our fingers laced together.

She rests her head on my shoulder, and I close my eyes.

I don’t deserve this moment, this woman, but she deserves the truth.

The problem is, I don’t really know where to start.

It suddenly occurs to me that this story has never actually been written.

Not in a cohesive form, not in any kind of meaningful narrative that can explain the Train-Wreck, Gravedigger, Dandelion that is Luke Craven.

Even during the good years with Elena we had been more focused on surviving our present than worrying much about our pasts.

She had known details, facts, but no one knew the person who lived them.

Not really. And now she’s a chapter I’m still trying to survive, one that will never close but will go on forever, even as new ones begin to form.

Holland squeezes my hand, and I force air into my lungs. She needs to know this story.

“I was married before,” I begin quietly.

Holland grips harder, as if sensing I’m approaching the vault. “I know. Elena, right? You still wear the ring.”

I nod, casting an instinctive glance at my hand.

“I’ll take it off eventually. I just…” I can’t finish.

The sudden heaviness rises into my throat, cutting me off.

I’m horrified at the display until Holland huddles closer, shattering the little hold I have left on my emotions.

The tears move to my eyes and I try to blink them away, but they press harder, threatening to expose me and the weakness that will probably always haunt me at some level.

I can’t stop thinking about Elena now, which makes me feel like I’m betraying both of these amazing women I don’t deserve.

Would she forgive me for this moment? For wanting to explore the depths of another soul?

For trying to be the man for Holland that I should have been for her?

“You don’t ever have to take it off, Luke,” Holland whispers. “I want to share you with her.”

The tears fall freely now, knocked from their dam by her selfless beauty.

I lean forward and cover my face, embarrassed but unable to stop them.

All I can do is hide now, hide and hope she can forgive the damage I’ve inserted into her life.

At least she knows. Giving her irrefutable evidence of what I am is maybe the first truly selfless thing I’ve done in return.

But she stuns me again when I feel the pressure and warmth of her arms around me.

She settles her head against my shoulder, holding on to everything that’s left of me.

“You’re not broken, Luke. Just lost,” she says softly. I glance up, and she brushes my wet cheek. “Not a ‘broken wanderer,’ just a wanderer like the rest of us. You just insist on doing it alone, which never works.”

I look away and stare at the far wall. She’s not wrong, I just don’t know how to be anything else. “I’ve done a lot of terrible things.”

“We all have.”

“No, but you don’t understand. You should know. You need to understand what I am.”

I can feel her soft laugh. “I hate to break it to you, but all your terrible things are pretty well-documented.”

I close my eyes and can’t stop the brief smile. “I know, but it’s more than that. I’m hard, Holland. Really hard,” I muse into the stillness of the room.

I sense her increased amusement and cast her a wry grin. “What?”

“Um…really?”

“Oh, come on, that’s not what I meant!”

She laughs at the look on my face. “I know, but, seriously! After what just happened?”

I shake my head, still grinning. “Get your mind out of the gutter, woman.”

She giggles and latches onto my arm again when I lean back on the couch. “Says the badass rockstar. Please. Your minds live in the gutters. ”

I grin and shrug. “Used to. Now I’m a fucking Hallmark card, apparently.”

“You’re thinking about adopting a kitten aren’t you?”

“Hilarious. Hey, how about you stop trying to strip my clothes off every time we’re together?”

Her eyes widen at the challenge. “Oh, really? Yeah, you definitely haven’t been sending signs that you want it too. I’m sorry, Luke, your head may be impossible to read, but this guy is not,” she teases, pointing at my crotch.

I laugh and settle into the cushions. “I can’t argue with that.” She returns my grin and begins tracing the tattoos on my chest, the mood growing serious again.

“Explain your ink,” she continues, and I almost flinch.

“What?”

“If you want to talk instead of letting me ravish you, you’re going to pay for it. I want details. Start here,” she says, moving her fingers to my wrist.

I laugh. “All of it?” I ask in disbelief.

She grins. “Why not? They don’t need us for another three hours. Besides, I’ve learned it’s the best way to get the summary of a person. You suck at sharing, so we can do bullet points.”

I let out my breath. “Um…how about we talk about you for once. I know even less about you than you do of me at this point. Maybe I’m the one who should be running.”

“Only from boredom,” she laughs.

“Oh, please. There’s no way.”

She settles against me. “Seriously, Luke, I’m frighteningly stable. I love my family, I have a college degree, and I’m incredibly happy doing what I love for a living.”

I smile. “So everything I’m not?”

“Everything you don’t need to be if you’d just accept the truth about what you are.”

I try not to roll my eyes. “So that degree is in psychology, I suppose?”

“Biology. Can I be honest with you for a second?”

I’m not even sure how to respond to that. “Haven’t you been flogging me with honesty since the day we met?”

She grins and shrugs. “True. That was more of a warning, I guess.” She sighs and pulls back so she can face me.

I brace myself as she grows serious. “You think you’re protecting me from yourself, all the rotten things you are that I don’t know about.

You’ve been pushing me away, refusing to let me in, terrified of the truth about who you are and what it would do to me when I found out. ”

I suck in my breath. “I don’t want to hurt you. I’ve hurt so many people in my life.”

She shakes her head and leans forward with an earnestness that immediately silences further protests.

“Here’s the thing, though, the part you’re not getting.

All the rotten stuff that you’re so afraid of me discovering?

All the shit you think you’re hiding and protecting us from?

That’s the crap that’s already out there!

That’s what we all see, plastered all over the tabloids and Internet. ”

She takes my hands and meets my eyes, refusing to let me look away.

“Luke, I’m here right now, pretty much begging for more, because you have it backwards.

You’re not hiding your darkness. That’s the part you’ve given the masses to label, judge, and punish.

” She draws in a breath. “I’m here because I’ve glimpsed the actual part that no one sees.

The real part you’re holding back from the world.

And I’m telling you, Luke, it’s fucking beautiful. ”

Holland and I talk for a long time, nearly until we have to start preparing for the show that night. It’s an incredible thing watching the lust that started the encounter transform into something deeper, something neither of us saw coming but instinctively know has changed everything.

Callie was right. Holland is a fascinating woman, incredibly intelligent, kind, and probably the most sincere, confident person I’ve ever met.

I love every “boring” detail she shares, and find it hilarious that her “boring” is completely mesmerizing to me.

She’s twenty-nine, terrified of alligators even though she’s never seen one in person, and has three sisters, including the baby of the family who’s sixteen.

She’s a natural blond, but likes to dye her hair different colors depending on her mood, and was born and raised in Canada.

She can’t wait until our Toronto stop so she can spend some time at home for a bit.

She’s had three serious relationships, her last one ending amicably two years ago.

No marriages or children, but would like both one day.

She despises mushrooms. All kinds, even on pizza.

I absorb it all, sucking it in like air, laughing so hard at times I can barely breathe.

I don’t remember the last time I’ve been able to abandon my weighted existence for so long.

For the next few hours I’m someone else, someone I don’t hate, someone who laughs, and cares, and even dreams a little. Someone who understands peace.

She learns some things too. I’m ambidextrous, find spider plants creepy, and have never been on a boat. I’m not a huge fan of mushrooms either, but I’ll at least forgive them on pizza under the right circumstances.

We talk about some of the dark stuff too. About my aunt disowning me, leaving me with no family other than the small one I’ve created with Callie and the band. How hard it was growing up believing you must have been the reason everyone kept abandoning you. We talk about Elena.