Page 48 of Defending Casey

Before Brian made it to the couch, Hale started talking.

“Casey doesn’t want to file a complaint on you, Brian. She’s not trying to get you in trouble, but she… we both want you to know that there won’t be a next time. You’ve been told by Casey and now, by me,” he glared at his cousin, “that you can’t just put your hands on her. She’s not in love with you, Brian.”

“Yeah?” Brian flopped down on the couch, a sneer of a smile on his face. “She doesn’t know what she wants. All of this time she’s put you on some kind of pedestal. The first love. Father of her baby. Fucking football star. But I see you for what you are, Hondo.” Brian took a big, deep drink from the beer bottle in his hand and then twisted it back and forth in his hands. “She tells you one stupid lie that she’s done. And you knew that was bogus. She gave you her virginity. You think she’d do that with someone she didn’t love? You’re not just an asshole, you’re dumb as shit. All these years you were out there, living your life. Never once did you check in to see how she was doing?”

Hale wanted to argue back and tell Brian it was just too painful to look back. He expected that she’d moved on and he couldn’t stand to see it. Know it.

Brian laughed. “Yeah, I’ve got your number, hero. I know who you are. I know what you are. And one day… one day she’s going to wake up and look at you and wonder why she took you back. You’re going to be just another mistake she’s going to agonize over.”

“Casey loves me, Brian. You should get that through your head-”

“She loves the memory of you. She kept that alive all of these years.” He started to lift the bottle to his lips and stopped. It looked like he rubbed his tongue over his teeth under his lips. “Hale this… and Hale that… all of it just this glossy, fairytale shit. But you weren’t there when people looked at her like she was a whore. I was. You weren’t there when she cried because she thought no one could see. I was.”

“You were a good friend to her. You took care of her for me.”

“For you?” Brian threw the beer bottle against the wall, and it exploded into shards of glass. “Fuck you! I didn’t do a thing for you! You think that because we share some blood that I’m going to do anything for you? You didn’t even talk to me before you left. If you had I would’ve given you an earful. You’re so fucking full of yourself! Get your head out of your ass! You think it matters that we’re cousins?”

“Yes, I thought it mattered that we were cousins. No, I didn’t ask you to watch over Casey while I was gone. I didn’t know I needed to. I didn’t know what happened after I left.”

“The Army! You were off playing G.I. Joe while I was standing by Casey. You were off somewhere being the big, bad soldier and me? I was here.

“And your dad, telling mine that I was just sniffing after your girl. Telling my father that I could never be the kind of man you were. That all I could get were your leavings all the while telling my dad all the heroic things you were doing? I shoved all of that aside and took care of her.” He smirked at Hale, his lips curling into a caricature of a genuine expression. “I did it because I knew that one day she’d give up on you ever coming home. She’d realize that if you cared one lick about her, you’d never have gone away. And when that happened. I was going to be there.

“Like I always was.”

“You were her friend, mine too.”

“Friend, right? Friends don’t think about her the way I do.” He scoffed and sat back against his threadbare couch and glared at him. “Do you have any idea how many nights I went home and fell asleep thinking about her? Those tits, that ass. Casey on her knees. Bent over with my hands on her-”

Hale didn’t know that he’d moved until they were grappling on the floor. The couch had tipped over and the two of them were trading blows.

It had been a while since Hale had to use his hand-to-hand skills, but this wasn’t about fighting a clear enemy. This wasn’t a man he was sent to fight. This was more a physical manifestation of his internal battle.

Brian had stepped in where Hale should have been. He took care of his family when he wasn’t around. And he couldn’t quite fault Brian for falling in love with Casey.

But he couldn’t let him say what he said. He couldn’t let Brian think that he had a right to Casey just because he’d given her the support he had.

No woman owed a man her body out of gratitude.

No woman should give her heart to someone because he’d chosen to be there for her.

She wasn’t something to own.

And for his part in leaving. Because he left her behind instead of fighting back against what he should have known was complete bullshit, he took the swings that Brian landed on him.

Hale took his penance and then he shut it down.

Putting his hands between them, he shoved and shoved hard.

They fell apart, sprawling on the worn linoleum of Brian’s apartment.

Without having to lift his hand to his jaw, Hale knew he was going to have one hell of a bruise, but he saw the way that Brian winced and wrapped his hand around his ribs. He was hurting worse, and part of Hale enjoyed it.

For a man who said he loved Casey, the way he talked about her said that he cared more for his own needs than Casey’s and that was enough to get under Hale’s skin.

“She’s not yours, Brian, and she doesn’t want to be.”

“Right,” he shot back, “is this where you beat your chest and declare that she’s ‘yours’ just because you want her… now?”

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