The Problem with Peace: Greenstone Security #3

by Malcom, Anne

  And for that reason, I hoped my tears, my pain, my sobs, wouldn’t stop.

  But nothing lasted forever.

  Not the bad.

  Not the good.

  Or anything in between.

  * * *

  “Do you want to, can you, will you...come inside?” I asked, lifting my head from where I had soaked his tee with my tears.

  His hands tightened around me.

  His eyes were still hard.

  Cold.

  I braced myself for the no. For him to let me go, to step back and to adopt the persona that was becoming so horribly familiar.

  But he didn’t.

  “Yeah, I fucking want to,” he said, voice rough.

  And he did.

  We didn’t speak when I unlocked the door.

  Not when I led us through the living room, dumping my purse on my sofa.

  Not when we entered my bedroom.

  I didn’t turn on the lights. Because that would make it impossible to avoid the look in Heath’s eyes. The truth. Reality.

  “Can we live in a fantasy, just for tonight?” I whispered. “I know we need reality tomorrow. And the next day. That it makes it impossible for a fantasy to last longer than tonight. I just...” I trailed off. “I just really need it.”

  I paused.

  “I just really need you.”

  There it was.

  Me speaking the truth that I’d been stuffing down for years. Me exposing that raw nerve that he’d been prodding at, damaging.

  He could crush it now.

  I wouldn’t blame it.

  But he didn’t.

  There was a lump of his boots hitting the floor. A squeak of the springs on my bed.

  “Get into bed, Sunshine,” Heath ordered quietly.

  I didn’t hesitate. Didn’t wait for him to change his mind.

  I climbed into bed. Into his arms.

  Into the fantasy.

  And in the morning, he was gone, replaced by reality.

  * * *

  “You don’t have to walk me up to my door,” I said, fiddling with my keys.

  I had come prepared with them out of my purse the entire walk and elevator ride with Heath at his prescribed distance.

  The distance that betrayed nothing of the night before.

  Like it never happened.

  Like it wasn’t even real.

  Maybe it wasn’t.

  Maybe I wasn’t.

  No way did I want to prolong this feeling. But even in pain, I wanted to be around him. It wasn’t for me that I wanted to speed up our separation. It was for him. Because I knew how much he didn’t want to be here, near me. How miserable it made him.

  The last thing I wanted in this world was for Heath to be miserable.

  Especially when my mere presence was the reason for it.

  “Yes, I do,” he said. “It’s—”

  “Your job,” I finished for him. “Yeah and let’s talk about that.” I stopped at my door, facing him. “Because this is getting beyond a joke. Your job is to protect people that are in danger. I’m not in danger. Craig saw me by chance, he was drunk. And he reacted. It was not part of some grand plan. Some threat to my life. It certainly doesn’t warrant this.” I waved my hands between us. “And even if it did, it does not require you to do it. I’m assuming Keltan has other men in the office who don’t have...your distaste for me.”

  Something moved behind his eyes. “Why? You asking for another man so you can find your next husband?”

  I flinched. There was no hiding the reaction to a blow that obvious. That painful. It was a punch that he didn’t pull, didn’t care to mind my feelings for. He wasn’t holding back.

  I’d been punched in the face by a man I’d thought I loved. And it hurt. Both the physical act and the emotional knowledge that he could do that to me.

  But it didn’t hurt as much as that comment coming from Heath. Heath could always hurt me more than Craig. And that meant he was the only one I really loved. Because only people you loved completely could ruin you so efficiently.

  “That is brutally ridiculous, Heath,” I croaked out.

  He didn’t look affected by the pain in my voice and what I was sure was agony in my expression. “You want to know what’s brutally ridiculous? This whole fucking situation. You.” His stare was a thousand knives and a thousand different wounds, and I couldn’t look away. “You ran,” he accused, his voice cold and hard and so full of judgment it hit me bodily.

  My instinct was to cower. To hide from this. Escape it. But I’d done that once. I’d tried to do that once. And I’d failed. There was no going back now. No hiding. So I jutted my chin up.

  “What you felt between us was real and visceral and you couldn’t fuckin’ handle it,” he spat. “So you ran. You ran into the arms of a man that hurt you. That doesn’t respect you. That showed that in a fucking restaurant when he was about to hit you.”

  “That’s cruel,” I whispered.

  Nothing moved in his eyes. “You’ve made me cruel, Polly. You’ve made me fuckin’ crazy. It was one thing to watch you fuckin’ marry someone else. It was a little death. And a lot of big ones. Every fuckin’ day I woke up with the knowledge that you weren’t in my arms ‘cause you were wakin’ up with your fuckin’ husband.” He hissed the word. “And it was all I could do to get through that day thinkin’ you were happy. I hated it wasn’t with me, but fuck I got through the day because I guessed you knew yourself enough to give yourself happy. And then I figure out you were wakin’ up with someone who had the world in his arms and he was ready to put his fucking hands on you? That wasn’t a little death. Or a big one—that was fucking annihilation.”

  His hands were fisted at his sides as the blank and emotionless mask he’d been wearing started to slip, to give way to anger, to something else.

  “You tried to put an ocean between us. A whole fucking continent.” He stepped forward, and I backed up right until I slammed into a wall and I couldn’t retreat any farther. He didn’t pause, didn’t show mercy at my obvious fear.

  He didn’t have mercy because there was no room for mercy between us.

  He boxed me in until his hands came against the wall, either side of my face, his body lightly pressing into mine.

  His gaze ripped through me.

  “So, Little Girl, did it work?” he murmured. “All that distance? That ocean? Did it wash us away from you?”

  I blinked at him. “You know it didn’t,” I whispered.

  The words had barely come out of my mouth until his lips crashed onto mine. Brutally. Painfully. Exquisitely.

  It was everything I’d craved but pretended I didn’t need. Pretended I didn’t need because I was sure I couldn’t have it.

  But now that I did, now Heath’s hands were tearing through my hair, yanking my body to his, and then my legs were suddenly wrapped around his hips, I couldn’t imagine taking another breath in a world where this wasn’t a part of it.

  I’d run out of reasons to fight this. To fight us. To pull back. To run again. There was no more running for me. No, there was Heath. Finally. Kissing me. Me, finally getting my shit together.

  Just as quickly as he started kissing me, he stopped. He was across the hallway in one heartbeat.

  My hand went to my lips, trying to extend the sensation of his kiss.

  “Fuck,” he growled into the empty air.

  I focused on him.

  He did not look like he was ready to stop fighting. To continue kissing me.

  No, he looked like he was about to run.

  But he didn’t run, of course.

  He gave me one last glare and turned on his heel and walked purposefully out the door.

  * * *

  “Dude, do you know you’ve got a hot guy following you?” Rain stage-whispered as I met her at the doors to our favorite bar.

  Well, it was my favorite bar and I took her here one night and she, therefore, decided to was ‘our favorite bar’ since then.

 
It was mine and Heath’s bar.

  It was dangerous. The emotional version of self-harm to come here at all, let alone the night after...everything that happened last night.

  I hadn’t slept.

  Not a wink.

  How could someone sleep with those words bouncing off their skulls? Off the walls? They were louder than any chaos in L.A. could reproduce.

  So I just lay there, replaying the words. Replaying the kiss.

  And then it was morning.

  I expected Heath to be waiting outside the building.

  But he wasn’t.

  There was a man, he had impressive muscles, leaned with the appropriate alpha stance, but he was not Heath. He was slightly shorter, he had short blond hair and a much kinder expression than what I was used to.

  It was his kind expression that almost brought me to my knees. It was the fact he was there at all. The morning after Heath had kissed me and walked away.

  He’d given up on me.

  Finally.

  It was all I could do to continue walking toward the man supposedly responsible for my safety.

  “Polly,” he said, grinning. “I’m Duke.”

  He extended his hand and I took it, smiling back because it was reflex to smile at someone who smiled at you so easily and openly. His hand was dry and warm and welcoming, just like everything about him.

  I liked him.

  I knew he’d be easy to be around, he wouldn’t make it hurt to breathe. To exist.

  But I missed Heath physically nonetheless.

  “I’m guessing you’re my next victim?” I asked, walking toward my car.

  “Victim? You a serial killer?” he asked.

  I smiled. “Not that I know of. But I’m wasting the time of someone who I’m guessing has much better things to do.”

  He grinned, snatching my keys from my hand in a gesture that managed not to be rude and opened my door for me after unlocking it.

  Heath didn’t open doors anymore. Sometimes he looked like he wanted to jam one of my fingers in one.

  “Hanging out with a pretty lady who I’ve heard is crazier than her sister in all the best ways is not what I consider a waste of my time.” He winked, closing my door.

  Before I knew it, the passenger door was opening, and the large man had folded himself into it. He threw a yoga mat into the back seat and two paperbacks.

  “You’re riding with me?” I asked, though he’d put his seatbelt on so it was pretty obvious.

  He nodded. “Heard you’re a maniac driver and I haven’t had time to head to Disney this year so I’m lookin’ forward to the thrill.”

  Again, I couldn’t help but smile. “I’ll do my best to recreate Space Mountain.”

  “All I can ask for.”

  Duke had been easy all day. Offering help when needed at the homeless shelter and even volunteering to teach self-defense classes once a week when he’d talked to a couple of bruised and skinny girls who were barely out of their teens.

  All of his pleasant and joking manner had disappeared when he’d finished speaking to them. I knew why. They were under the thumb of some asshole pimp who preyed on girls with bad home environments. He showed them a beautiful life for just long enough to get them committed, tied. Then he took down the façade, trapped them in an ugly life.

  Not unlike how Craig had with me.

  I just had people to run back to.

  These girls had no one.

  I’d been trying my best to help as many as I could. Using Craig’s money, I’d managed to rehome a lot of them out of state, and Jay arranged everything out of his own pocket when I’d told him about it. Wire did his thing and they disappeared. But for every girl I got out, another ended up in her place.

  I knew that Rosie had a side business for people like this. That I could’ve told her, and the problem would’ve gone away with the life of the man spreading all of the violence and pain, ruining innocence along the way.

  But as much as I hated seeing those girls like that, it went against everything I believed to make a call to end someone’s life.

  Now Duke knew even a little bit—and those men gossiped like high school girls—I wondered how long these girls would have under the control of that ugly man.

  The thought simmered at the back of my mind but disappeared for the rest of the day until I informed Duke I was meeting a friend and that he didn’t have to come.

  “She has a taser, pepper spray, and brass knuckles. I’m covered with her. And it’s Friday night. Surely you’ve got something better to do.”

  It was one thing having Heath follow me around. And that was uncomfortable enough. It was quite another with Duke having to stretch out his day protecting me from a threat that didn’t even exist.

  “I can honestly tell you there’s nothing better than meeting a woman that owns brass knuckles,” he said seriously.

  I laughed.

  He came with me to the bar.

  And Rain obviously drank him in as we approached.

  “Seriously,” she said. “Do you know that he’s like, right there?” She held up her hand and pointed into it, in a false attempt to hide the pointing.

  I smiled. That was Rain. As subtle as a two by four to the face.

  “Rain, this is Duke, Duke, this is Rain,” I said.

  She shook his hand. “Nice grip.” She grinned.

  “Ditto,” he replied.

  “You two are going to be trouble, aren’t you?” I asked.

  Rain grinned. “Oh, no more than usual.”

  But trouble was on its way.

  And it had nothing to do with two good people.

  It had to do with a lot of very bad ones.

  * * *

  “I think it’s my turn to drive,” Duke said, deftly taking the keys I’d unearthed from my purse.

  I nodded. “I think you’re right,” I agreed, not slurring my words, but I was almost singing them. A sure sign of a tipsy Polly. Because one of the things I never did when sober was sing. I was considerate of people around me, and wouldn’t subject them to my tone-deaf tunes when sober. So, despite the fact I’d only nursed two beers over the two hours Rain and I had gone over six years of pain—Duke had sat at another table for most of the night, and that meant I had to spill the reasons why, reasons that ended up into the whole story—I was tipsy.

  And tipsy meant no way was I driving.

  Drunk driving was something I was violently against. Not just because if someone crashed, and killed themselves, it was their families and friends that had to suffer through a preventable death. But because it could kill someone going about their life, completely sober, doing everything right.

  The person doing wrong usually walked away.

  Duke opened the door for me and he was in the driver’s seat in what seemed like a long blink.

  “You know, there’s really no excuse for drunk driving,” I said. “Not with things like Uber. Or, you could just do what I did, get married to an a-hole, divorce him, not see him for a year and then have him accost you in a restaurant so your brother in law gets his security firm to cover you.”

  “Agreed. But it is a heck of a long game to play for a free and sober ride home,” Duke said, smile in his voice.

  “Yeah, Uber is most likely much easier. And it won’t ruin your life.”

  There was a long silence after my words.

  “Could you take me somewhere?” I asked.

  “You got a hankering for a cheeseburger?” he asked knowingly.

  I shook my head. But I did kind of feel like one. Veggie burger, of course. ”No. Do you by any chance know where Heath lives?”

  Another pause. Duke was grinning.

  “Yeah, I do by chance know.”

  * * *

  I stared up at the building in awe. “This isn’t where Heath lives now.”

  “Well I sure hope it is since I’ve been pickin’ him up for our workouts every Saturday for three years,” Duke said dryly.

  I continued to stare.
“He’s still here,” I whispered.

  I was looking at the same apartment building I’d lost my virginity in years before. The exact same one.

  I’d assumed now that Heath was out of the Marines, he would’ve made a home, a real one. I knew Keltan paid his employees well, so Heath could’ve afforded a condo in a nice area, even in L.A.

  But he was still here.

  I wanted to cry.

  But I didn’t.

  I turned to Duke. “Thanks for bringing me.”

  “Thanks for asking me to bring you,” he said.

  I furrowed my brows in question.

  “Heath’s a buddy. We don’t talk about shit ‘cause...well, we’re guys, and we don’t talk about shit, but I know he’s hurtin’,” he explained. “Know he’s been hurting. And I know it’s never as simple as it seems on the surface, so I don’t judge you even a little bit for holdin’ back. Understand it, in fact. But I’m thankful you’re here.” He nodded to the building.

  “Well, you might be the only one,” I said, sobering instantly at the reality of what I was doing. And being faced with the fact that Heath might not want me here.

  That Heath might not be alone.

  The mere thought filled my mouth with bile.

  He had every right to have someone else in his bed. I’d married someone else, for Christ’s sake.

  “Whatever you’re thinkin’ about, you cut the shit right now,” Duke commanded. “He’s gonna be thankful you’re here. You trust me on this. Fucker can’t get out of his own way, ‘cause, well...he’s a fucking guy and we can’t swallow our pride at the best of times. This ain’t the best of times. But I’ve got a feelin’ it might be able to turn into that, you get outta this car and stop overthinking shit.”

  Overthinking.

  No one in my life would’ve ever accused me of that before.

  But that’s what I was doing.

  I leaned over to kiss Duke’s clean-shaven cheek. “Thank you.”

  “Didn’t do anything, but I’ll take the thanks.” He winked at me. “Now get outta the fucking car, babe.”

  I did as I was asked.

  But I stopped to lean back in before I closed the door. “Will you stay, just in case he slams the door closed in my face?”

  “He won’t.”