A Reason To Live (Reason #3)

by CP Smith

  “The lights went out,” she replied. “And before you blame me for this, I was nowhere near the light switch, nor did I trip and bust the fuses.”

  Max smirked at her defense and pulled her into his arms. “Doesn’t matter,” he answered, “the law of averages says if it can happen, you’ll be close by.”

  Shane put out his hand to help me out the door and down the stairs. I took it because I wanted out of there.

  “Thanks,” I said once I was breathing fresh air.

  “We need to talk.”

  “No, we don’t. I let you off the hook, Shane. I no longer need your help.”

  Shane rolled his lip between his teeth, no doubt to control his anger, then grabbed my arm and pulled me to the side where we had privacy.

  “Listen to me and listen good. I couldn’t save your sister, but I’ll be damned if I’m gonna let anything happen to you.”

  “So your only interest in me is out of some duty to my sister?”

  If he agreed, I knew it would crush me.

  How had this man come to mean something to me in three days?

  “It has to be that way. We’re only askin’ for heartache if we go down that road.”

  “Because you think you’ll never be able to forgive yourself?”

  “Because we’ll never be able to look at each other without seeing Emma Jane. It’ll never work.”

  “Don’t you dare speak for me,” I shouted, ripping my arm from his grip. The psychotic I was afraid would rule my emotions finally made an appearance and put on her boxing gloves. “I, for one, like remembering my sister. When I look at you, I don’t feel sad, I feel grateful she had you as her friend while she was in the Army. If you can’t see past your unfounded guilt when you look at me, that’s your issue, not mine.”

  “It’s not unfounded.”

  “In your mind maybe, but I don’t blame you. It was a tragedy of war. You need to face that, Shane, or you won’t move past it. Talk to Max, talk to one of your former men, hell, talk to Maxine before you drown in this guilt. If you don’t, you’ll be folding it around you like a blanket to keep you warm at night,” I choked out as tears welled.

  I wanted more than anything for this man to see me differently, as more than just a reminder of my sister’s death, but it was clear he was lost to his demons.

  He looked stunned at my outburst and didn’t reply. They thought I was a kitten because I was soft-spoken, but when push came to shove, I was always a lioness.

  When a knot started forming in my chest, I turned to walk away. But I stopped when a voice inside my head urged me to make it clear to him exactly what he’d be giving up if he rejected me. So I turned back and bared my soul.

  “You told me once you weren’t the person I thought you were, but you’re wrong. You’ve just forgotten who that man is. You’re walking alone through life, Shane. If you’d given me a chance, I would have tried to be your anchor, to keep you grounded, given you a reason to live. You could have breathed me in, even when it hurts to breathe, and I would have helped you heal,” I cried out. “You could have found love so profound it stopped time in the face of it—that’s what I would have given to you if you’d been brave enough to try.”

  I didn’t wait for his reply. I turned to leave as soon as I finished. But Shane grabbed my arm and spun me around before I made it one step. I gasped when my chest slammed into his and then his mouth was on mine. I wanted to cry at the intensity of the kiss, at how beautiful it could be between us. But heartache was mixed in with his passion as he drew out the kiss, bending me at the waist to control every nuance.

  When he finally broke from my lips, he placed his forehead on mine and stared into my eyes. I saw his pain, his uncertainty, what I didn’t see was forgiveness for himself.

  “Sage.” His voice was strained. The longing, the pain in that single word was heartbreaking

  “I wish I could help you,” I whispered, reaching up to run my hand down his cheek. “You deserve love and so much more.”

  Shane held my gaze for a moment longer then kissed me softly before releasing me. I stepped back, refusing to look at him because it hurt too much, and made a decision that would save us both the heartache he feared.

  Turning to my right, I found Maxine and Gregor standing next to Max and Mia watching us, all with identical looks of sadness. They cared so much for Shane. He had the support he needed. I could only pray he reached out at some point and took it.

  Moving toward Maxine and Gregor, I shored up my defenses for what was to come. When I was standing in front of them both, I spoke.

  “Gregor, I made a mistake. I won’t be staying in Trails End as I thought.”

  Maxine widened her eyes in response and she turned to Gregor, placing her hand on his arm. He looked at her and put his own hand on top of hers. Something passed between them, like minds speaking without words.

  “I’ll be in a pickle if you don’t at least help out this weekend. Can you put off leaving until then?”

  I thought about my proximity to Shane until I could leave and nodded. It would be easy to avoid him on the river so I could delay leaving until we returned.

  “All right. I’ll stay until after the trip.”

  “Thank you, lass,” Gregor responded, reaching out to squeeze my hand.

  I was on the verge of tears again, so I excused myself and headed for my Jeep. Max was talking to Shane as I walked away, so I put my head down and kept moving. I felt Shane’s eyes burning into my back as I left. Once I was far enough away, I turned back and caught sight of Shane walking away alone, heading for the lake. I watched until he made it to the water’s edge and lowered his head. My vision clouded as I took him in. I was aching to reach out to him one more time, but I didn’t. Nothing I said would change a thing until he was ready to accept the truth.

  I wasn’t sure if I’d see him again before I left, so I watched a moment longer than I should have. Then I tucked the sight of him away in my memory, said good-bye to what might have been, and went back to Maxine’s.

  After dealing with my stepfather, Emma Jane’s death, hiding from a stalker, and now dealing with Shane, I was emotionally exhausted. I couldn’t stop the tears if I tried. As a rule, I tried not to focus on things I couldn’t change, told myself what doesn’t kill me makes me stronger, but at that moment, it was a lie.

  Some pain can stop you in your tracks and halt your life. Some pain is so debilitating that you can’t see past it. It took the last year to bring me to that point, but here I was, lying on the bed in Maxine’s home with the blinds pulled and the lights off. It wasn’t until that moment when Shane’s rejection tipped me over the edge that I finally understood him. And that caused the tears to flow harder.

  The ache of all I’d lost was so intense I wasn’t sure if I could move from the bed if the house caught fire, and it was eye-opening. I realized that’s what Shane had been living with for the past year, and I ached more. I couldn’t breathe adequately; my lungs were constricted by a choking feeling of loss and regret. I wanted to take a knife and cut the pain from my chest so I wouldn’t hurt anymore. I don’t know how Shane got up each day with that type of pain radiating through his system. But it proved how strong he was. How brave he was that he faced each day without sharing his burden with a single person.

  I called him a coward.

  “I’m so sorry, Emma,” I whispered into the darkness. “I wanted desperately to help him. For you, for him, and for me. I don’t know what to do. Do I stay and fight or do I leave?”

  The door to my room flew open as I lay there waiting for an answer from my sister that would never come. “We need to talk,” Maxine said as she entered and flipped the light on.

  Rolling to my back, I covered my eyes from the blinding light and mumbled, “What?”

  Maxine sat on the bed, so I moved up and leaned against the headboard, wiping my face dry before pulling my knees to my chest and wrapping my arms around them.

  Her face softened as she took in my
tears.

  “I got a story to tell you,” she started in a soft voice. “One I never told Maximilian.”

  “What kind of story?”

  “One about love lost and found. You see, my husband Tom loved another woman before me. Max knows about his father’s first love; so does the town, but he doesn’t know the whole story.”

  “Okay.” I was intrigued of course, but a little confused why she was sharing her husband’s past.

  “I met Tom when he was thirty-eight. I lived in Gunnison, Colorado, at the time, and he was passing through on his yearly vacation. He liked the look of the town, so he decided to stay for a few days. What you need to know before I continue is we Gunnisons have a way of knowing the minute we see our soul mates. It happened to my dad, his dad, my brother, his son Jack, and even Maximilian. It also happened to me. Tom walked into the bar I was in, and the minute I looked at him, I knew. He was ten years older than I was, but I didn’t care. I could see it in his eyes,” she explained with a faraway look.

  “You’re saying Max knew as soon as he looked into Mia’s eyes?”

  “Oh, yeah. He may not have figured it out right off, but something happens when you meet your soul mate. You see, soul mates are two halves of the same whole, so when you meet, it’s like coming home. But it’s different for everyone. The Gunnisons, for instance, just instinctively know when we meet our other half. We become protective, possessive, almost instantly. And the Hunters, like my Max and Tom, the ground beneath their feet shifts and a calmness kinda washes over them.”

  “Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies. Aristotle.” Aristotle’s quote was based on Greek mythology where humans were believed to be born with four arms, four legs, and was half male and half female. But after they conspired to climb Mount Olympus to attack him, Zeus ordered them cut in half. Since that day, it’s believed every human spends their life searching for their other half. I hadn’t given much thought to the legend until Maxine told her story.

  “You know Aristotle, I see.”

  “I do. And I think it’s the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard.”

  “It is,” she agreed. “It can also be a curse, though.”

  “How so?”

  “Well, for one thing, not everyone realizes what’s happening and they fight it. Some will go as far as to push the other away, causing heartache and disappointment. And in some cases, separation for the rest of their lives.”

  “Did Tom fight it?”

  “Oh, Lord, yes. And that’s the part that Max doesn’t know,” she informed me, so I leaned in closer, my attention riveted to her story.

  “Okay, I’m listening.”

  When she moved closer and took my hand, I knew she was about to lay some wisdom on me I needed to hear.

  “See, the reason Tom wasn’t married at thirty-eight is his first love had died in a hunting accident. It’s a sad story, I’ll tell you about it some time,” she explained with a flip of her hand and then continued. “Anyhoo, he vowed never to marry after that; was convinced he’d lost his one and only true love, you see. So he walked around a shell of a man for years until he met me. But I recognized him immediately as my other half. I also saw the darkness he carried within him and knew I’d have to fight for him. That’s what Max doesn’t know. He thinks his father took one look at me and fell head over heels, so let’s keep it that way.” She winked. “But the whole truth is, I fought tooth and nail to bring him out of the dark and into the light with me. And once he paid attention to me and honestly looked with his whole heart, he realized who I was. His soul mate.”

  I could see Tom as he fought his feelings for her, and his face morphed into Shane’s.

  “You’re telling me this for a reason, aren’t you?”

  Maxine nodded and her eyes sharpened, pinning me in place. “I see the same look on your face I had when I met Tom. You see Shane’s soul, his dark, and his light, don’t you?”

  “Yes,” I agreed. “But he’s pushed me away. I don’t think he’ll let me help him.”

  “A woman’s any woman at all, she digs her feet in and fights for what she wants.”

  “But how do I fight when I’m the problem?”

  “You gotta pull from that place in your gut that feeds you when you think you can’t go on. You use it to fight, to guide you, to sustain you when you think you can’t handle one more thing, and then you hand it to Shane to guide him out of the darkness.”

  “I’m worried he can’t be helped,” I admitted.

  “Nonsense. Shane’s born from the same mountain stock as Max. They don’t lie down easily. They’re strong, courageous—albeit stubborn to the core—warriors. He’s been injured, broken even, but he’s made of sterner stuff. He just needs a reason to fight back the darkness, and that’s where you come in.”

  “But how? Do I follow him around and get in his face?”

  “Nope. It’s easier with men like Max and Shane. He’ll come to you.”

  “Why would you think that?”

  “Shane wants you. Which means he won’t want anyone else to have you. Eventually, the need to claim you will weaken his defenses and then he’ll open his eyes.”

  “If you’re saying I should flirt with other men, then the answer is no. I won’t play—”

  “Goodness, no. That’s distasteful and unbecoming of a real woman. Just don’t leave Trails End. Put yourself out there so he is forced to deal with you, is all I’m saying. Conduct yourself like always, and no matter what he says, brush it off. Don’t run from the fight, stay and fight. He’ll see that you’re made of sterner stuff just like him and can bear the weight of his darkness. When he sees that, he’ll fall.”

  “But I have fought and it seems to have made no difference.”

  “Oh, it’s chipped away at some of his armor. But he’s got a stubborn streak the likes I’ve never seen. Dig deep, Sage. Square your shoulders and show him you can handle anything he throws at you. By doing that, you’re giving him your strength to let go and move forward.”

  “Give him my strength? . . . I can do that. I’ll start tomorrow,” I agreed, then wrapped my arms around her and gave her a hug.

  “I’m thinking tonight. Say, eight, at Last Call.”

  “That soon?”

  “No time like the present.”

  “All right. Any more wisdom you want to impart to me before tonight?”

  “Yeah,” she replied with a sly grin pulling across her lips. “Wear something green, low cut, and leave your hair down.”

  “Isn’t that playing games?”

  “Nope. You’re just working with what your mama gave you.”

  ***

  You could have found love so profound it stopped time in the face of it—that’s what I would have given to you if you’d been brave enough to try.

  Shane closed his eyes and attempted to block out Sage’s words. Whiskey wasn’t easing the hard edge that had set in since she’d confronted him.

  He was sitting at the end of the bar at Last Call, and everyone was giving him a wide berth. Max and Mia were at a table with Maxine, talking in whispers as they kept an eye on him. Tapping the bar with his finger, he watched Ralph Potter fill his shot glass again. Then he threw it back.

  “That’s your fourth,” Ralph pointed out. “Either you eat somethin’ or give me the keys to your truck.”

  Shane stood and pulled the keys from his pocket, dropping them on the bar, then tapped it again and waited. He saw Ralph look over his shoulder at Max and gritted his jaw.

  “Are you pourin’ or turnin’ into a mother hen?”

  Ralph locked eyes with Shane, his brows pulled down in concern, then he lifted the bottle and filled his glass.

  “Obliged,” Shane muttered.

  He lifted the shot and got it halfway to his mouth when a hand stilled its assent. Shane didn’t have to look to know it was Max. No one had a hand that big.

  “You want something, Max?”

  “I want you to pull your head out
of your ass.”

  Shane shrugged off his hand and threw back the whiskey, praying the burn would take his mind off his trouble for the millisecond it took to make its way to his gut. He was determined to get good and drunk.

  “Did you pull your head out of your ass when your father died?” Shane asked without inflection.

  “No,” Max answered, ignoring the punch to the gut that always came when he thought of his father’s death.

  “Then what makes you think I can, Max?”

  “There’s a difference, Shane.”

  “Yeah? And what’s that?” he asked, turning his head to look at Max.

  “I didn’t stand to lose Mia because of it.”

  You could have breathed me in, even when it hurts to breathe, and I would have helped you heal.

  Shane took a deep breath to ease the pain and clipped, “Don’t compare a woman I’ve known all of three days to your wife.”

  Max leaned in and rested both his arms on the bar. When Shane turned his booze-soaked eyes back to him, Max answered.

  “I knew the moment I looked into her eyes she was the one for me. I didn’t need a year, six months, or even a few weeks to know I would do whatever it took to win her heart. When love is involved and you find the one you’ve been looking for, you weather any storm ‘til you’re standin’ right where you want to be. So don’t give me that shit about only knowin’ her three days. I’ve watched you around Sage and I recognize the look. It stared back at me in the mirror the very day I met Mia. The only thing stoppin’ you from gettin’ in your truck and claimin’ that woman is your own stubborn need to be right.”

  Shane’s temper ignited, and he raged, “You think I want to feel this way?”

  The bar went on alert, heads turning in shock at his outburst.

  “Jesus, Shane,” Max whispered. “I think you’ve felt this way for so long it’s like puttin’ on an old pair of jeans that has seen its last leg. It feels right on your skin, so you don’t know how to let it go. You gotta talk about what’s goin’ on in your head; purge the demons from your soul so you can move forward.” Max held Shane’s glare for a moment then looked back at his wife. “You know I’d die for her,” he announced.