Page 87 of The Heart We Guard
“I don’t want to argue with you, but I know what needs to be done already. We’ve done this before.”
“And the last time, I ended up stitching you up on my dining table. I know we both have things we need to work on. But some of them are too big to wait for. Learn how to not cheat in five years? Learn how to show unconditional love in seven years? Don’t bring risk to my family’s door in three years? Trust and involve me in things that are happening to me in four years? Those things all need to happen now for me to feel safe and secure in a loving relationship. You might be more of a work in progress than is good for me.”
“Don’t leave,” Butcher says suddenly, taking my hand across the booth.
“What?”
“What I said. Don’t leave. Not yet. IknowI’m a work in progress, but you inspire me to be better every day, Greer. Even when you weren’t here. There was something about my time with you. How committed you were to setting up your mobile medical unit, your passion for surgery. It made me see the holes in my life.”
“I agreed to stay for three months, so I’m not going anywhere. Yet.” I slide my hand away. “But, I’ve dedicated the last twenty years of my life to the work in progress that was my career. I’m not sure I’m ready to take on another long-term project in the form of a man.” The words are blunt, but it’s the truth.
Butcher takes my hand again, and this time, he locks his fingers between mine. “But here is where we are. Before I met you, I felt like my life was falling apart. Or maybe I was ready to shed a skin I’ve been wearing that’s gotten too comfortable, butI’ve just realized I’ve outgrown it. And then, you come along, and from the moment we met, you haven’t accepted any of my shit. You’ve physically put me back together. And this news, you, the baby, it’s putting me back together mentally.”
I take a deep breath. This is a tender and delicate path we’re on. It takes a lot for most men to express their feelings, their deepest emotions. But sometimes, they need to hear real truths that might set them back.
“Our baby can’t be born with a job, Butcher.”
Surprise etches his features at my response. “What do you mean?”
“Exactly what I said. Pooks’s job isn’t to exist so you can prove to yourself and others that you can be a better man. Their arrival won’t suddenly fix your mental health. You need to do both those things because they’re coming, not because they’re here.”
Butcher rubs his thumb over the back of my hand. “And I can’t do that if you’re in Las Vegas and I’m here.”
It’s a fair point. And in truth, there is no rush to move to Las Vegas. Just because I’ll soon have the funds from the sale of my house, doesn’t mean I need to immediately spend it on a property somewhere else.
“If I stayed, I’d have to get my own place.”
Butcher shakes his head. “Definitely not. You stay at my place. Separate rooms, if you need ‘em. For now.”
“I think I’ve proven already that I’m happy in your bed. And I’d want to pursue the set-up of the mobile clinic, working on grants and those kinds of things.”
Butcher smiles wryly at that one. “Done.”
“You’re being overbearing.”
He nods. “I know.”
“That should be something you work on.”
He grimaces. “Truth, Doc?”
I like it when he calls meDoc. “Always.”
“Think the overbearing part is something you’re just gonna have to live with.”
I think of the way Raven handled Wraith. “None of this comes with any guarantees.”
Butcher takes a deep breath. “I know. But we can take it a day at a time, right?”
Raven interrupts at that moment to put a mountain of food down on the table, then points at Butcher. “Do not say one word about how much food just arrived on this table!”
Butcher chuckles. “Wasn’t going to. Was going to help her eat it.”
Raven’s shoulders relax. “Good. Because I didn’t want to have to stab you with the butter knife.”
“We’re good, Raven,” I say. “Thanks.”
Raven places her hand on my shoulder when she walks by. And for some reason, I feel as though I already have one ally in this town. Maybe it won’t be so bad, after all.
