The club took me in after I left the military a broken man, Stone’s entrusted me to watch after his daughter, and this is how I repay their loyalty? By fucking Adella when she’s at her most vulnerable? When she’s shaking and broken from watching a man die right in front of her?
What the fuck am I doing?
My agitation leads me to shower, to want myself clean of what just happened, to wash away the betrayal of my honor and duty to the club — even though that means tangling again with the hot and cold water that has a mind of its own. Deservingly, it goes to scorching hot at the absolute worst time and nearly burns my junk; I have to drive my fist into the tiled wall to keep from crying out.
I dress myself.
Take up a post on the couch.
And keep watch on the door, like I should’ve been doing the whole time.
I faltered once in my duty, but I won’t again.
Hours pass in the same sense of alertness that I perfected while serving in Afghanistan. Where I’d be on watch in the most remote location, where enemies might not be present for hundreds of miles, where I’d need to be ready to kill at a moment’s notice, and yet also have part of my mind elsewhere — thinking thoughts of better times, better places, better company than whatever small squad of unwashed-for-weeks soldiers I was sharing the outpost with — in order to keep my sanity.
It’s easy to slip back into that mentality. Because, hell, I’ve been teetering on the edge of it ever since I heard that bomb go off, ever since I saw Goldie suffer the aftermath. My skin still crawls, my heart still surges uncontrollably in my chest, my teeth threaten to grind themselves to nothing at the slightest unexpected sound and, no matter what I tell my wayward and chaotic mind, it still tells me I’m back in that war zone. The same place where I saw my best friend and brother in the Rangers die in my arms.
Just like then, I find myself scraping the bottom of the emotional barrel to come up with positive thoughts to keep away the dark. Because I’m feeling damn dark about betraying my oath to the club.
Hours pass until Adella’s slender bare frame fills the doorway again. Until I see those eyes wide with confusion and longing and hurt. Until I see that expression — of pain, of anguished wonderment — on her face.
“Did I do something wrong, Snake?”
I want to kill myself for making her feel that way. That she should ever think that about herself is a fucking crime.
“No, Addie.”
“Then why did you leave me?”
“Because we shouldn’t have done that. You didn’t do something wrong, Addie. But I did.”
She approaches. Slow, hesitant, and sits next to me on the couch.
One delicate hand settles on my shoulder.
Two too-wide eyes threaten to swallow my soul.
“There’s more to it than just us having sex, Snake.”
I peel my eyes away from her. This woman — every little thing about her — strips past all my defenses and touches my wounded soul.
“There isn’t.”
“Snake, I know you. I’ve known you almost my entire life. I know when something’s bothering you, and it’s been bothering you long before we had sex. There’s a way you clench your jaw, and there’s a vein that comes out against your right temple that only happens when something is really, really messing with you.”
She’s got a good eye. Too good. It’s helped her take some incredible photos, and it’s cutting through every lie I could try to throw in her way.
“Leave off it, Addie.”
“Why? Because there’s something wrong with being hurt? Do you want to know how hurt and scared I was to wake up earlier and find you gone? Not because I have some stupid expectation of cuddling. But because, when I opened my eyes, I saw in the dark that man who tried to take me. I saw his dead face. I saw his blood. I saw the wound in his throat from where Ruby shot him. I saw the way his eyes were just open and staring and empty. And I swear I heard the final shot that took his life. It was all so real.”
Addie lays it all out there with no hesitation, with no regret, and she looks at me in a way that says ‘why are you afraid to talk about it?’
She’s so brave in her innocence and kindness.
But my pain is something I’ve kept buried and at bay for years. I’ve used one-night stands, violence, alcohol, and a million other things to keep it away; and now she’s asking me to dig it up and bring it out into the light of day. To look at it and face it in a way that cuts past all the bullshit.
“Hey, I’m here for you. Right here. Right now. I care about you, Snake, and all I’m saying is that I’m ready to listen,” she says, squeezing my arm.
It’s the first time in my life I’ve heard those words with such sincerity. In the club and in the service, this pain isn’t something you talk about — it’s something you bury, you deny, you fight against tooth and nail, because to do anything else is a sign of weakness.
But she’s not looking at me like it’d make me weak.
“I need a beer and I need a minute,” I say.
Saying nothing else, she heads to her fridge, and she gets me a beer, opens it, and sits silently at my side with her hand on my shoulder and all the affection and kindness in the world brimming in her too-wide brown eyes.
More than minutes pass in quiet, time where
