Page 142 of Never Let You Go

“Might as well drive you both ways. When is it?”

“Few weeks.” I look up the date on my phone as we make our way back to the bar.

“You’re a pussy,” he repeats after he’s entered it into his calendar.

He might as well have punched me with his fists.

I could have punched back.

Maybe I am a pussy. I wasn’t always like that. I fought for Skye. God did I fight to have her. And to keep her. She was my flesh and blood. It was instinct.

But I never fought for a woman.

I didn’t fight for Skye’s birth mother. The minute she turned her back on me, I was done.

Didn’t care.

Never missed her.

All I wanted was Skye, and I got her.

But now?

All I want is Alexandra, and I don’t know how to fight for her.

“Women want us to fight for them,” Justin says. The fucker reads my mind all the goddamn time. “Alex is no different. What’s the deal with her, anyway? Looks like she likes it here. Not like that snob,” he adds, referring to Skye’s mother. “I heard she was looking pretty hot for you the other night when you went all knight in shining armor at The Growler. You bang her after that?”

My jaw clenches and I scowl.

He chuckles. “D’you propose? Did she say no?”

I take my time slugging my beer.

“I don’t know, man,” he pushes. “Seems to me, you did the manly thing, saved her from the bad guy, got her home, nailed her. At that point she must have been putty in your hands. I’d thought I’d be seeing you two walk in here the next day holding hands and making out in a booth. So. What gives?”

I signal him for a refill on my beer, but instead, he pushes a tall glass of water in front of me. When I don’t say anything, he continues, “I heard the most stupid rumor. This one’s gonna make you laugh.”

I raise my eyebrows.

“Supposedly, you were having dinner at Emma’s that night. Doing dishes together, necking in front of the fire with after-dinner drinks. Took her queen-size bed for a trial run. All while the girls were sound asleep upstairs.”

My blood boils. The problem with rumors, everyone knows it’s gossip. But the truth is, I wasn’t paying enough attention to what me having dinner at Emma’s would do to Alexandra. Barbara told me, yet I didn’t really understand how much Alexandra was closed off about expressing her feelings. Until I had her in my arms that night. Until I saw the devastation on her face, for that one little thing.

I know my apology could never be enough.

“Now were you at The Growler rescuing Alex or were you nailing Emma?” Justin continues, pushing.

“Shut the fuck up,” I hiss. Alexandra is so protective of her own self that I ended up hurting her.

He rounds the bar and sits on a stool next to me. “Look, man. I know what went down with Skye’s birth mother. I was there.”

I raise a hand. He doesn’t know the hurt. The humiliation. The loneliness. “Don’t.” Plus, her and Alexandra? Entirely different.

Different women.

Different stories.

Worlds apart.

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