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“Well just know that you don’t ever have to feel insecure with me. I don’t always know what you’re thinking. I’m typically really good at reading people, but it’s different with you. You have a hard exterior and a wall around your heart, which sometimes makes it hard to understand your true feelings. But I want to knock them down and hope you’ll let me be the one to do that.”
I suck in a deep breath, relief washing over me as she gives me reassurance. “I think some see my hardness and ability to shut off the world as a strength, but I also know it’s one of my weaknesses. Especially in the relationship department.”
“Just be honest with me, Tristan. That’s all I want.”
I nod. “I don’t know how to process what we’re doing. It’s been a long time since I’ve been in a relationship or fallen for someone so hard and fast. The truth is, there’s something about my past I haven’t told you.”
She sits at the bar and pats the stool next to her. “Tell me, please.”
I take a seat and swallow hard. “I was engaged to a woman named Willow.”
Her eyes widen in shock just like I suspected. “When?”
“Before I went overseas. We planned on getting married when I came back home, but after she heard of the explosion and my injury, she called off the wedding and left me. I haven’t spoken to her since.”
“Wait, what?” Piper shouts, her face reddening. “Please tell me you’re kidding.”
I shrug. The pain she caused no longer bothers me, but the damage of what she did still affects me. “Nope. I woke up two weeks after the explosion since they put me in a medical coma due to the numerous surgeries. I tried to call her as soon as I could and learned she blocked me. Easton told me she had packed her things and moved out of our house.”
“She didn’t even tell you herself?”
“No. Pretty sure her heart was too cold to care.”
“What a fucking bitch!” Piper says. “You risk your life to fight for our country, and just because you lost part of your leg, she leaves you? What a heartless cunt.”
I laugh at her choice of words but agree wholeheartedly. “Willow was a narcissist who only thought of herself, and it took being away from her for me to see that. I’m actually thankful she left before I returned. I thought I loved her, but once the blinders were off, I realized it wasn’t a forever kind of love. She just did me a favor.”
“That’s why you’re jaded about relationships, isn’t it?”
I nod. “It’s the root of my insecurities, yes. At the time, I was devastated and extremely angry. I thought if my fiancée couldn’t even love me after I became an amputee, there was no way anyone else ever could. I was a broken man, inside and out.”
“You know that’s not true, right? You have your reservations because you’re afraid to get hurt again, but you have so much to offer. More than she ever deserved. It was a thousand percent her loss.”
“You have no idea what that means to me, Piper. I haven’t allowed myself to get close to anyone since then, except you. I let you in as much as I could, but each day, you dug yourself in a bit more, and soon, you were in so deep, I knew I was in trouble.” I chuckle, brushing my fingers along her cheek and wrapping a strand of hair behind her ear. “I don’t know what we are or how our relationship will change once we’re back in the real world, but it scares me to think of losing you. And those feelings brought my insecurities to the surface again. I found myself asking what a young, beautiful woman like you would want with an older man like me. I can’t offer you the things you deserve, but I can give you my whole heart…if you want it. As long as you promise not to break it.”
Her wide smile is contagious.
“I’m falling for you so fast and hard, I don’t care what people say or think, and although I can’t predict what’s going to happen, I know I want to see where this goes. We deserve a real chance at being together because I can’t imagine not being with you at this point. I want this. You. Us.””
I lean forward, brushing my thumb across her soft cheek as I study her beautiful face. Slowly and passionately, I kiss her, pouring all of my emotions into it.
“I want that too,” I confirm.
“I told my sister how I felt about you. She totally supported it and was happy for us,” she admits when we pull away.
“Wow. You did?” I’m not sure why this shocks me, but it does. Honestly, I imagined Piper would want to keep me a secret because of who I am and how little I really have to offer a star like her. But then again, I keep going back to what she said earlier, when she first started to open up to me—money can’t buy love or happiness. Deep in my heart, I know I can give her both.
