Mess is Mine // Calum Hood

Chapter 24

"Tell me something you haven't told me yet," Calum spoke, gazing at me from across the dinner table. The candles were burning low, our dinner plates were long gone, and the bottle of wine was nearing empty. We didn't mind, however. I was completely lost in conversation with him, losing all notion of time. His request caught me off guard, and the one big thing I hadn't really spoke about with him appeared into my mind.

"It's a lot," I warned him, raising my eyebrows as I took a sip of wine. A brief look of concern flashed in his eyes, but it was quickly replaced with a warm look.

"If you're uncomfortable with it, you don't have to tell me," he said softly. I smiled gratefully back at him and shook my head.

"I think it's time," I responded, taking a moment to mentally assure myself before jumping into the Beau story. "Remember right after we first met, and I told you I'd been in a messy relationship?" He nodded, encouraging me to go on. "I wasn't ready to talk about it then, but I am now. I need to share my story, especially with you."

He reached across the table to take my hand, his eyebrows pulling together in a mixture of confusion and concern. He mindlessly stroked the back of my hand with his thumb, which greatly helped decrease the level of anxiety I was feeling. What happened to me wasn't my fault, but there was still some unnecessary guilt and fear that rolled around in my mind. How would he react? Would he look at me differently?

"My last relationship started off fine," I began. "It gradually got worse over the course of two years."

"What do you mean, 'got worse'?" he asked, tilting his head to the side. There was truly no way to put it lightly, so I just let the words fall.

"He hit me," I spoke simply, looking down to the table. "He punched me, kicked me, threw me into the walls, gave me a few black eyes, caused several trips to the hospitals, and at the height of things, he choked me."

Silence settled over the table, and when I gathered the courage to look up at Calum, I saw him looking at me in disbelief. A tear slid down his cheek, and I instantly stood up to wipe it away. However, he stood up before I could reach him. He took a step closer to my chair and squatted down, wrapping his arms around me so tightly I could barely breathe.

"You didn't deserve that," he whispered in my ear, reaching up with one of his hands to stroke my hair. I hugged him back, wrapping my arms around his neck. Tears pricked at my eyes, and as much as I wanted to hold them back for the sake of my makeup, I couldn't. His reaction was so genuine and so kind, and it felt good to have him just hold me, knowing without a shadow of a doubt that he would never, ever, put his hands on me like that. "You're so beautiful, inside and out, baby. You never deserved that, and I'll spend forever showing you that."

My heart instantly clenched at the promise of a 'forever' with him, and I squeezed my arms to pull him even closer. Suddenly, he began to stand up, taking me with him.

"What are you doing?" I asked, keeping my arms wrapped around him to prevent myself from falling.

"Taking you home and showing you how a man should treat a woman," he spoke simply as he lifted me up from the chair with effort. I had no idea what he meant by that, but I was about to find out. Holding me up with one arm, he reached into his pocket, grabbed his wallet, and tossed a couple hundred dollar bills down on the table. He carried me out of the restaurant, earning us some odd glances from other customers and employees.

"You can put me down now, you know," I told him, laughing lightly at the fact he was still just carrying me. I felt him shake his head.

"Not tonight," he responded. "I'm not letting you go tonight."