Page 97 of Forgotten Pieces

“Of course.” I round the bar to grab his whiskey and a glass while he takes a seat at his usual corner. I set the glass down in front of him. “On the house.”

“You going to join me?” he asks.

“Okay,” I whisper. I grab the bottle and a glass and set it down on the bar in front of him. Then I go and turn off the signs and lock the door before taking a seat next to him. “Just you and me Ry.”

He sets his glass down and grabs my face, giving me a bruising kiss to my lips. I don’t mind at all as I return his kiss, opening my lips sliding my tongue across his.

When he pulls away, he pours whiskey in my glass and I grab it as he lifts his. “Cheers,” he says clinking my glass. “To us.”

I raise a brow at him and take a sip while he downs the whole glass. He takes it upon himself to pour another glass and downs that one too. It looks like he is going in for a third so I put my hand over my glass to stop him. “Talk to me, Ry.”

His sad eyes meet mine. “I want this with you, T. All of it.” He pauses and rubs his hands over his face. “I want everything with you. The house, the two point five kids, the dog.” He stops again to look up at me. “I want to spend my life with you.”

I grab his hands. “I want that with you too.” Because I do. I really do. I never thought I would want it again. Not after Cole. Not after the heartache Ryder caused me the first time he left. But these last few weeks with him have changed my perspective on everything. I have never been as connected to a human being as I am with him and I don’t know if I could go on without him in my life somehow. But there are so many things in our way. Not to mention we have only been physically together for less than a week. “Are we moving too fast though?”

He shakes his head. “I don’t think you can put a timeline on love when you find your soulmate.”

My heart clenches at the word love. Does Ryder love me?

“I want all of this with you, Tacoma. I need you to know that. But it’s going to be hard. And I want to make sure you are ready for that.”

I pull away from him and drink the rest of the whiskey in my glass. “Do you think I can’t handle struggles?”

“Not at all.” He reaches out for me and I can’t find the willpower to pull away. “I just need you to know this lifestyle isn’t easy.” He pauses again and looks down at the floor. “I didn’t just talk to Shell today. I talked to my commander too. They want me to deploy again.”

I understand what he means now. He knows how hard I took it when he left the first time. But that was leaving without a word. “Are you ready?”

He shrugs. “I’m not sure. My episodes are so few and far between. My therapist cleared me. My commander wants me on this mission.”

“I don’t care about what your commander wants or what your therapist says, do you feel like you could do it?”

He grips both my hands and looks into my eyes. “When I am with you, I feel like I can do anything. So yes, I want to go, as long as I know it’s you I am coming home to.”

I nod as I hold back tears. “But I am not the one you will be coming home to?” I ask even though it is more of a statement.

He brushes a piece of my hair behind my ear. “I told you I talked to Shelley today.”

I nod.

“I asked her when she was coming home. She said hopefully a week. I don’t know if I believe that though. I told her we need to talk. We need to talk about my deployment, which I know she hates. And I need to talk to her about us.”

He holds my gaze as I noticeably swallow, hoping to calm the beating of my heart and the roll of anxiety in my stomach.

“I told her I didn’t see us having a future. That we’ve grown apart. And if I am going to go back overseas and she will be working in California half the time, we will never see each other. And it’s not the relationship I want to have.”

My heart beats faster with every word. “What did she say?”

“She didn’t want to believe it. Any of it. She said I will not be deployed. I am delusional for thinking that. She says we can’t break up. It’s not part of her plan.”

I bristle at that. “Part ofherplan? You have a plan too, Ryder. You can’t let her walk all over you like that.” I go to stand up because this feels like the perfect time to start pacing but Ryder’s strong hands hold me down.

“I told her our plans weren’t working anymore. And I didn’t want to be a part of her plan. I didn’t want to be with her.”

I grab the whiskey and pour us both more but Ryder takes my glass away before I can drink it.

“I broke up with her, T. It’s over.”

“Does she know that?”

---