Page 49 of Mariposa
She rears back. At first, her face is still, deadpan, but then the skin around her blue eyes creases, and she sighs. Her pink lips lift into a relieved smile.
“Whew. I thought you had feelings for that woman. Thank God.” She intertwines her fingers inside mine. “You were just looking out for her. I’m sorry. I know we agreed to no attachments. I do, but I can’t help it when it comes to you. I thought you were jealous.”
Jealous?
Feelings?
That I do have for her.
Frustration. Confusion. Maddening affliction.
I’ve never felt like this. This emotion makes you want to burn down the world if anyone tries to touch something that doesn’t belong to them. A feeling that makes me want to make sure she’s okay in every sense of the word.
No.
She’s a pain in my ass. Nothing else, nothing more.
“Kade, where are you going?” she asks. She switches from my fingers and hooks her arm with mine, struggling to keep up with my pace.
I sigh.
Bringing the lighter to my lips, I keep walking toward the beach access. Every step away from Violet makes it easier to think but harder to breathe. The cigarette bud is between my teeth, and I spark it three times before it finally lights, and the tip sparks.
“On the beach,” I say. Something about the ocean always calms me. I could stare at it for hours and lose myself in someplace no one can follow.
“Obviously, but why don’t we go to my place instead?” She tugs my wrist in the opposite direction. Her two front teeth are biting into her bottom lip in an attempt to seduce me.
I wish it were that easy.
“I think I want to stay out here for a bit before I call it a night,” I grumble through the cigarette.
She crosses her arms as the wind blows through her blond curls. She suspiciously narrows her blue eyes at me as I smoke and blow it in the opposite direction.
“Look, if it’s not a woman on your mind, then what is it?”
“Karen,” I warn her.
I’m a man of few words, and Karen is pushing it. I don’t like to open up about shit. I keep my life private. Hell, I don’t even have social media. I’m a ghost online; only my close friends and family have my number.
“Do you want to talk about what’s on your mind? Was it this last deployment when you lost that kid?”
Kid.
And just like that, images of watching the father-to-be die come back like a trigger. I halt my movement, my fingers sticking to the cigarette, losing myself in the last mission before returning to the course.
The sound of his body hitting the floor after being shot two times. It all plays in my head in slow motion. His pale face looked like it was frozen in time as he took his last breath. We all fulfilled his last request, which was for us to let his wife know he loved her when he only had seconds left to live.
Ten.
Nine.
Eight.
Seven.
“Kade?” Karen waves her hand in front of me with a puzzled look on her face. Her dark brows pinch together as she approaches me with evident hesitation in each slow step.
“Fuck,” I mutter when I realize my cigarette was blown out moments ago. How long was I lost in my head? My hand falls to my side.
