Page 31 of Give Me Three

“No,” Logan snapped. “You don’t get to work things out now that he’s standing in front of you. You and your weak ass husbandcan fuck right off, you hear me?” I growled low in my chest at his insult of my husband. I could handle anything, but bringing Eros into my shit was treading into dangerous territory. “You’ve done enough goddamn damage. Stay the fuck away from him.”

“Logan,” Jaxon snapped in that hot as fuck dad voice.

“Let’s go,” Spencer said, grabbing Jaxon’s hand, tugging him to the door.

“Jax,” I snapped, my voice sounding strangled. Clearing my throat didn’t help. Logan had done a fucking number to my throat. Jaxon looked at me over his shoulder, pain glimmering in his dark eyes, but Ezra gently pushed him toward the door.

Logan stepped up to me, the tips of our boots touching. He glared at me, and I evenly met his gaze. “Be a man and fix this shit on your own time—not mine, you hear me?” He looked over at Eros, who was now standing, looking between me and Logan warily. Logan shook his head, scoffing quietly. “Maybe you should fix shit with your husband first and figure out where to go from there.”

With that, he spun on his heel, following his men and his father-in-law out the door. Eros crossed his arms over his chest, his scrub top pulling tight across his shoulders. Normally, I’d pull him close and kiss him and whisper how good he looked in that top into his ear, but I feared touching him right then might make him punch me, too.

“You fucked up with him so bad that his kids don’t even want me near him,” Eros snarled at me. “And I didn’t even do a goddamn thing. Nothing short of getting me arrested too would get me a single word with him.” He glared at me. “We’re going home.”

I clenched my jaw, pain slicing through my chest. “Eros?—”

“Not. Here,” he snarled at me before spinning on his heel and storming out of the police station.

My fingers twitched at my sides, my chest feeling like it was going to cave in. Vomit swirled in my gut, and my vision blurred. Still, even with the panic attack tightening my throat and constricting my lungs, I somehow managed to put one boot in front of the other and follow my angry, hurting husband out the door.

How the fuck was I supposed to fix this now? I couldn’t even be trusted to fixmyself.

CHAPTER 22

Eros

Zeppelin stepped into the kitchen, his hair damp from his shower—a shower I refused to join him in, even though I needed to wash the day off of me as well. Instead, I’d grabbed my clothes and showered in the guest bathroom, too angry to share even bathroom space with my husband.

He’d overreacted last night—badly. The only thing he had going for him was that he’d confessed what he’d done as soon as I woke up. That was it. Otherwise, he was a total dick who’d broken the heart of one of the kindest, most selfless men I’d ever known. Jaxon had already been through so much—losing his wife, being one of those things. Fuck, he’d even taken on two other kids. Granted, they were his son’s boyfriends or whatever, but still. It was clear he was doing his best to make their transition into adulthood easier. He was being a fucking father to them when their parents clearly weren’t.

There’d been so much pain in Jaxon’s eyes when I’d seen him at the police station. He’d looked haggard and broken, like he wasjust too tired to function. When I’d tried talking to him, Ezra had intercepted, telling me to fuck off. For Ezra to be that upset when he was usually the easy-going, quiet one of the bunch, IknewZeppelin had royally fucked up everything for both of us.

Fuck, I hadn’t even done anything wrong. And had I been awake when Zeppelin lost his shit at Jaxon, I wouldn’t have let Jaxon leave.

I… loved him. I loved Jaxon as much as I loved Zeppelin, and losing him fuckinghurt. Like the beating organ inside my chest was being ripped out, each artery and vein being slowly plucked from the bloody organ so I felt every fucking painful, agonizing beat of my heart.

“I’m sorry,” Zeppelin rasped, shoving his hands into the pockets of his sweats. He wasn’t wearing a shirt, leaving all his tattooed skin on display. Usually, I would ogle the defined muscles of his chest and abdomen, but I was too hurt. Too angry. Too… too fuckingeverything.

I jerkily wiped down the kitchen counter, turning away from him. “You know he called the office today?” I snapped, tension riding my shoulders. “I didn’t speak to him—hadn’t known he called until the end of the day when Miranda told me about it. He asked for all of Ash’s records to be transferred to another vet.” I dropped the wipe into the trashcan and turned to face my asshole of a husband. “We’re fucking losing him, Zeppelin, and it’s because ofyou.”

Zeppelin scrubbed his hands down his face. I hated that I was hurting for him, too, even though he’d caused all of this. Because my husband looked just as broken as I felt. “I thought?—”

“Thoughtwhat?” I snapped, cutting him off. “That he was betraying you? Gossiping about you? You should have known better. Hebledfor you, goddammit. He allowed you to rip him open and fuckinghurthim, Zeppelin.” Zeppelin swallowed thickly, his face paling a little. “He gave you everything you fucking needed in that moment, and you thought he would just take the first fucking opportunity he had to run his mouth about you? You’ve got to be a fucking idiot.”

“I know,” Zeppelin said quietly, staring at me with so much pain, it cut me. I hated seeing Zeppelin hurt. He’d already been through so damn much. He had enough trauma to fill a fucking football stadium. I never wanted him to hurt like this, but dammit, his actions had hurt me, too. “I want to fix this. I just… I don’t knowhow,” he croaked, his words strangled. He flailed his hands helplessly, breaking my heart even more. His tongue flicked out over his lips, his gaze pleading.God, he looked so fucking broken.

His voice cracked as he confessed, “He told me he fucking loves me, Eros.” His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. “He… he told me he loves me, and I just… I fucking panicked. I panicked and sent him away and?—”

I couldn’t stand there a second longer, watching him suffer like that. Fucking spiraling. I wrapped him in my arms, squeezing him to me. And Zeppelin fucking broke down, tucking his face into my neck and crying, his tears wetting my shirt. “I’m so fucking sorry,” he croaked, clinging to me. “I’m so sorry, Eros.”

I held him tighter, my own eyes glistening with tears, but I held them back. “You’re going to fix this,” I whispered, sounding like I’d been chewing and swallowing gravel. “You will. I fucking know you will.” I stepped back and grasped his damp cheeks in my palms, letting my eyes meet his sorrowful dark ones. “I’ll gotalk to him tomorrow. I know one of his kids will be around, so I’ll see if they’ll back off a bit so you can see him and fix things, okay?” I brushed some tears off his cheeks with my thumbs. “I love you. I’llalwayslove you, even when you fuck up. And I know he still loves you, too.”

Zeppelin shook his head. “I’ll hurt you, too,” he whispered.

I shook my head. “Just like Jaxon, baby, I’ll bleed for you, too,” I promised him. “Figuratively or literally. I’m yours. I’ll always be yours. But Jaxon belongs to us, too. You have to make this right.”

Zeppelin nodded and then tugged me back to him. We stood there in silence, wrapped in each other’s arms. I didn’t know how long we stood in that kitchen for, holding each other, but eventually, the sun went down completely, and stars twinkled in the sky, the moon shining into the kitchen, casting us in a silvery glow.

After making sure Zeppelin ate and drank his coffee, I left him at the tattoo shop after he promised me he would stay there all day and not try to take this situation into his own hands. He was too overbearing and too pressuring. I had no idea what state of mind Jaxon would be in, so I wanted to get him open to seeing Zeppelin first.

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