full throttle || h.s. ||

eighty-one || disconnected lines

The song for this chapter is "Love In the Dark," by Adele :)

I apologize for the emotional turmoil in advance. Please don't forget to vote and comment and let me know how you are liking the newest chapters! Xx

"Please, stay where you are
Don't come any closer
Don't try to change my mind
I'm being cruel to be kind."

Harry:

My blood was beyond a boiling point. It felt like my veins contained a molten substance...seething, bubbling...threatening to melt through the skin. I picked up the photograph with the note on it. If I clenched my teeth any harder, they may start cracking.

I felt her hands on my forearms, rubbing up and down in a soothing manner. I think she was speaking, but I couldn't make out what she was saying, my ears were ringing too loudly, my heart was beating too harshly.

My fist clenched tighter, causing the photograph to fold in on itself, a defined wrinkle cutting through Finley's beautiful face. Her face that had unknowingly been photographed. Unknowingly to her.

Unknowingly to me.

I had done everything right. I had stayed by her side, I had never left her on her own, she never left my sight.

How had she managed to still be so close within his sights with me practically attached to her hip?

A sharp pinch to my arm broke me out of my trance.

"The fuck was that for?" I snapped, rubbing the skin that Finn's fingernails had just dug into.

She raised an eyebrow at me, crossing her arms across her chest. "Oh, I don't know, maybe because I've been talking to you the last two minutes straight, and you were completely unresponsive," she explained, pressing her lips together in a firm line, her brows knitting together in concern.

I was getting so tired of that look coming from her sweet face.

I had put that look there. Whether it was a byproduct or a direct result...I felt the responsibility for any crease of her face for the last however many months.

I had often thought about how Finley's life looked before I came into it. She definitely had visited her parents more, or even talked to them more. I had hated sneaking peeks over her shoulder as she fed them another excuse about why it had been so long since they talked, or why she couldn't come visit.

I knew she was close with her mom, but it nearly wrenched my heart out when I had overheard some of the phone calls with her dad. Whenever I saw his name flash on her phone, all I could think about was her car...the hours, days, months, and years it must have taken them to build this car to what it was, bit by bit. The laughs they must have had, the conversations that must have transpired.

I bet that was her favorite thing in the world before she met me...working on that car with her dad.

And then she met me, and as a result...so many happy memories of that car had been replaced by utter despair.

I'd give anything to get the look on her face out of my mind when I saw her look at it...saw her take it all in. Sitting in her garage, staring at years worth of love smashed beyond recognition within one fit of violence.

Just as it had when it happened, the thought of the horrible event made me think of my own dad. I wonder where I would be in life right now if I had fixed that Mercedes with him that summer instead of getting into street racing. He had asked me so many times about it...and I couldn't give him the time of day. I would give him any time in any day to go back and do it over again.