Fragile Lives: A small-town, age-gap, brother’s best friend romance (Little Hope series Book 4)
Fragile Lives: Chapter 2

Fuck. Fuck! What am I doing?

I look at her swollen lips and crazed, glassy eyes. She stumbles back and stares at me.

“Fuck, I’m sorry.” I wipe my face with my hand. “I don’t know what came over me.”

“That’s okay.” She averts her unusual gray eyes as if seeing me disgusts her, and I notice the specks of dark blue in them.

And oh fuck, do I understand her. Seeing myself in the mirror every single day disgusts me too.

“It’s an adrenaline rush,” she adds with a small smile, finally meeting my eyes. “Happens to the best of us.”

“Right.” I start backing away. “Thanks for stopping by.”

“Where are you going?” Her voice rises slightly as her eyes narrow suspiciously.

“To my car.” I point behind my back to my nonexistent car and turn to walk away.

“You’re delusional if you think I’m letting you walk all the way to your car.” A deep, loud sigh follows. “Wherever it is.”

I keep walking, not paying attention to what she said. Feeling ashamed to my fucking core that she caught me thinking and somehow read my fucking mind, I wish more than anything to disappear and to never see this woman ever again.

Someone grabs my forearm, and I suddenly turn, ready to push whoever’s next to me away. Not seeing her, I shove the hand touching me away, too rough and too fast, before I comprehend it’s her. Shaking my head to clear it from the haze I’m in, I wipe my face again and groan.

“Fuck. Fuck!” I take a deep breath, reining myself in. “I’m sorry. I don’t react well to people touching me unexpectedly.” Another reason to be ashamed and hope to never see her again.

Her wary eyes dart between mine before she swallows and nods. Too understanding. “That’s okay too.”

“Okay?” I let out a sardonic laugh. “Are you okay?” I take a step toward her. “Stopping for a fucking stranger on an empty road?” I spread my arms wide. “I can be a serial killer, for all you know. I just fuckin’ pushed you away, and yet, you’re saying it’s okay. It’s not fucking okay.” I get in her face, noticing that I let my accent slip a bit, being high on emotions. “I’m twice your size, if not more, yet you’re here, eager to help. What’s wrong with you?” Her eyes widen at the proximity. I’m an inch away from her.

“With me? What’s wrong with me?” She presses her finger between my pecs, pushing hard. “What’s wrong with you? Huh? Being here alone in the cold? Walking to your car,” she mockingly mimics my voice and makes quotation marks in the air. “I don’t know what kind of assholes people are where you’re from, but where I’m from, we don’t do this to people.” She lifts herself up on her tippytoes and gets in my face, still poking her finger into my chest. Her wild, red hair frames her pale face and reddened cheeks like a sun wrapping someone in a blazing hug. “We fuckin’ care.” She pokes one last time, hard—surprisingly hard for such a tiny human. “Now get your ass in my car before we both freeze to death.” Her little nostrils flare, and she begins walking toward her tiny sedan. There’s a light jump in her step, a clear indication of irritation.

My cock jerks as my eyes widen. Fuck. I want to look down and ask the fucker what’s happening and why he got so excited, but that would be too weird, well, weirder, because the situation is already awkward enough.

I didn’t know I like to be ordered around like that, but I replace myself smirking before following her like a puppy. She climbs into the driver’s seat, her head barely visible from behind the wheel, and I replace myself smiling at how cute she looks. Like a tiny, angry doll, her red hair sticking out from under her hat, her small hands tightly gripping the steering wheel, knuckles white.

The passenger seat is so close to the dashboard, I feel like a four-foot person sat here before me. Moving the seat back, I can barely fit my six-three frame into it as I crouch and knock my head on the ceiling in the process.

“Are you done?” comes a snarky voice from the driver’s side, followed by a snort. I give her a side-eye and buckle up as she starts the car. “Where to?”

“Cat and Stallion.” I name the local bar I left my car at, and she quirks a questioning brow. “I drove a friend who had too much. Happy now?” Why I am explaining this to her, I’ll never know.

I don’t tell her that I came to the bar hoping to get wasted, but instead, I met a dude who was suffering, forced to separate from the love of his life, apparently, and needed to get wasted more than I did. And that I shared my bottle of scotch—the last one in the whole damn bar, if you can believe—with him and drove him home, where I met his love outside his house.

I could tell it was her from her apprehensive eyes as she saw me dropping him off at home. We had a short talk but enlightening regardless. I don’t tell her any of that. It’s a small town, and I know better than to tell her that “the love” was Justin’s sister, a dude I don’t have a good history with.

To be fair, I don’t think anyone does. Besides Alex, my friend and an old team member from our Navy years. He seems to be one of the only people with enough patience to put up with Justin, and the reason I’m in town today: we’re trying to spend more time together since it seems to be helping him with his PTSD and guilt.

Unfortunately, it does nothing for mine.

The silence in the car is suffocating, and more than anything, I just want to jump out of it to be alone, but the raging ball of anger next to me is dead set on delivering me to my car without any jumping involved, so I grind my teeth, praying for the five-minute drive to pass faster. With the heavy snow packed on the road and her driving like a grandma, I’d get to the car faster by foot.

As the lights from the bar come into view, I let out a loud sigh of relief. I can feel her rolling her eyes next to me. She stops right under the sign and parks the car.

“Thanks,” I mumble, and she grunts something, not turning my way. I climb out of the vehicle, hitting my head on the ceiling in the process. I want to walk away but pause, deciding to say my piece. I bend over the opening of the car, meeting her eyes. “For real, Leila. Don’t stop to help strangers at night. You never know how far they’re gone.”

She turns back, staring ahead without answering, and I shut the door. She puts the car in drive and hits the gas. The rear of the vehicle swivels, and she hits gas harder, disappearing down the road.

I look longingly at the bar, deciding if I should go inside and fulfill today’s dream of getting wasted and maybe take that pretty bartender Rory up on her offer to meet after her shift. But I replace myself remembering those big gray eyes looking warily at me on that bridge, in the moment of my lowest low, and I decide that I can’t do either.

I walk to my Rover and climb inside, grateful for the tall ceiling and enough space for my frame without breaking my back.

I’m supposed to meet Alex tomorrow for dinner and a drink, but for some reason, I replace myself in Little Hope, Maine, today. Ever since I visited Alex a few years ago, my soul yearns for this place. I don’t have a family or anything besides Alex here, yet I’m earlier than I’m supposed to be.

Since sharing a bed with the bartender and drinking bourbon at the bar are out of the question, I let out a heavy sigh and drive to the bed-and-breakfast I usually stay at. I guess I’ll experience small-town life at its very core by turning in early.

The next day, I do some work from my laptop, move some investments around, and check in with my parlors. I have a few requests about franchising, but I’m not planning on expanding anymore, so I move them to the back of my priority list.

When the evening comes, I shower and head to the local diner where I agreed to meet with Alex. He invited me to his place at first, but I feel like an intruder every time I go to his happy home. He has a family, and it’s no place for a morose asshole.

So I asked if we could meet at the diner. I don’t know today’s waitress, but Marina, the owner, gives me a wave and goes back to cooking.

I replace an empty booth in the corner and take a seat facing the door. A few minutes later, the door chimes, and Alex walks inside. It takes him two seconds to replace me, and he saunters toward our seat with a smile on his face.

“Fucker. Took the best spot,” he says with jealousy. Facing the door lets me observe everything happening in the diner. Old habits die hard, and every little comfort helps break the everyday hell cycle. I’m not moving my ass from here.

“You snooze, you lose,” I say with a laugh and push the menu toward him.

“I know what I want. Freya thinks,” he’s talking about his girlfriend, “I like this breakfast, the Lonely Kurt, that she keeps bringing me, but I just want my fuckin’ steak.” His eyes roll back in his head, and I bet if Freya was here, she’d smack him.

I laugh, understanding where he’s coming from. He loves Freya too much to disappoint her, but a man needs his steak.

A young girl comes to take our orders. Alex orders a medium steak with extra sides for himself, and I mimic him, not bothering with being super creative today. When she leaves, Alex leans against the back of his seat.

“So, how have you been?” His eyes narrow.

“Good. You?”

“I’m good.” He chews on his lips. “Have you talked to them?”

“Who?” I ask, confused.

“Their families.”

And here comes the dark cloud, wiping any joy I felt away. I knew he was going to ask about it at some point, but I didn’t think he’d start off with it. To be honest, I’m surprised he waited so long. And by long, I mean years.

“No.” I shake my head firmly. “You?”

“No.” He taps his finger on the table. “Not since that first time, no.”

When we were both in the hospital after the explosion during our mission, we received calls from the families of two other people in our unit. They wanted to ask how their loved one’s last minutes were, and I couldn’t fuckin’ bring myself to utter a word. I just breathed into the damn phone, listening to one of their mothers crying. Alex got our other brother’s wife, and to this day, I don’t know what he told her. And I don’t think I’ll ever be brave enough to ask.

We sit in silence, remembering.

Alex got burned pretty badly. Half of his body is damaged. When I was trying to get him out from under that burning truck, I didn’t think he’d make it. Thank God he did. But he got scarred, inside and out.

And I got nothing. Not a fucking cut.

The waitress brings our food, but we both lost our appetites. Alex becomes grimmer, and I don’t want his girlfriend coming after me for ruining his anti-anger strike, so I try to lighten the mood.

“So, how is domestic life going?” I chuckle. “Must be cool to have a willing woman by your side every night.”

“You shut it, fucker.” He laughs as his neck pinkens.

Hook, line, and sinker. Anything to change the subject.

“She’s my girlfriend.”

“I remember.” I lean back with a toothy smile, glad he’s moving away from that dark place he goes to when anger hits. “So, how is that?”

“Fuckin’ amazing. Ten out of ten recommend.”

I laugh louder. “Sure, whatever you say.”

“No, for real. It’s awesome. You have someone in your corner all the time. Every day. No matter what happens, she’s on your side. It’s amazing.” He shakes his head in wonder, a look of pure awe on his face.

Then, a moment later, Alex digs into his food, missing how it’s my turn for dark clouds to shroud my mood.

What he found isn’t in the cards for me, ever. I’ll never have that with someone. Ever. My life is written in the stars to be lonely and miserable. I just need to make sure it’s not long.