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Standing there on the porch, he looks ready to battle. Ready to find a fight the way we always do when the tides rise, and we get scared. But I am ready too. Or at least, I hope I am. Because I don’t want us to get torn apart by the tornado of what we do to each other again. I want us to weather it.
We will survive it this time—we have to. “Because I cannot live without you again. I do not think I can survive it again,” I whisper before I go to him to see how this storm will wash down on us.
CHAPTER 12
Bran
* * *
Sometimes you have to let things go—even if it tears you apart to consider it.
Five years ago, I let the woman I love go—over and over again—because I did not want to tie her to a town that was too little for her big dreams. To a man who could not give her all the things I knew she deserved. I could not stand the idea of my beautiful girl ever settling here for something or someone less than she deserved.
Now I won’t be so selfless—I need Paisley and I won’t let her go.
Whether I am good enough for her or not, I have her again. I can’t stand the idea of losing her again. It drives me to madness and the last few days, she has handled that madness. My need for her is obsessive, impatient, and unhealthy but I don’t care. And lately neither has she—my girl knows just what I need, and she never fails to give it to me.
What I need most is her forever. To bind her to me so I never have to suffer life without her again. I tried it and I fucking hated it. I kept my distance and for as long as I could. Truth be told, had she not wound up coming home, I was close to going after her. I could not take it much longer.
Now that she is home though, I still cannot tell if she is content. If what we have here, in this tiny town with our best friends and memories of how good we were—how good we are now—is enough for her. This project with the art gallery has been exciting for her and I want her to have it. But I am afraid it is going to take her away from me once again.
No matter how far we have come and how we have both grown and changed, sometimes I still feel like that stupid kid who could not seem to get it right. I was shy but made up for it by cracking jokes and pretending nothing got to me. But when it came to her, everything got to me. How she smiled, how she drew on absolutely everything, how she flirted with other guys when she thought I didn’t care. It all got to me and all this time later, it still does.
Her going off to meetings with rich, powerful men should not intimidate me. Not when it means she gets her dream. Yet all day I have been impatient for her to return home. Afraid of what I will do or say when she does return. I cannot tell her how jealous I am that those men can give her something I never can. Despite my success, I am not rich like Connor. I do not have the connections or the cash to buy her a gallery—if I did, she would have had it waiting for her when she got back.
Instead, another man—well two, really because Gabe Holmes partners with his brother-in-law Brady—will give her what she needs. That truth is like a punch to the gut. Knowing I can’t give her what she wants most. All these years I worked to take care of my brothers and my mother—when I should have been doing whatever it took to be able to take care of the woman I love.
“How did it go?” I steady my voice as wonder what I already know—it went well because I can see how excited she is. That means she will be opening a gallery somewhere—maybe here but possibly Crystal Cove—and that will take her away from me again.
“Very well, thank you,” she offers as she beams up at me, coming up the stairs to wrap her slender arms around me.
Sighing, I kiss the top of her head, breathing in the sweet scent of her. It’s paint and perfume and shampoo and I love it. I drape my arms around her shoulders to gather her close. We stand there together for a moment just holding each other and something feels so wrong about it. As if we are both holding on too tight because we are terrified to let go.
“That means it is a go, right?” I say gently, refusing to let her go.
“It does. We even chose a place and...” I put her away from me as pain slices through me. I hate how she said we as if they are some team. As if they are somehow important to her now. I hate how much I hate it. How jealous and insecure it makes me that someone can make her so happy. Why do I still feel this way? Why can’t I be secure that I can make her happy too? I can give her what no one else can and we both know that. But once before, that was not enough to keep her.
“You chose a place. So soon? In Crystal Cove?” I swallow hard as emotions churn in my throat, in my gut, fear pumping through my veins.
Paisley tilts her head and narrows her pretty eyes and I feel my heart stop. I know that look. That is the look she hits me with right before a fight. Whenever I say or do the wrong thing. When she calls me on being a jackass, which I deny, and we wind up going in circles until we can’t stand each other.
“Yes, so soon,” she says the word like she is dropping a bomb and she might as well be.
The air between us grows thick and I know what is coming. I feel it churn inside of me like bile. I am going to say something nasty, something cold, and petty, just to hurt her. Because I am hurting. I am going to pick a fight and kick up a storm that we were never able to make it through together. Her bomb is like the eye of the storm we are about to be lost in.
Maybe I’ve been acting so desperate with her lately because I sensed I was running out of time. Because I always knew she was meant for bigger things. Better things. I let myself believe that with her back home, none of that mattered. But of course, it does. My girl deserves bigger and better—she deserves the world.
It just so happens I can’t give her the world.
Even as I think it, I know it’s not true. At least a small part of me knows it. I can make her happy, I can support her, I can be there for her, and I can please her in ways we both know no one else can. That’s not me being cocksure-that is just me understanding that I know her better than anyone else does. I know her better than anyone else ever could.
“Don’t,” I whisper more to myself than to her, grabbing her hips to try to pull her close, “let’s not do this. I don’t want to do this. Ignore me. Please, please, baby, ignore me,” my voice is ragged and I feel the swell of emotion in my chest as my eyes sting.
“You cannot be serious,” she murmurs brokenly, pushing at my chest. “Still? After all this time, you still want to sabotage my moments? You still want to make them about you and what I do or do not feel for you? Whether it is enough or not? I hoped we were past that. Jesus, Bran,” she says on a sigh, turning and storming into the house—the one I bought hoping to make it a home with her.
All I ever wanted to do was be with Paisley and play football. I maybe wasn’t the superstar my best friend turned out to be, but I loved it and I was good at it. I thought if I could get drafted with him, he was so damn good no one would notice I was not. If that had happened, I knew I could give Paisley everything she deserved. When my father passed within weeks of me not making the draft, it felt like some sort of cruel cosmic joke on me.
As soon as she left after that last summer together, I knew I had made a mistake. We had gone out to the lake we used to spend our summers at and I had told her I couldn’t do long distance. I couldn’t promise her to wait for her while she traipsed around the world living her dreams while I never got to live mine. Said I could not wait back home as a miserable boyfriend waiting for his girlfriend to come back to him. I broke her heart before she could break mine.
