Messy Love - Stephanie Witter

Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Epilogue
Author’s Babbling
About the Author
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Epilogue
Author’s Babbling
About the Author
MESSY LOVE
Copyright © 2018
Stephanie Witter
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters,
places, and incidents either are products of the
author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any
resemblance to actual events or persons, living or
dead, is entirely coincidental.
All Rights Reserved.
No part of this publication can be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic
or mechanical without express permission from the
author, except by a reviewer who may quote brief
passages for review purposes.
Cover Design by Stephanie Witter
Picture by VikaOvcharenko (depositphotos)
Editing by Laura Tepedino at Editing For You
Formatting by Stephanie Witter
This one goes to Dean and Alec for keeping me
motivated. :p
Sam, Jo and Michelle will understand.
WYATT
I had always thought that being a good person
was easy. I had been so damn wrong I’d laugh if
only my fucking heart weren't about to
irremediably break and if I wasn’t so scared.
Being good wasn’t easy. Doing something good
for someone else could very well ruin you and
leave you with nothing but darkness. I was about to
experience that first hand.
I looked down at the old and battered stuffed
turtle with a missing leg in my hands. One tiny
object changed everything right when I was just
starting to turn my life around, right when I was
making an effort to make her happy.
“What’s that?’’
Her soft voice full of sleep after a night I was
sure to cherish for the rest of my days made me
tighten my grip around the turtle until some puffy
white stuffing fell at my bare feet.
I closed the door and turned around to stare at
the most beautiful woman I had ever met, a
beautiful woman who turned my life upside down
months ago and forced me to be a better man.
But if I wanted to be truly better I needed to
break her heart and mine.
My life had always been a mess and every time I
had thought things were looking up and I dropped
my guard something else came up. With her in my
arms all night long, I had thought that I had a
fucking right to be happy and claim my damn
happy ending. I believed that because I fucking
loved her with all my destroyed and poisoned heart
I could be with her because she saw the ugly in me
and still wanted me, even after all the pain I caused
her. But no. I couldn’t have her.
I swallowed past the tightness in my throat and
lost myself in her eyes.
She knew me, so much better than I thought
possible. I didn’t need to utter a word for her to
understand I was gearing up to hurt her.
She took a step back, shook her head once and
looked away. She was already retreating from me,
and it cut me so deep I wouldn’t feel less pain or
less weak if I was bleeding all over the place.
“Please, don’t.’’ The plea in her voice was my
undoing. Shit. How could I do this after everything?
I closed my eyes and turned my back to her. I
needed to hide. I couldn’t do this if she kept on
looking at me like that, with all that pain etched
over her face. But before I could find my voice,
hers tore through me.
“If you do this again, I’m not coming back this
time, Wyatt.’’
My eyes fell on that fucking stuffed turtle so old
it smelled of mold and dirt. I didn’t have a choice. I
needed to protect her. She thought I was only
reverting to my old habits, hurting her just because
I was scared, but this time was different.
I had an excellent reason to get her out of my
life. I needed to remember that.
I closed my eyes, didn’t turn around and said the
words I knew would haunt me for the rest of my
life.
“Then go.’’
MARISSA
When you’re adopted and you looked in the
mirror the first question to come to mind was "who
did I look like?" It was superficial and yet was very
much a part of who you were.
I always wondered when I caught a glimpse of
myself in a window or a mirror. I had always
wanted to know from where I came.
And now I was about to find out.
The envelope, tall, white and quite thin, laid in
my hands. Who knew such a simple thing could
hold all the answers I had been carrying with me
since I was a pre-teen? With the years, that need
for answers only grew, and with it a fear consuming
me regarding my conception. Had my birth mother
been raped? Had she been in an abusive
relationship? All kinds of scenario haunted me and
sometimes when I looked at myself I had trouble
breathing.
It was strange because the worst-case scenarios
appeared more plausible than the possibility of
being simply an unwanted baby.
It should be easy to tear this envelope open then.
I shouldn’t second guess my decision to know who
my birth mother was.
There were a lot of things I should probably do,
but I still sat on the bed in my childhood bedroom
at my parents’, surrounded by the teen I used to be
only a couple of years ago. At that moment, I felt a
lot younger than my twenty years, as if I was back
to being the shy kid only my big brother could get
out of her shell.
I swallowed and looked away from the big poster
of Kurt Cobain tacked on the wall next to the
closed door and stared again at the envelope in my
hands. I brought my fingers to behind my ear and
rubbed at my black tattoo of three birds taking
flight. I always touched that tatt when I was
nervous or upset.
I took a deep breath and finally stopped that
agonizing waiting game. I slipped my pinkie finger
in the flap of the envelope and tore it open. I
pushed through the trembling of my hands, through
the buzz in my ears and the throb in my temples.
My eyes homed in on the papers piled inside and
the first thing greeting me upon grabbing the papers
was a bad photocopy of my birth mother’s ID.
My heart clenched in my chest until I gasped, the
poor sound nowhere near as strong as what I felt at
the moment upon seeing my birth mother for the
first time.
The picture on the ID was graining, and I
couldn’t make out a lot of her face, but I didn’t
have any doubt. She’s the one. For the first time in
my life, I saw someone I physically related to.
My face with high cheekbones looked a lot like
hers. My mouth, wide and with thick and well-
defined lips matched hers almost to perfection. The
small dimples in my cheeks… They’re the same as
hers. I didn’t know if her eyes resembled the
unusual violet-blue color of mine, or if her dark hair
were the same almost black shade as my own, but
the shape of her eyes did look like mine.
I looked so much like her.
An intense pain took hold of me, digging inside
me as if it tried to poison me and taint my life up
until now with ‘what ifs’ that had nothing to do
here. I shook my head and pushed everything away,
my frown deepening as my grip on the papers
turned my knuckles white.
I would not let this ruin me.
I was a well-balanced twenty-year-old woman,
happy and graced with a wonderful, tight-knit
family. I built myself as an adopted kid, as a child
loved by her parents and her big brother. I wouldn’t
let this make me feel lost.
I had never been lost.
I only needed answers.
***
MARISSA
“How do you feel? And don’t bullshit me, little
sis,’’ Jameson, my older brother, asked me as we
settled on the couch in his two-bedroom house.
Jamie had always been very protective of me and
my confident whenever something troubled me
deeply. He was also adopted and, yet he never
showed any need to know where he came from. He
told me once that he was happy the way his life
was, and he didn’t want or need to shake things up
with a mess that wasn’t exactly his. Sometimes, I
envied how laid back he was.
I shrugged at his question. “Where’s Aimee?’’
“She’s with her mother. They’re currently on
their way to cleaning off our bank account. They’re
always shopping these days,’’ he replied with a
bright smile. His dark brown eyes, soulful, had a
warmth in them that calmed me down.
Growing up, all my friends had told me how hot
Jamie was. With his Latino heritage, his bronze skin
had a perpetual glow I remembered envying when I
was a teen. His thick, dark hair always seemed to
fall back in his eyes, but even though he sometimes
complained, he would never cut it. He wasn’t
extremely tall, but his broad shoulders and strong
arms gave him a bulk I knew attracted more than
one women.
But Aimee had captured his heart two years ago
when he met her during a call for a fire in the
building she used to live. From then on, he stopped
playing the field and devoted all his big heart to her.
They married last year and were now expecting
their first baby. And still, he didn’t need to know
where he came from.
“As if you’re not the same. I remember you three
days ago when you asked me to go with you to get
a car seat. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you with
such a buying fever before.’’
He chuckled, blushed slightly and rubbed his
neck. “Don’t remind me. Aimee laughed at me for
half an hour straight when I came back with all
those shit.’’ Instead of just a car seat, we came back
also with a bassinet, a stroller, and three different
stuffed animals. “Now, little sis, stop deflecting.
How do you feel?’’
“I don’t know.’’ I looked away and focused on
the pile of books on the coffee table, all pregnancy
books. I barely saw the colors on the covers or the
titles. Stuck in my head, I went over and over the
papers, I read through a few hours ago. “It’s like
when you’re in a car and it’s raining. You look
through the window, but the world outside is
distorted from all the rain. It's the same here.
Everything is distorted, and a part of me doesn’t
know which way is up.’’
“Marissa.’’ He shook his head and stood from the
armchair to sit next to me on the couch. I let him
wrap myself in his arm. I closed my eyes and let my
big brother comfort me. “See that? That’s exactly
why I would never want to get to know who my
birth mother is. You were fine until now.’’
“Not really. I’ve always had so many questions.
You know that.’’
He nodded and kissed the top of my head before
he released me. “Where is she then?’’
“My birth mother?’’ I smiled softly, but it’s not
natural. Everything in me seemed as if stretched to
its limits as if I would burst at the seams at any
moment. I expected feeling something and being
unsettled, but I never thought I’d feel out of place
as if not much made any sense anymore. “Believe
it or not, but she’s still in Atlanta.’’
“Really?’’ He ran a hand through his hair when
strands fell into his eyes before he eyed me again.
“You’ve been living in the same city for two years.
It’s…’’
“Wild. I know.’’ I shook my head. For all I knew,
I crossed paths with her once without knowing it.
My stomach tightened again. I brought a hand to it
as if it’d settle it. “She has two kids, one of which is
adopted. I don’t know how old he is.’’
“Adopted,’’ Jamie noted, covertly cringing.
It’s nothing like my reaction when I read the PI’s
report regarding Lydia Burton, my birth mother.
When it stated that she married a man named
Danny Burton, had a biological daughter named
Ava and an adoptive son named Wyatt, I couldn’t
breathe. I knew she would have a family, but
knowing that she adopted a kid when she
abandoned me hurt me unexpectedly. I had to stop
reading then and put everything back into the
envelope and grabbed my car keys to go and visit
my brother. I knew it had worried my parents when
I left their house without a word, but I needed out.
“I won’t lie, it’s a hard pill to swallow.’’ I glanced
down at my left wrist and fixed the flock of birds
tattooed on the inside. “It shouldn’t affect me.’’
“Are you kidding?’’ He put a hand on my
shoulder, bringing my attention back to him with a
tight squeeze. “It’s huge, Marissa. All of this, it was
bound to shake you up. I’d be worried if you took it
lightly.’’
“I look so much like her, Jamie. It’s crazy.’’
His eyes softened some more, and he placed a
few strands of my hair behind my ear. “Same
eyes?’’
“I don’t know. The shape looks the same, but the
copy of her ID is too bad to know the color.’’
“What are you going to do now?’’
I nibbled on my lip and shrugged. “I have her
address. I don’t know if I should use it or not. She
has her own family. What if they don’t know about
me and I ruin everything? It could hurt the kids.’’
“Oh come on. You went through all of this.
You’re not going to drop it now. I know you need
answers and you shouldn’t let them eat away at
you. They’re her kids, her family. Let her worry
about them and worry about yourself and what you
need. If you need to meet her, then do it.’’ He
sighed and the way he tilted his head to one side I
knew he was mulling over his next words, maybe
even reconsidering saying them. But if there’s
something about Jamie, it’s that he would never
back down from telling something he thought
needed to be said, even if it was hard to hear it.
“You must be prepared for her to reject you, sis. It
wouldn’t have anything to do with you but—.''
“I know. Honestly, I think I went through every
possible outcome in my head. I’m tired of it all.’’
“You’re ready then.’’
Ready? No, I was nowhere near ready to face my
birth mother, but I didn’t see ever being ready for a
moment like this. I was ready to hurt, ready to cry
and maybe be angry. I was willing to feel, but
facing the woman who gave me life and abandoned
me as soon as I took my first breath? No, I wasn’t.
I had never been angry at her for abandoning me.
I was happy with my adoptive family, but today, for
the first time I felt a hint of resentment. I hated that
feeling. It was dark, weighing down on me over
everything else, scaring me of my feelings and
emotions, showing me a side of myself I had
ignored until now. It only enforced the lost
sensation I experienced.
“I didn’t tell the parents, but I plan on going
tomorrow on my way back home. She lives in
Brookhaven.’’
“Do you want me to come with you?’’
“Nah. I’ll be okay. I mean, that’s what I’ve
always wanted.’’
“It’s one thing wanting it, but another one getting
it, sis. If you don’t feel it just yet, take your time.
There’s no rush, you know me and the parents are
here for you. Aimee too, even if she’s so emotional
these days. I’m not sure she’d be of much help.’’
I laughed at the dig to his wife and punched his
shoulder, making a face when my knuckles took the
brunt of it. “Be careful, or I’m going to tell
Aimee.’’
“I knew it wasn’t a good thing when you two
became friends.’’
Even through the tempest that I brought on
myself I had my brother and parents there to center
me and remind me of who I was.
I was a daughter, a sister, a young woman. I was
happy and healthy. I was so damn lucky that I
shouldn’t even think about letting fear and
resentment win over who I truly was.
MARISSA
“Okay. Just breathe and don’t faint. Don’t.
Faint.’’
If anyone were looking at me, sitting in my car
parked in front of a small suburban house like you
often saw around here in Brookhaven while I was
talking to myself, psyching myself really, they’d
sure be scared I was a nutcase.
I sighed and looked again at the house, ignoring
my pounding heart and the sweat coating my palms
and the back of my neck under my long dark brown
hair.
There’s nothing special about the house. Its size
was standard for an average family home in the
suburbs. The walls painted a fresh white, and light
gray gave it a welcoming feel, the shutters were
dark, and the front door was of the same color. The
only thing that looked like a lived-in home were the
two bikes against the house and the football in the
grass in the front yard. The town car in the curb,
the one I knew my birth mother was driving
according to the file I had in the glove
compartment, betrayed her presence in there.
“It’s now or never,’’ I mumbled to myself one last
time. I dried my palms on my skinny jeans, grabbed
my purse on the passenger seat and exited the car
on wobbly legs.
It’s hard to ignore the way my heart tried to carve
its way through my rib cage or how unsteady I was
on my peep-toe heels and how my fingers were so
weak they barely had a real hold on my purse and
car key.
Walking toward the front door was probably the
hardest walk of my life, far harder than that time
when I followed Jameson and his friends to hike the
Raven Cliff Falls trail when hiking was one of the
things I despised most.
“Looking for something?’’
I started at the gruff voice and the breathlessness
coming from behind me, tearing me from my rising
panic. I turned around abruptly and faced a tall
man.
At first glance, I was taken aback by how tall he
was, towering way above me effortlessly when I
wasn’t exactly a tiny woman. But then, then I
noticed other things, starting with his sweaty hair,
curling slightly in some places to his sweaty
forehead and sticking up in other places on top of
his head.
Then, my eyes locked with his, so dark and hard I
audibly gasped and recoiled. His thick beard hid
most of his facial expression, but it’s still blatant he
wasn’t happy I was right here. My eyes fell, looking
away from his dark look and then I was
mesmerized by his thick arms glistening in the
morning sun, making his colorful tattoos stand out
even more on his pale skin. His tattoos were a work
of art, marrying the lines of his massive muscles to
perfection. Even the shading was perfect.
Next, his powerful thighs encased in shorts had
me distracted, and I almost forgot the reason why I
was here in front of this very house and how harsh
this man had been looking at me. That was until he
cleared his throat loudly enough to be considered
rude.
I blinked a few times and glanced back at his face
before looking away when my cheeks warmed
uncomfortably. This day was such a mess.
“So?’’ he pushed on when I still didn’t answer his
question.
I pointed over my shoulder in the direction of the
house and willed my voice to come out. “Hmm,
well, I’m visiting someone.’’
“Visiting, uh?’’ He shook his head, and his dark
eyebrows lowered more, something I hadn’t
thought possible seconds before. His voice, still
hard, had an undeniable ‘don’t bullshit me, or I’ll
fuck you up’ vibe I wasn’t necessarily familiar with.
“Listen, I don’t know what you’re selling, but
we’re not interested. Go back to your car.’’ He
gestured to my small town car, beat up and with dirt
from the drive from my parents’, parked behind
him on the curb in front of the house.
But my mind was stuck on something.
He said ‘we.’
I raised a shaky hand to my still flushed cheek as
pinpricks took over my whole face when I was sure
the blood was leaving it at once. “Do you live
here?’’
His stance hardened more, muscles bulging
briefly in his arms as he crossed them tightly,
making his soaked t-shirt stretch over his broad
chest and shoulders. “Who are you?’’
I shook my head, unable to come up with
something. It’s a simple question, and he’s entitled
to it even though he was, without a doubt, an
asshole. But I couldn’t answer it. Instead, standing
in front of him, head tilted up to keep my eyes
locked in his stormy ones, hands clutching my
purse and car key as my mind was scattered at my
feet, a single thought blared in my head.
He was Wyatt Burton. He’s my biological
mother’s adopted son. He wasn’t a kid.
“Oh my God,’’ I muttered with a quiet voice as
my eyes widened.
And then, I didn’t know how or if I imagined it,
but his eyebrows shot up on his forehead for the
tim...