I held my breath. I couldn’t inhale him. I didn’t trust myself.
Then he leaned back, eyes on my mouth. “He’s trouble, Polly,” he said, stepping back and folding his arms.
“You don’t know him,” I replied.
“I wasn’t a good man when you met me,” he said instead of arguing with me. “War makes it impossible to be a good man. There’s no such thing as a noble cause when you have to kill another human being for it. Survival isn’t noble, not when we get down to the crux of it.”
He paused as if he sensed I couldn’t breathe when he was shoving words down my throat so they could pierce my heart.
I inhaled,
Exhaled.
He continued.
“I wasn’t a good man and I was at peace with that. Didn’t come from a good place, good people, so it’s not like I had the makeup for it. But somehow, taking the virginity of the one good, truly good woman I’d ever met and ever would meet—one of the worst things I’d ever done—turned a part of me, however small into a good man. And I carried that with me until I saw you and I wanted to be a good man for you. You turned me into a good man by givin’ me everything and you turned me back into who I truly am by taking it all away.”
He stopped with his words, with his attack and I gave myself two strangled breaths to recover. To realize it was time for an attack of my own.
“I don’t deserve this,” I whispered. “All of this blame because I didn’t jump at the chance to be yours when you came back into my life after years, after leaving me to wake up alone after giving you everything.” My voice was a low hiss. “Everything you took with you. I built my life around those days. I did it in a way that they stayed beautiful and untouched. Now you’re back, they’re not beautiful, because you’re turning me into this villain because I’m not being who you want me to be.”
“No,” he argued. “You’re not being who you want you to be, ‘cause you’re too fucking scared. If you didn’t want this, like truly didn’t want this, me, then I’d know, I’d fuckin’ see. Because nothing’s changed from that night. You still wear your heart on your face, and I see what it wants. Didn’t think you’d be a girl to let her head get in the way.”
And he walked away.
It was becoming common with us.
Him walking away.
Me being too cowardly to chase him.
And then I didn’t see him until my wedding day.
And by then it was far too late.
Chapter Six
Three Months Later
I was shocked to see him. More shocked than having Rosie tackle me to the ground just before bullets started flying.
Yeah, seeing Heath for the first time after he’d tried to stop me from marrying Craig was more intense than being involved in a drive-by shooting.
Especially since I wasn’t the one that was shot.
Rosie was.
I was too busy freaking out about that and the situation in general to notice Heath’s presence until he was literally dragging me away from Rosie’s bedside.
I would’ve fought him more if Luke hadn’t been there too. Luke would take care of Rosie.
Heath wouldn’t take care of me.
No, he might ruin me and my fragile state of mind.
He had me backed up against the wall in a secluded corner of the hospital before I could take him in. Before I could even inhale and exhale.
“Heath—”
“Shut the fuck up.”
I flinched and did as he ordered. Because his words were a whip, slashing against my skin. Opening up barely healed wounds. His tone was cold, cruel, brutal.
As were his eyes as they ran over me top to toe.
Twice.
Though everything about him was cold, my body was on fire.
He was cataloging me. That’s what he was doing, I realized. He was searching every inch of me for an injury.
“I’m okay,” I whispered.
His eyes snapped up.
Another slash.
“You were shot at,” he said flatly.
I nodded. “But I’m okay.”
His jaw was hard. His hands were fisted at his sides.
He was different.
After only a handful of months, he’d changed. Everything about him was sharper. Colder. Tortured.
I’d done that.
My stomach lurched.
He’d disappeared after my wedding day.
In what was supposed to be happily married bliss I’d thought of him more than I cared to admit.
A lot more.
And in the two weeks since my happily married bliss became a nightmare, I’d consciously not thought of him. Of the huge fucking mistake I’d made.
I wondered if that’s why Heath was here.
Because he’d heard.
Heard that I’d done the oh so Polly thing of leaving her husband after not even a year of marriage. He hadn’t heard the details, obviously. Because no one knew the details. Except Rosie. And Rosie wouldn’t tell. Plus, if he knew the details, he wouldn’t be here, he’d be in prison for murder.
Though I reasoned he could murder someone without getting caught. Especially if that someone was my husband who’d decided to use me as a punching bag.
So he wasn’t here because of that.
I wondered if he was going back on his word, on the promise he’d made on my wedding day.
“You’re makin’ a mistake, Sunshine. And I’m not gonna save you from it.”
No, I wasn’t wondering that.
A sick little part of me was hoping for that.
Hoping to be saved from it all. From myself.
But this wasn’t that kind of story.
“You’re back,” I said when the silence had lasted for too long. Long enough for me to try and yank up a fantasy that toyed with my tortured soul.
His nod served as his response.
I itched to escape his empty stare. His cold presence. It was tearing at my skin.
But I also wanted to sink into that pain. Live in it.
I sucked in a breath. “Did you...”
“Hear that your marriage broke up after two months?” he asked, voice cruel. “Yeah, I heard.”
I steeled against the pain.
“Not here to be the second choice,” he continued. “Here because I was with Luke when he got the call. Needed to make sure you hadn’t gotten yourself shot.”
I was winded from the force of his successive blows. “Gotten myself shot?” I repeated on a whisper.
He nodded once. “Let’s be real, Polly. Not like you haven’t been playing Russian Roulette with your life thus far.”
“And you know me well enough to hurl this at me?” I asked, my voice still a whisper.
His eyes stayed hard. “Oh, I know you, wish I didn’t. But I do. You fucking know that. I’ve known you since that night four years ago.”
“That night four years ago,” I repeated, tasting the sweetness of the past on my tongue, then it turned rancid with Heath’s stare.
I was done.
I had almost been shot today.
After hiding out for two weeks waiting for my bruises to heal. Bruises made by my husband. The man I loved.
Somehow still loved.
And now I was standing in front of another man. Who made what Craig and I had turn flat. Two dimensional.