Page 44 of Stone Cold Savage

“If you’re neutralizing threats before they can harm anyone else, then who the hell do you think follows you everywhere, putting your family at risk? They’re all dead and locked up, Coy, so who is it?”

“I don’t want to take chances.” He became defensive.

“Oh, so that’s the story now.” Kenzie shook her head in frustration. “Coy, you aren’t protecting them. You’re protecting yourself because your heart has already been broken in such a way you believe you wouldn’t survive any more blood on your hands –– not when it comes to your family.”

“You…”

“I, what?”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Sure, I do. That’s why this is pissing you off. You know I’ve seen my fair share of the world’s bullshit, and I’ve suffered the worst kind of pain just like you…” She stood. “The only difference is –– I chose to go on living after my heart broke. I chose… to live.”

Coy watched her storm off to her room seeming aggravated while letting out an audible huff. Coy followed her.

“You think you know.” He said. “You think you know what it’s like.”

“I do.”

“Really? It’s not the same Kenzie.” He raised his voice. “Your husband did not die the same way or for the same reasons my wife did. Our losses… they may be equally painful, but they aren’t the same.”

Kenzie turned on her heels and stood toe-to-toe with Coy. She poked him in the chest, “It is the same. Do you think because you knew who killed your wife makes it different? Because you didn’t see the warning signs and led danger right to her?”

“Now you’re getting it.”

“Wrong, Coy. It’s still the same.”

“How do you figure?” he taunted.

“Because I couldn’t save him. Just like you couldn’t save your wife.” Tears began to spill over, and her voice quaked. “I couldn’t save him from the killer I knew either. I couldn’t save him from himself. I may as well have put the gun that he used to take his own life in his hand myself because I couldn’t stop him… and the worst part, I made it easy to take his own life by bringing him here instead of having him locked up somewhere until we could find some magical cure for the demons that haunted him. So, it is the same, Coy. It’s the fucking same.”

Coy stood silent and in absolute shock at her admission. The idea that she felt responsible for her husband taking his own life was more than he’d even thought to consider before. It never occurred to him that she would, or could, feel the way she did about her husband’s passing, given the circumstances. What hit him the hardest was that she did indeed feel just as he did, and yet, she’d managed to move on with life, and for some reason, he was still strapped in his.

“I-I had no idea you felt that way, Kenz.”

“Why would you? It seems ridiculous, right? To take responsibility for someone else taking their own life.”

“It’s not ridiculous, but you have to know…”

“That it isn’t my fault, and there’s nothing I could have done to change the outcome? I’m well aware. That doesn’t mean I live without the what-ifs, and could I have done more? I knew he was unwell, yet I left him alone, and that one time, I ran to the little farm stand for eggs so I could make him pancakes for breakfast. I wasn’t gone but a handful of minutes, Coy. Minutes. I could have made him something else. I could have brought him with me. But he seemed fine, and I was going right up the road –– so close to home, I heard the gunshot… and knew. There is an endless list of would have, could have, should have’s… but at the end of the day, I know that no matter what I did differently, this was going to be the outcome… we can’t control the actions of others and we certainly do not get to control the fate of others. He wanted this. He was going to do it, eventually, no matter how hard I fought for him.”

“I… I don’t know what to say.”

“Then don’t say anything at all. Just listen, Coy. No matter what you wish you would have done differently, whoever came for your wife would have found a way, regardless. You had no warning. You only knew what you knew at the time. Had you known you’d been double-crossed and made by the darkest of enemies, you could have taken every precaution, protected her, got to them before they got to her… but you didn’t know, Coy. You believed she was safe because you kept her safe the best you could with the information you had. It was tragic, horrific, and soul-crushing, I’m sure, but it happened. And you didn’t die that day, too, Coy.”

“Part of me… part of me did.”

“When we love someone, they own a piece of our heart forever. When they die, that little piece dies, too. That’s why it hurts so bad, and we don’t feel like we’re whole anymore. You may not be whole, and you never will be while branded with a scar something like that leaves, but you still have a whole life, full of people who love and adore you, who miss you, and who feel like that little piece of their heart that you own… is dying. Don’t run from that kind of love, Coy. Embrace it. It may not fill the holes left from loss, but it sure makes them easier to live with.”

Coy sat at the edge of her bed and buried his face in his hands. She was right. He’d been punishing himself all these years and, by doing so, punishing his family too.

“I didn’t mean to… ya know? I didn’t mean to push them away. I really want to keep them safe. I didn’t think…”

Kenzie stepped closer and ran her hand through his hair as a gesture of comfort, “I know you didn’t. Love hurts and costs us a lot, but it’s the most worthwhile investment if you don’t waste it. There’s a difference between life and living, and you get to choose if you’re just present for it or you’re going to experience every inch of it, Coy. You don’t have to keep punishing yourself or those around you. You’ve already paid the price, dearly. Take away the power from those who are really responsible because every day you give in to the guilt and sorrow, they win just a little bit more.”

Coy put his hands on her hips and brought her closer, resting his head against her belly, his voice dropping to a near whisper as he began to confess what was heavy on his heart. “Today. In that basement at the station… it took everything in me to keep me from running straight into the fire to find you, Kenz. When I heard that gunshot, and I couldn’t find you… it was that pain all over again.”

“I’m fine, Coy.”

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