Page 150 of Protecting What's Mine
Well, hell. That hurt.
“And look. If Linc took one look at you like this and walked away or let you walk away, maybe he’s not the guy.”
“He didn’t see me. Not really. I didn’t let him in.”
He sighed. “Believe me, I’d like to keep hating the guy forever. But maybe you should have let him in. And he definitely should have fought harder,” Luke said. “Bottom line. You both fucked up. And now you both need to decide if you’re brave enough to give it a real shot.”
A real shot. Could she even have that with the way she was raised?
“I don’t even know what a healthy relationship looks like,” she confessed, slumping back against the couch cushion.
“Open your damn eyes, Mack. Look at Gloria and Aldo. Look at Soph and Ty. My parents. Hell, me and Harper are doing pretty damn great. Because we love each other. We trust each other to handle the heavy stuff. We know we’re always, always going to be there for each other. You didn’t give Linc the chance to be there for you. I guarantee if you would have called him and asked him to pick you up from the airport, he would have been there.”
“But then he would have seen this, Luke.” She gestured at her face. “He’d see a victim who needed saving, not a woman he could maybe spend the rest of his life with.”
He sighed heavily. “That’s just the stupid motherfucker in you talking. Bottom line: you either trust each other to be there through the bad times or you don’t.”
“Coffee’s ready,” Aldo called from the kitchen. “I made some of that green tea crap for you, Dreamy.”
The nickname did it.
Mack put her face in her hands, yelped when she bumped bruises. “I hate everything.”
Ty came back inside with the slam of the front door. “Cold out there. But I got some interesting news from the PD in your mother’s neighborhood,” Ty said, leveling her with a cool gaze.
Her story, her past, was leaking out, the poison oozing out and affecting the people near her.
“You’re pressing charges,” Ty told her. “I will not leave this house until you agree.” To prove his point, he toed off his boots and made himself comfortable in the armchair facing the fireplace.
Aldo shoved a mug of coffee at him.
“Pressing charges is just going to make it all worse,” she insisted.
“See that?” Luke asked, pointing at Ty. “That’s what you do. You stick.”
She’d wanted Linc to stick.
Wished she could have had the guts to ask him to stick. But neither one of them had tried hard enough. And that said something.
“You sticking around?” Luke asked Ty.
“I’ve got all the time in the world, till the doc here sees the error in her ways.”
“Same,” Aldo said.
“I have an errand to run,” Luke said, rising.
“Keep your left up,” Aldo told him, setting a mug of coffee in front of Ty. “My turn, Dreamy. Let’s talk about vulnerability.”
“Oh my God. You guys. You’re the most masculine girlfriends I’ve ever had.”
“I watched a lot of Oprah when I was recovering from having my leg blown off,” Aldo said cheerfully. “And then Ty made me read this book.”
“Did you watch the ‘standing in her shoes’ bit?” Ty interrupted.
“Fuck yeah I did.”
Ty pounded a fist to his chest. “Every time. Gets me right here”
