Chewing on my bottom lip, I release my hold on the blanket, letting it relax around me. A weight as heavy as the world lifts from my shoulders hearing that. Not that Liam would be foolish enough to go to the bar that I half own, where Nate, Savanna, or myself might be at any given time, and try to pick up a woman. He’d be smarter than that and go somewhere else. I hope.
“Do you want him back?”
My stomach swirls with unease, dreams, desires, and fears. That’s a loaded question that comes with too many feelings. Feelings I’ve been trying to avoid while simultaneously being confronted with, every second of every day, since I walked away from him.
“Thinking about that makes too much hope swell inside of me when I have no idea what he’s thinking or feeling,” I whisper to my brother, twisting the ends of the blanket together as I pull it taut around me again. It brings a false sense of security to my aching heart. “He doesn’t think he’s any good at this. He doesn’t believe in himself. Which is irritating beyond belief because he’s the most confident man I’ve ever met in my life.”
“I tore a pretty good strip off him,” Nate comments with a sigh.
The sound of defeat from my brother causes me to glance at him. Despite his bowed head, I can see the furrow between his brow and the wrinkles in his forehead. He knows he screwed up, and he regrets it. Just like I know I screwed up with him and regret it.
“You know this isn’t high school, right? Liam is not Anthony.”Anthony. The one who would have done God knows what if Nate hadn’t burst through my door.
His head snaps up, and I can see his nostrils flare, the muscles of his jaw grinding together. We don’t ever talk about it. I don’t think I’ve mentioned Anthony’s name since the party all those years ago. But it seems like now is as good a time to talk about it as any, even if Nate doesn’t like it.
“I’m not a freshman anymore, Nate. I’m an adult. A grown woman. And while I definitely need you at my back, knowing I’m safe and taken care of no matter what, I can also take care of myself.” I’m soft with my words, gentle but firm, ensuring that he knows I’m good, but there are times I still need him. Nate is the kind of guy that needs to be needed. If he weren’t helping someone, in some manner, I don’t think he’d know what to do with himself.
“I know.” Another sigh as he ruffles his hair with a hand. “But Christ, Jor, when I saw the two of you, I’d be lying if I told you I wasn’t transported right back to that day when I… when you… when he…”
Nate’s voice cracks each time he tries to finish that sentence. I get it. It affected him. In so many ways. Not only did he have to protect me in a way I know he wishes he never had to, but he lost who he thought was a best friend. Someone he trusted. Someone I know he considered family at the time. Nate lost a part of his youth and innocence that day, finding out just how cruel and evil the world could be. The same as I did.
Pushing up from the couch, I move to the oversized chair he’s in. Nate’s big enough to take up most of it, but I drop down beside him and wrap an arm around his.
“I know how it went that day. I understand what you lost. I even understand being taken right back there,” I tell him, droppingthe side of my head to his shoulder. “But we both know that while Liam might be a lot of things, he is not that guy.”
I can hear the thick emotion in his voice as he whispers to me, “I know. But Jor—” he pauses, clearing his throat. “He’s my best friend, and I can’t… I can’t…”
“Can’t lose him like you lost Anthony,” I finish for him, knowing where he’s going with this.
I know because I feel the same way about Liam, and yet I already have. I also know that Nate won’t lose Liam because Liam isn’t Anthony. Liam is Liam, and while they may be fighting right now, it won’t always be like this for them. They’re brothers. They fight alongside each other every day.
Nate nods, scrubbing his hands over his face. It jostles me around as I hold onto his arm, and I lean away from him, studying his profile for a moment. All this time I was most concerned about breaking my promise to Nate, thinking that’s what would upset him the most. It never occurred to me that his fear of having to give up his best friend is what would really upset him. Even though I saw and knew what he went through the first time.
“Nate?” I say his name in a way that doesn’t give him a choice but to look at me. When he does, I squeeze his forearm. “I’m really sorry that I broke my promise to you.”
The corners of his lips tug upwards for half a second before they fall flat again. “I know. And I’m sorry I reacted the way I did.”
“I know.”
He pulls his arm out from mine and slings it around my shoulders, pulling me in for a side hug. I take in the love and strength from my big brother. I’ve needed this all week. As angry and upset with him as I was, I needed him. Before Liam, Nate was my confidant. He was the one I went to with everything, even when I was with Paul. Especially when I was with Paul.
“If I can put him back together again, do you want him?” he asks.
Pulling away, I readjust the way I’m sitting until I’m perched on the arm of the chair, facing Nate with my feet up beside his leg. Do I want Liam? It’s a dumb question. Of course I want him. But there’s that whole hope thing again. I don’t want to hope and dream for a future with him if he’s going to run anytime there may be adversity. I’m willing to be patient with him because I know he’s damn near thirty-one and has never had a real relationship, but I need him not to run. I need him to face things with me. It’s the only way things will work.
I rest my arms over my knees and give Nate a slow nod. “But only if he’s willing to fight. For me, for himself, for us.”
Nate’s face begins to transform, a wicked smile tugging his lips upward. “Give me a few days, okay? Unless you hear from him first.”
If I was going to hear from him, I feel like I already would have, but I have no idea what’s going on with him. Besides being a mess. Whatever that entails.
“Okay,” I agree but my eyebrows pull together as I frown. “What are you going to do?”
The wheels in Nate’s head are turning. I can see them plain as day as his impish grin widens. “Wage a war.”
There’s a commotion that comes from behind Quinn’s door, causing both Nate and I to look over at it. When nothing happens for thirty seconds, we glance at each other, curiosities piqued. I have zero doubt that Quinn has been standing at the door listening to as much as she possibly could. She warned us, after all. But what the clattering and banging was all about I’m not sure.
Until the door flings open revealing Quinn struggling to pull a camo-colored shirt over her head. The shirt isn’t the only camoshe’s wearing either. She’s got a pair of baggy pants that sit low on her hips. When she finally gets the shirt tugged down and covering most of her upper half, she grins at the two of us.
