Mallory

by Michelle Love

  “You won’t be glomming onto me, Jude. I want to be there for you. I want to be with you. I want to take care of you. I really do,” she says as tears start to fall over her pink cheeks.

  “You say that now but you won’t. I’ll be a burden on you. Just another burden on your shoulders. I can’t do that to you. I won’t do that to you, Mercy.”

  MERCY

  “We can talk about this later, Jude.” I kiss his cheek that’s gone red with his anger. “You stay calm.”

  “Yes, Jude,” his mother says. “You stay calm. We won’t let Mercy carry the work of caring for you all on her own. You let us worry about that and you just worry about getting better.”

  “There is no getting better, Mom,” he shouts. “Did you hear him? This is me forever, now. Because of one stupid ass decision, this is me now. For fucking ever!”

  I get off the bed and look at the doctor. “Can’t you give him something to calm him down?”

  He shakes his head. “He’s got too many drugs still in his system. And frankly, I’ve never seen anyone who could get so irate with so many in them. You all have a lot on your hands to get him to accept what’s happened to him. I’ll send in the chaplain. Maybe he can help.”

  I watch the doctor leave the room and turn back to see Jude’s face is red and he’s pissed at the world right now so I reach deep down into my own private misery and pull out a bit to try to help him understand things better.

  “Jude,” I say, pulling his attention to me. “I know this is hard. I do. But you need to be grateful for your life. Take it from someone who’s lost nearly her entire family in a matter of minutes. I know how life can knock you out with one punch. I do. You were kept alive and nearly completely intact.”

  “Not intact enough, Mercy. Not enough. I won’t do this to you. I will not do it. You deserve more. You deserve a real man. Damn, baby! You need a real man to help you. I’m not that anymore and I’ll be Goddamned if I make you take care of me. I’m supposed to be the one who takes care of you and those kids. Not take more away from you.”

  Zeek steps up to bat. “Jude, let her take care of you, bro. She’s the one who caused it all, anyway.”

  All eyes go to Zeek and all are shocked with what he’s said. Then Jude asks, “How is that?”

  “She overheard you talking about how you hunted her down and all that and got mad and ran off. You chased after her and that’s how you were nearly killed. Let her take care of you. Fuck! She’s the reason you can’t walk or fuck anymore!”

  “You watch your mouth, Zeek!” Jim shouts then he looks at Jude. “You were drunk and driving is the reason you’re here. Not because of anything to do with Mercy.”

  Jude looks at me with a frown on his handsome face. “Mercy, I don’t care why this happened to me. I really don’t. I just know I’m not about to become another person who takes a piece of you. You have way too much on your plate to have to include me in on that too.”

  “Jude, I’m not leaving you. You can say whatever you want to. I’m not going to walk away from you. I’m not this weak woman you make me out to be. I can handle what comes with you. I can do it. So just let me,” I tell him.

  Jude looks at his family then says, “I need to be alone with her.”

  They all nod and leave as I stand there looking at them. One by one as they file past me they give me nods except for Zeek. He says, “You better make this better with him. Or you’ll have me to answer to.”

  “No, she won’t,” Jude says. “This is between her and I. Not anyone else.”

  Zeek gives me a look anyway. And I know what he means. He has no idea how much I hold myself accountable for what’s happened to Jude. He has no idea of how stubborn I can be. He also has no idea how much I love the man.

  As he leaves the room, I turn to look at Jude and put my hands on my hips. “Before you say a word. Let me tell you how my day went today. I know yours was hard but so was mine. So will you allow me to let you in on my rollercoaster ride of a day, first? Then you can tell me how yours went.”

  He cocks his head to the side as he says, “Do you really think you can top mine, Mercy?”

  “We’ll see,” I say as I start to walk slowly in front of his bed. “First thing this morning I was met with Mia’s wet bed. She was afraid to get up and go pee and she said she had called out for me but I didn’t hear her because the house is too big. So I put on my list of things I need, a baby monitor.”

  He looks a little sad as he says, “Aw, I didn’t know that. Did she feel awful?”

  I nod. “She was pretty upset for wetting her new bed. But I bathed her and dressed her and told her it was alright and that I was going to fix that problem today.”

  “Good,” he says then looks at me. “You’re very good at problem solving. Has anyone ever told you that?”

  “You’re the first,” I say as I turn and walk back in the other direction as I go on. “So, I took the kids shopping. Let me tell you how fun that was. Not one bit. I should’ve never taken them. They wanted everything but clothes. Becky was a help but we both were running in circles trying to keep them in the clothing sections of the stores rather than the toy sections.”

  He makes a low chuckle. “I bet they were handfuls.”

  “They certainly were. Then we took a lunch break,” I say as I continue walking back and forth. I pull at my pink shirt. “Did you notice that my shirt isn’t the one I left the house with today?”

  “No,” he says as he shakes his head. “But in my defense, I did nearly die today.”

  I stop and smile at him. “That you did. Well, the reason is that at lunch Carter was shoving a hotdog into his mouth like he hadn’t eaten in a year and he choked on it. I had to give him the Heimlich maneuver and the hot dog came out and he started crying so I turned him around to face me and hugged him and he puked chili all over my shirt.”

  “Poor kid,” Jude says as he shakes his head. “He must’ve been so scared. I choked on a cheese stick once. I was so afraid I was going to die and no one even noticed I was choking until I fell on the floor. I was six.”

  “He was scared and we both were messes. So I had to go to the bathroom and change him. Luckily, I had him some new clothes so that was an easy fix. I hadn’t bought me a thing yet, so I had to put one of the little t-shirts of his on myself and go back out into the mall with my tiny shirt, looking very trampy and getting many whistles.”

  “I bet you did,” he says as he raises his eyebrows. “And what hurts the most is how my dick would’ve gone hard with that story and now I can’t feel a damn thing.”

  JUDE

  “Jude, I know that’s weighing heavily on you right now. But you’re going to get therapy, both mental and physical, to help you with that. Don’t let that be the thing that settles on you. It’s just not going to be a healthy thing for you right now,” Mercy says as she comes and sits on the bed next to me, facing me and running her hand over my cheek.

  I grab her hand and pull it to my lips. With a soft kiss to it, I can’t help but notice the absence of the usual stirring in my groin. I can’t help but notice how when I run my hand through her hair and she leans her cheek against my hand, how nothing is happening in my lower regions like it has always done for me.

  “This isn’t the man I wanted to be for you,” I tell her as I take her by the chin to make her look at me.

  “It doesn’t matter. You are still the man for me. Can you tell me that you don’t love me?” she asks.

  “No,” I say as I run my fingertip over her red lips. “I can’t say that. I love you more than I can imagine loving anyone. I love you so much, I can’t do this to you. I can’t make you take care of a man who can’t do a damn thing for you.”

  “I think you can figure out how to do lots of things. Given time,” she says.

  “Not make love to you,” I say as I run my finger down her neck and trace the outline of her breast.

  “There’s more than one way to make love, Jude,” she says. “As long a
s we feel it in our hearts, that’s all that matters.”

  She takes my hand and pulls it to her mouth, leaving a kiss on it then holding it. “I can’t stand the thought of you having to push me around in a wheelchair.”

  “Then get a motorized one,” she says with a light laugh.

  “How can you not be running away from all of this?” I ask her.

  She should be hauling ass as fast as she can. Then I remember that she doesn’t have a nice place to live right now. It makes me think that she might be thinking she has to hold on to me.

  “Running away? From you? Never,” she says as she leans in and kisses my cheek. “You’re stuck with me. So just get used to it. I’m not ever going to run away from you. Not ever again.”

  “You’re not blaming yourself about me, are you?” I ask as I can see it in her eyes. I just want to see if she’ll be truthful with me.

  Her head cocks to the side as she says, “You want a lie or the truth?”

  “The truth,” I say. “Always the truth.”

  “Then the answer is, yes, I do feel I’m to blame. But that’s not the reason I’m determined to stay with you. That reason is pure love. Nothing else. I promise you that.”

  “I’ll let you stay in the house. I’ll still take care of all of the bills until your house is ready for you to move into it. I’ll still do the partnership with the fitness center and everything will stay the same. Only I’ll set you free. Free of taking care of me, and free to move on to a man who can really take care of you in every way.”

  She looks at me for a long time then she leans in and kisses my lips. “Thank you, Jude.”

  I guess that’s her answer. I guess she’ll accept what I want. I can’t let her waste her life away with me. Half of a man.

  “I completely understand,” I say.

  “Do you?” she asks as she runs her hand over my chest. “Do you, really?”

  I nod. “I’m not about to let you end your life by being with me.”

  She nods and looks at me then gets up. “So the rest of my day went like this. I came home after one hell of a long day and found the man I love telling his brothers how he had hunted me down, used my orphaned niece and nephew to pull me in, and put me in a gorgeous mansion all to capture his trophy.”

  “About that,” I say. “You don’t know how sorry I am.”

  She looks at me with a stern expression. “Don’t. Don’t you dare try to explain that.”

  I have to say, I didn’t expect her to bitch me out after all I’ve been through. But I do believe she’s about to give it to me and I have to say, I don’t think I can take it. Not right now. Not with everything that’s happened to me.

  “I don’t know what came over me when I first saw you. I wanted you like I’ve never wanted anyone before. And I’m a hunter, Mercy. That’s what I am at my very core. So when I set my mind on you, I went into hunter mode. But I swear to the Lord above, I didn’t pretend to love those kids to reel you in. I swear that. I genuinely love them. As a matter of fact, I want you to bring them to see me. No matter what our situation is, I want you to know I’ll be there for those kids forever. I mean it.”

  “So you are admitting that you did some pretty sneaky things to get to me?” she asks as she puts her hands on her hips.

  I nod. “Yeah, I did. I made sure you fell into the traps I set for you. I made sure you became mine. I made sure you’d stay with me forever. I know the things I said may have sounded crass. And I did mean them. I’m not going to lie. I meant it when I said that you were the one. I meant it when I said I was going to make you mine. I meant it when I said you were my trophy. Because that’s how I see you. You’re my golden trophy and I couldn’t be more proud that I’m the one who caught you.”

  “Why?” she asks as she sits back down on my bedside. “Why, Jude?”

  I run my hand through her hair and hold a lock of it, reveling in its softness and wishing like hell the accident hadn’t happened. If it hadn’t, I’d have given her the ring I have at home.

  I was going to ask her to marry me tonight. Instead, I’m lying here, half the man I was earlier today. All because I hauled ass after drinking way too much. If I had been sober and in my right mind, I’d have known she’d calm down and we could’ve talked on the phone and worked things out.

  Instead, I drove a car when I shouldn’t have and fucked myself up. Fucked my entire life up, forever. This isn’t her fault. It’s entirely mine and I am man enough to admit that and man enough to let her go for her own good.

  But she has asked me a question so I answer, “Because somewhere in time, I think it was written that you and I belong together. I felt it the moment I saw you. When I touched you, it became more evident. As time went on, and we made love, it was cemented in my head. You and I were meant to be.”

  “So, why end it now?” she asks as she leans in close and presses her lips to mine.

  I don’t let it get further than that. I turn my head before her tongue moves past my lips. “Because I am no longer a man. I’m sorry if you can’t understand. This is over. I love you too much to keep you attached to what I’ve become.”

  The tears that instantly stream down her cheeks hurt me, but only to my waist because from there down, I feel nothing and it’s evident to me now that numbness will soon move all the way through my body as life without her is never going to be the same.

  Giving Up The Hunt Part 9

  Billionaire’s Quarry

  By Michelle Love

  MERCY

  “So that’s it then?” I ask Jude as he looks at me with a defeated expression. “You’re giving up the hunt for me?”

  With a nod, he says, “How can I do anything now that I’m only half a man, Mercy? You tell me how I can compete with other vital men for you. The answer is, I can’t. And you know it.”

  “So you want me to walk away from you and act like neither of us holds any love in our hearts for the other? You want me to turn my back on the man I love when life’s dealt him a sharp blow? That’s what you’re asking me to do, you know. Leave you when you’re at the lowest point in your life. Well, I can’t do that, Jude. So suck it up and get ready to lean on me because I’m not going anywhere.”

  His eyes follow me as he holds his jaw tight. I know the man is used to getting this way and even I’ve given into him on most everything he’s wanted from me but not this time.

  “Mercy, you can’t do this to yourself,” he says as he presses some button and lays his bed back so he’s lying flat on his back. “I’m not going to let you. If I have to make you hate me then I’ll just have to do that. But I won’t let you waste your life on me.”

  Closing the curtains, I turn back to find him with his eyes closed and go to his side and kiss his cheek. “I love you, Jude Hurst. And I know you’re a very stubborn and bratty man. But you’re not going to win this fight. I love you too much to allow that. So get ready to hear the word, no. Get ready to hear it a lot out of me.”

  “Mercy, leave me alone,” he growls.

  I kiss his cheek again then say, “No.”

  His eyes open and I see a ton of anger in the greenish brown depths. “Mercy, damn it! Don’t make me hurt you!”

  I cock my head to the side and study him for a moment then stick my tongue out at him then say, “Get used to not getting your way, Jude. I know it’s going to be difficult for you but I’m not going anywhere. If you say mean things, I’ll know it’s the protective side of you saying them. Not the man I know you are and will be again in no time. You’ll see.”

  The door to his hospital room opens and an older man with a Bible in his hand comes inside. “Hello, Jude. I’m Pastor Stevens. I heard about your terrible accident and I’m here to lend an ear and tell you about some fascinating miracles I, myself, have witnessed. And who is this lovely young lady who stands at your side, Jude?”

  “This is Mercy and she needs to leave me alone,” he says with a snarl.

  I give the man a smile. “Nice to meet you
, Pastor Stevens. I’m Jude’s girlfriend. His live-in girlfriend and I’m not going anywhere.”

  The man takes a seat in the one chair in the room and opens the Bible. “Jude, let me hear your story, son.”

  I raise the bed back up so Jude can talk to the man and get an icy stare from him. Placing another kiss on his cheek, I say, “So tell him your story.”

  “Not much to tell,” Jude says. “This morning things were great. More than great, actually. I had ordered something special and it had come in. I went and picked it up. I had big plans for this evening. Big plans that were crushed like my body was. The end.”

  “What was this special thing you got this morning?” Pastor Steven’s asks.

  Jude looks up at me and says, “It was an engagement ring. I was going to ask this lady to marry me.”

  My heart stops and I stare into his eyes. “You were?”

  He nods and the Pastor says, “So why change things now? You can still ask her. You’re not dead, son.”

  Jude looks away from me and my head is still spinning from what he was going to do but now it seems marriage is off the table. “I might as well be. I’m not a man anymore.”

  The Pastor pulls out a paper from the back of his Bible and looks at it. “I don’t see that here that has happened to you. I see paralysis that might be operable sometime later to restore mobility and some injuries to your reproductive organs but nowhere does it say that you’re not a man anymore. Nope, not anywhere on this paper.”

  “I can’t feel anything,” Jude says. “Nothing is moving or putting out any kind of anything. I’d welcome pain right now. That’s how dead it feels.”

  I run my hand over his head and whisper, “But you aren’t dead and I, for one, am glad you’re not in pain right now.”

  The Pastor smiles at us then looks at Jude. “Jude, you have a good woman right there. Don’t let your foolish pride rob you of her. I’m here to tell you about some of the things I’ve seen. Now, nothing happens overnight, mind you, but with time and work, anything can happen. Even if it’s acceptance of new limits.”