Taking Liberty: The Next Generation

by Edwards, Riley

  “There a reason why you keep asking about Trey?”

  What the hell?

  “Well, let’s see, Drake. I saw a piece of shrapnel sticking out of his bloodied thigh, after I failed to warn him and Luke in time that Lore was going to commit suicide. I know Luke’s at home being taken care of by a leggy blonde, as Trey describes her. But as far as I know, Trey’s home alone and I’m worried about a friend. Is that a good enough reason for you?”

  “Damn, Liberty, I’m sorry.” Drake blew out a breath. “Yeah, he’s fine. Logan and Matt are taking turns going over there during the day to check on him and Matt’s been staying the night.”

  “And you?”

  “And me what?”

  “You said, Matt and Logan. What about you? Have you checked on him?”

  I swore I saw him flinch with guilt but I couldn’t be sure.

  “I’ve seen him. But I’ve been caught up in meetings and briefs so I haven’t been over as much as they have.”

  There was an edge to his answer. My mom would call it a deceptive misdirection—or a lie without lying. I couldn’t understand what there was to hide, but swore I heard tension in his tone.

  What was that about?

  29

  I was screwing this up—big time. Liberty was standing ten feet away from me in my hotel room with her arms wrapped around her middle, unsure and nervous. From the moment I’d led her into the room, she’d put distance between us.

  There was a lot that needed to be said, explanations given, feelings aired. I just didn’t know where to start.

  My body was at war with my mind.

  My mind warring with my conscience.

  And I seriously had to get my jealousy in check. What the hell was wrong with me, snapping at Liberty when she asked about Trey? I knew she wasn’t interested in him as anything more than a friend, but her asking about him twice in thirty minutes had crawled under my skin. I was behaving like a jackass and I knew it. Not the best way to win my girl over.

  “Drake? You wanna tell me why you’re here?” she asked, and my gut clenched at the uncertainty in her voice.

  “You wanna tell me why you’re standing across the room looking freaked?” I volleyed.

  Again, not the best way to start this particular conversation—an important one where I needed to convince her the connection we had was not severed. And I needed to do that in a way she couldn’t twist in her head, because the rest of what I had to tell her was likely going to piss her off.

  “Because I am freaked. I haven’t seen or heard from you in weeks and you show up out of the blue—with my dad, which I don’t understand how that happened. I asked you why you’re in Georgia and you give me some strange non-answer. Then I ask you again and you tell me to wait. Now I’m standing in a hotel room with you and you’re staring at me but still not talking.”

  My eyes moved lower, from her arms wrapped protectively around her middle, and caught sight of her bare legs. I’d never seen her in shorts, never seen her in flip-flops. The Liberty I knew wore ACUs, tactical vests, and even wearing jeans and my shirt in Beirut, had multiple weapons strapped to her body.

  I quickly formulated a new plan—I needed to prove to her our connection was more than adrenaline, battlefields, and rescues. She needed to see me as a man—her man—not the Navy SEAL. Which was important, considering I was no longer an active one.

  So I changed tactics and decided to lay it out for her.

  “I’m out of the Navy,” I told her.

  Her arms didn’t unwrap but her body jerked back and her eyes widened.

  “What? Why? How?”

  The lie was on the tip of my tongue. I could bullshit and tell her my enlistment was up, but that shit would inevitably come back to bite me. Not to mention, it was all kinds of wrong and as a habit, I didn’t deceive people. But the truth was going to infuriate her, possibly worry her.

  And worst case, scare her that there was a creepy psycho taking pictures of us.

  As quickly as I could, I told her about the pictures someone sent my command. Her expression ran the gamut—shocked, angry, very angry, then slid to furious. When I was done explaining that I’d been discharged due to our fraternization, Liberty McCoy was well beyond infuriated and nearing thermonuclear.

  “What?” she thundered.

  I didn’t feel her scathing response warranted an answer so I didn’t give her one. Instead, I remained quiet and let her sort through what she needed to.

  I’d find that was the wrong play. I should’ve reminded her what we shared. I should’ve led the conversation with how I felt about her and why I was there. But it was too late and I knew it when her already red face turned crimson.

  The anger drained and hurt crept in.

  “Liberty—” I started, but got no further because she’d stepped closer, unwrapped herself from the protective display, and cut me to the quick with her cold eyes.

  “What have you done?” she whispered.

  It didn’t take a genius to know her quiet words were in contradiction to the battle that raged behind her stare.

  Fucking shit.

  “Let me—”

  “I can’t believe you did this to me,” she hissed through gritted teeth.

  To her?

  “I didn’t do anything to you, Liberty. I did it for you.”

  Disappointment. Pain. Hurt.

  What the hell?

  “I can’t believe it.” Her fists went up and drove into her eyes. Then her tear-filled gaze came to mine, the look so raw it gutted me. “I can’t believe you’d do this. I thought you understood. I thought…I was wrong.”

  I was walking through a minefield, one I had no clue how to navigate, and one misstep and it was over. Worse yet, it felt like those mines were hidden on an iced-over pond, one that wasn’t completely frozen, and it was cracking under my feet.

  “Baby—”

  “Don’t, Drake. I can’t even look at you right now.” Her hands dropped to her sides and her fucked-up declaration sliced through me. But even though she’d said she couldn’t look at me, her haunted eyes hadn’t left mine. “I don’t know why you came down here, but I do know whatever your reason is, I don’t want to hear it. Don’t know why you were with my dad, but that doesn’t matter, either.”

  “I came down here because I missed you.”

  “Don’t say that.”

  “Say what? The truth? That when your dad showed up at my apartment and told me that you were working through some stuff but there were things that were hurting you, things you hadn’t shared, the tight leash I had on my control slipped? That hearing that you were hurting made it impossible to stay away? That I missed you and thought about you every day to distraction until I had to find physically taxing ways to exhaust myself so I could sleep? That I couldn’t stop myself from thinking about you, even though every time I did, it hurt so goddamn bad I couldn’t breathe?”

  Liberty’s lip curled in disgust. Her hand shot up and she jabbed a finger in my direction.

  “Your control? Must be nice for you to have that. I wouldn’t know what that’s fucking like.”

  “What?”

  “You said, the tight leash you had on your control slipped. Must be nice to have control over your own life. Must be nice to be allowed to make decisions pertaining to your own life. Must feel really good to know that you control—something.” Liberty finished on a hiss, still stabbing her finger at me. “Sorry it slipped and you wasted your time coming down here.”

  I’d never thought I was a stupid man. However, apparently I was a complete dumbfuck. In my haste to clear the topic so we could move to the next, I totally screwed up. No, screwed up was a far cry from what I’d done.

  “Let me explain.”

  “No. I don’t want an explanation.”

  “Liberty. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I wanted to protect you.”

  Again, wrong thing to say. That knowledge was slammed home when Liberty started to shake. Not a small tremble, oh no. He
r body convulsed, her hands balled into fists, and her face scrunched in agony.

  “There’s the problem, Drake,” she snarled. “That’s everyone’s problem. I don’t want to be protected, goddamn it. I want my fucking control back. I want everyone around me to stop. My family’s going after Roman against my wishes, not caring that it’s killing me. The Army, which means General Wick, gave the order to move my post to Savannah. My cousins are tiptoeing around me, at least the females are. The men are looking at me like I’m a child who needs to be coddled. No one is listening to me. I talk and they ignore me. But I get them doing it. To them I’m Moira. To my uncles, I’m their little niece. To my parents, I’m their only child and they’re worried. But you? What you did, how you went behind my back, how you took away any say I had in my life, my career, stripped me of the control I’ve been fighting to get back. That doesn’t kill me. Oh no, Drake, that rips my heart out. I thought you knew me. I thought you respected me. I thought you at least cared about me a little. But you don’t.”

  “Baby, please, listen to me,” I begged.

  The gravity of my mistake hit full-force and a paralyzing fear gripped my chest. How had I mishandled the situation so badly?

  “There’s nothing you can say. You gave up your career, gave up something that was important to you, something that was vital, and good, and honorable. You did it. And you didn’t even ask me if I wanted you to. So now, on top of everything else I’m dealing with, including you not being that man I thought you were, now I have to live with more guilt. And you did that, too. You piled that on my shoulders. And you’ve destroyed any chance of me one day completing the massive task of unfucking myself enough where I felt I was strong enough to seek you out, see if there was a chance what we’d shared was real, and build on it. You made it impossible because one day you’ll resent me. One day you’ll resent that dishonorable discharge. You’ll remember the hit you took and you’ll remember it’s my fault. You lost everything because of me.”

  Before her words had stopped dicing me to shreds, she was on her way to the door. I moved to block her path and her hand shot up in a defensive measure that told me she didn’t want me anywhere near her.

  Too damn bad. I’d listened, no, I’d felt every word Liberty had to say, even agreed with most all of them. I hadn’t seen what I’d done as taking away her control, or that by me giving up something that was indeed vital, honorable, and even if she hadn’t said it, made me the man I was. And that was protective—apparently to a fault, if there could be such a thing.

  But there was a lot she was not right about and I intended to make her understand I wouldn’t give up on us or lose her because she was somewhat right, but also wrong.

  “I did give up something important to me.” Liberty tried to step around me but I sidestepped, impeding her advance. “Take a minute and think about that. Nineteen years I served. Nine-teen. I think you get my job meant something to me, more than just service to my country, more than a paycheck, more than a rank before my name or some letters after it. I didn’t join the Navy because I had nothing better to do with my life. I didn’t go to BUD/s to accomplish a goal. I didn’t go through Green Team so I could be the baddest of the bad or brag about being a part of DEVGRU. I did that, all of it, because it’s who I am. I was born this man. Born to protect.

  “And faced with the fucked-up decision of choosing to protect you or my job, I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t need a day to contemplate, I didn’t even need a minute. This is not me falling on a sword so you don’t feel a moment of discomfort. This is not me taking away your choice, or not respecting you, or trusting you. This is me being the man I am, and taking the hit, so you don’t.”

  Liberty started to protest but I talked over her muttered objections. “But you’re right, I shouldn’t have done it the way I did. I should’ve talked to you about it, told you what was going on. But, babe, straight up, it wouldn’t have changed my mind. But you had a right to know. I was wrong for keeping it from you, because it does involve your life. Someone took pictures of us and I should’ve told you about them immediately. I’m not gonna make excuses for why I didn’t, just know it wasn’t done to be malicious.

  “Now we’re gonna talk about something else. Control, and why you think you don’t have any.”

  “Think I don’t? People are maneuvering around me, not giving me a say in what’s going on.”

  “Right, like your family tracking Roman. Baby, that’s not you losing your control. That’s about them regaining theirs. Roman took something that means something to them. And if that wasn’t bad enough, he violated it. You understand that something is you, right? Roman took you, held you prisoner, put his filthy hands on you, and he did those things to hurt your uncles. Put yourself in their place, and tell me how you’d feel if someone hurt them because of you.

  “Something else we’re gonna get untwisted. I didn’t lose anything. And believe this, I’m man enough not blame others for my choices. I made a decision, one I stand behind, and I did it knowingly. I did it because you mean more to me than anything. I did it because it was the right thing to do. And I will never regret it.”

  “We’ll see,” Liberty mumbled.

  “Yeah, baby, we will. And the way we’re gonna see it is years from now when all of this is behind us. You’ll see I still don’t regret it.”

  Her gaze snapped to mine and hostility radiated from every pore. I wasn’t sure how to make this right, so I reverted to my original plan—the one I should’ve stuck with before I had a major lapse in judgement. I went about reminding her we not only had a connection, but it was strong and true and unbreakable.

  “I missed you and I mean that down to my soul. When you were gone, nothing felt right. I couldn’t escape the loss of you.”

  “Then why did you let me go?” Her voice was thick with emotion, so raw I felt her words abrade my skin like sandpaper.

  “Because when you told me you’d never forget me, I thought I was doing the right thing giving you a clean break. I thought you were saying goodbye and I needed to have a mind to what you wanted even though I wanted to beg you to give us a chance. To figure out a way to make something work while we were both in the military until I could get out. I wanted to plead with you not to cut me out of your life. This is what you fail to understand. I respect you. I respect your hard work and dedication. I respect your commission, I respect you as a Ranger, as a Special Forces soldier. I respect all of that so much I would do anything to protect it. So I let you walk away.”

  Some of the hostility faded but none of the hurt. Liberty broke eye contact and looked at the floor, her lips pinched together in two thin white lines. I wasn’t sure if that was good or bad—Liberty in her head thinking about what I said. She could’ve been regrouping for another round. What I did know was, I never wanted to be the source of her hurt.

  “I would’ve taken responsibility, Drake.”

  “I know you would’ve. That’s why I did what I did and didn’t tell you.”

  Any inch of headway I’d made dissipated with my admission. “You took that from me.”

  “You’re right, I did.”

  “And you’re not sorry,” she noted.

  I was back to that minefield, and so far I had all my limbs intact, even if I was a little bruised. I’d be damned if I hit one now.

  “I’m sorry I handled the situation poorly. But I am not sorry I took the discharge and you didn’t lose your commission.”

  “Did it ever occur to you, that, had I been given the opportunity to protect you, I would’ve taken it? And I wouldn’t have seen it as losing something? That I would’ve gladly taken the punishment if it meant you got to stay in.”

  I didn’t answer, mainly because Liberty wasn’t done. “You know, as disturbing as it is that someone took pictures of us, I’m not sorry. I’m not ashamed you were holding me after I said goodbye to my team. I’m not ashamed that you held me through my nightmares. The only part I care about is that some asshole took memori
es that meant something to me and shit all over them by sending them to your command. That person stole something special from me.”

  “From us,” I cut in. “Those memories are special for both of us.”

  “If they were so special, then why’d you do this to me?”

  A prickle of unease shifted over me.

  “Babe, I told you why.”

  “Yeah, you told me some bullshit about how you felt the need to swoop in, protect me, take my choice away, and saddle me with the responsibility of you giving up your naval career.”

  “Fucking hell, Liberty,” I bit out and clenched my jaw until my molars ached. “Would you listen to me?”

  “I did listen. But you’re not hearing me. Go home, Drake, I don’t ever want to see or hear from you again.”

  While I was recovering from her kill shot, she made her way to the door. But before she could open it, I placed my hand on the metal and leaned my weight against it so she couldn’t pull it open.

  Her wounded eyes came to mine, a sight so painful I had to suck in a lungful of oxygen. The vision so unsettling, I was at a total loss how to make this right—how to make her understand that I’d give up anything to be with her.

  Liberty’s eyes closed. When they reopened, I braced when she whispered, “If there’s any part of you that cares about me, you’ll move out of my way.”

  Fast and hard, everything clicked into place.

  With no other option but to give her the play, I pulled my hand away from the door.

  Liberty flung open the door and rushed out.

  Fucking hell.

  30

  Fuming mad and not paying attention because I was outrageously angry, I continued my fast-paced clip down the sidewalk.

  My temples throbbed, my heart hurt so I almost missed him, but when my gaze scanned the lot, I saw Carter was standing next to his SUV waiting for me. Drake must’ve called him as soon as I walked out of the room.

  He was also wearing a frown.

  Great. Perfect. Another lecture.