The warm water does nothing to ease the pain in my heart. I see my mom’s beautiful smile, and hear her laughter, and it hurts. It hurts so fucking bad. I didn’t even get to say goodbye. God dammit, I didn’t even get to say goodbye. Did she know I loved her? Did I tell her enough? I just want her back. I want five more minutes. I want to tell her I’m happy, that I’ll be okay.

I didn’t want her to die worrying.

And she did.

Tears explode from my eyes, and I’m so tired of them, but I can’t keep fighting the waterfall that needs to run free to ease the pain in my chest. So I cry. I cry until I’m gasping for air and my entire body is shaking. I cry so hard I don’t hear the door open, I don’t see the shower door move and I don’t notice anyone is there until the shower goes off and a set of hard arms curl around me.

I don’t stop crying. I don’t even fight.

A warm towel is pressed against my skin, and I bury my face into the cotton of the T-shirt that is covering a chest I love so much. There’s only one person brave enough to chase me when I storm out, and that’s the man I love so much. The only person who knows me better than anyone. The only person who understands me.

“Make it go away,” I sob violently. “Max, just make it go away.”

“Can’t do that, sweetheart,” he murmurs, sitting down onto the bed.

I curl my fingers into his shirt and tug over and over, just wanting it all to go away. He lets me; he lets me cling to his shirt until my knuckles are white. My body trembles in his arms and everything inside me aches so hard that I just want to claw at my own skin to make it stop.

“I didn’t get to say goodbye, Max.”

“Sometimes that happens, but she was prepared for it, Belle, and so were you.”

“I didn’t tell her I loved her.”

“You think she didn’t know that?”

“But I didn’t get to say it one last time.”

He squeezes me tightly. “There’s never a last time. You can tell her as many times as you want, even now.”

“She was worried for me, worried I wouldn’t be happy. I wanted her to die in peace.”

“She did, Belle.”

“No, she didn’t. I was a mess, Max. Always a damned mess, over you, over the things that went wrong . . .”

“She knew you’d be happy,” he says, his voice thick. “Because I told her you would be.”

I go still in his arms. “What?”

“I went and seen her, the day before she died. I wanted to—ah, I don’t fucking know, clear the air I guess.”

“You went to see her?” I whisper.

“Yeah, and when I was there, she told me a lot of things, but she asked me . . . she asked me to take care of you.”

“And you told her you would just to make her happy?”

“No, baby,” he says, clutching me tighter. “I told her because I fucking meant it.”

I start crying again.

“She told me that I was the only thing you’d ever want or need, and all she wanted before she went was to know you’d have what you deserved.”

“She thinks I deserved you?” I sob.

“Yeah, and she was right.”

“I don’t deserve you, Max. I don’t deserve anyone.”

“That ain’t the truth, Blue Belle, and you know it.”

“I don’t,” I cry out, jerking his shirt. “I let you push me away, and I didn’t even know you were suffering.”

“No, you didn’t, but I didn’t make it easy. You can’t live holding onto the past. It’s a toxic place that’ll only bring you pain. We’re here now, aren’t we?”

“Being without you—God, Max, it was horrible.”

“Yeah,” he says. “It fucking was.”

“Y-y-you said that you . . . that we . . .”

“We gotta go slow, but I’m being a fucking fool if I say I’m not desperate to have you back in my life. Fuck, I love you, Blue Belle. You’re the only woman I’ve ever loved.”

“You do?” I squeak.

“Abso-fucking-lutely, and nothing is going to stand in my way of fixing what I broke, but it’s going to take time, and I think we both need that time.”

“I think you’re right.”

“But hear me now, kid,” he says, leaning down and pressing his forehead to mine. “Nobody is going to take you from me. Nobody. Not even you.”

“I can live with that,” I croak.

He grins. “Fuckin’ glad, baby.”

I kiss his jaw.

Maybe the light at the end of the tunnel is finally starting to shine through.

We buried Mom five days later with a simple but beautiful service. We laid her down next to Dad, the place she’d most want to be. Heaps of people came to pay their respects, and Tina was apologetic to me for her outburst in regards to Max. I was glad, because saying goodbye to Mom was hard, and I needed her there.

It’s been two weeks since that day, and things have been hard. Some days are easier than others, but mostly they’re getting better and not worse. Max has been taking Imogen on his days off, spending as much time with her as he can, and she’s thriving. She adores him, and he loves her with his whole soul.

I haven’t spent much time with him, though every time we’re alone, he takes me into his arms and kisses me long and hard. He’s been holding back, claiming we have to do this the right way, and that’s slow. We don’t want to lead Immy on and then crush her if things don’t work out, so we’ve been mostly hanging together as a family.

The more time I spend with him, the more desperate I’m getting for more of him.

Tonight I’m going to watch him fight with the girls from the club. They’re coming because Rainer is fighting Max tonight. It would seem that after Max fought with Rainer, he decided he wanted him to start fighting for him. Max obviously saw talent in the sexy bartender, and now Rainer spends his weekends in the House Of Obsidian, fighting for extra cash. He’s good too, from what I’ve heard.

I’m both nervous and excited to see Max fight, because it’s something I don’t link to good memories. Every time I’ve seen him fight it’s ended badly, but tonight I know it’ll be different. Tonight he wants me there, and tonight I want to be there. So the girls and I have basically spent the entire afternoon decking ourselves out, and now we’re ready to see the men get down and dirty.

The club is pounding when we arrive, which isn’t surprising for a Saturday night. There’s a massive line up at the door, but we get in straight away because Max made sure the bouncer knew who we were. It’s a tight squeeze inside, but we manage to get to the bar to order a drink. The girls have all their men with them, so right now I’m the only one without a gorgeous male on my arm.

I adjust my short dress and take the drink handed to me. I’m not used to wearing something so revealing, but Santana assured me it looked amazing, and paired with my high black pumps, she claimed I would have Max eating out of the palm of my hand. I’m not so sure about that, but I went along with it and let her deck me out.

The dress itself is actually cute, and on any other woman I’d probably be envious. It’s just not something I’m used to. It’s short and tight at the bottom, but the top dips down with ruffles flowing down over the top of my belly. It opens up around my breasts to expose good cleavage and has one hell of a back dip. Santana compromised with me on my hair, letting me have it down with thick curls, so that my back wasn’t so exposed.