by Anna Edwards
He stayed frozen and waited, hoping the unknown person would think no one was home and take his happy ass back to wherever he’d come from.
Two seconds later, a familiar voice hollered out from the other side of the door.
“Open the door, asshole. I know you’re in there.”
What the…“Nate?”
After the shock of hearing his best friend’s voice wore off, Kole lowered his weapon and walked to the door. He released the locks and flung it open.
“How the hell did you find me?”
Nate’s brows shot up. “I’m going to pretend you didn’t just ask me that.” Not waiting for an invitation, Nate pushed past him. “Shitty greeting aside, I’m glad to see you’re not dead. Not that any of us would know, since you practically dropped off the face of the earth two weeks ago.”
Kole closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Shutting the door, he willed himself to not turn around and beat the hell out of his best friend for coming here.
“I’ve sent texts,” he grumbled.
“Text. Singular. You sent one text, a week ago, and all it said was, ‘I’m fine’. Doesn’t exactly scream conversationalist.”
Kole’s desire to clock the sarcastic bastard grew stronger.
Nate shook his head. “Sarah needs you, man. We all do.”
Hearing Sarah’s name hit Kole hard. He didn’t want to think about her. Didn’t want to acknowledge the fact that he missed the hell out of her or that he’d tried everything he could think of to forget the way he’d left her.
All he’d done since coming here was try to erase the image of her standing in their apartment, upset and crying.
Kole had done everything he could think of to forget the pain he’d put in her eyes. The way she’d begged him to stay.
Nothing seemed to work. Not even drinking himself into oblivion. And God knows he’d given that one hell of a shot.
“Well, like you said, I’m not dead. So, thanks for stopping by.” He turned and headed back to the kitchen for the much-needed drink he’d left on the counter. “You know the way home.”
“Seriously?” Nate exclaimed from behind him. “That’s it?”
Without looking back, Kole sat his gun down, picked up the glass, and swallowed the whiskey in one gulp. “I got nothing else to say.”
“Oh? Well, you can just listen, then, because I have plenty to say.”
Cursing under his breath, Kole grabbed the bottle of Jack and poured himself another drink.
“Yeah, keep doing that. Looks like it’s helping a whole hell of a lot.”
Without another thought, Kole squeezed the bottle’s neck and flung it as hard as he could against the back kitchen wall. Shards of glass flew out to the sides, pieces scattering across the wooden floor. The whiskey he hadn’t yet consumed ran down the log wall before pooling against the baseboard beneath the point of impact.
“Feel better?”
Spinning around, he yelled, “What the fuck do you want from me?”
Nate’s face filled with anger. “What do I want? I want to know that my best friend really is okay. I wanted to see with my own eyes that you weren’t wasting away somewhere, wallowing in a pile of your own self-pity. Which, by the way, you clearly are. I also wanted to be able to go back and tell Sarah you truly are fine, and I also thought you should know that—”
“Alright! You’ve made your fucking point. Christ, you’re worse than a nagging girlfriend.”
“Easy, man. Friend or no friend, I’ll knock you on your ass, you talk about Sarah that way. That woman is worried sick about you.”
Kole rolled his eyes. “I wasn’t talking about her, dipshit. I was comparing you to a—” He shook his head, deciding it wasn’t worth the effort. “Never mind.”
For a moment, both men stood in silence, each trying to regroup. Kole was the first to speak up.
“Look. I appreciate your concern. I really do, but I’m fine. I just needed to get away from everything. I needed to think, and I couldn’t do that with Sarah trying to tell me everything was going to be fine. I know she believes that, and I love her for it. The thing is…between the shit with the doctors and having to leave Bravo, I just couldn’t—”
“I get it.”
The sincerity in his voice caught Kole off guard. “Yeah?”
“Of course. You needed time to get your head on straight. There’s not one member of R.I.S.C. who doesn’t get that. It’s why I haven’t been here before now. Sarah, though…she’s different, man. She’s—”
“Incredible.”
Kole didn’t even realize he’d said the word aloud until Nate responded with, “She is. And for reasons I’ll never understand, she loves your dumb ass more than life itself. Which means you hiding out here and not returning her phone calls or texts is tearing her up inside.”
Fuck. “I never meant to hurt her. I just figured she was…” Kole’s voice trailed off.
“What, better off without you?” Nate asked sarcastically.
“Yes.” There was no hesitation in Kole’s answer.
“Come on, Kole. You can’t honestly believe that shit.”
“The fuck I can’t. I have MS, Nate. Do you know what that means for me? For her? Bravo Team aside, Sarah could end up having to take care of me for the rest of my life. I could start forgetting shit, and having issues with my vision, not to mention my eventual loss of mobility. Can you honestly stand there and tell me she deserves to have to deal with me constantly pissing and shitting myself because I can’t control my own bladder or bowels? I might be a selfish prick, but there’s no way in hell I’ll allow that amazing woman to tie herself down to someone like me.”
Rather than the understanding Kole expected, Nate’s expression became one of impatience and boredom. Crossing his arms, he sighed. “Are you done?”
When Kole remained silent, mainly because he didn’t know what else to say, Nate started in.
“Well, you’re right about one thing. You are a selfish prick.” Before Kole could tell him to go to hell, Nate kept on. “First of all, those are all things that may happen. Someday.”
Shaking his head, Kole started to argue. “I can’t count on—”
“Have you had any more symptoms since you left the hospital?”
“That’s not the point, and you know it.”
“Answer the fucking question, asshole. Have you had any more symptoms since your diagnosis?”
“No, but that doesn’t mean—”
“So, you’re in remission, then.”
Nate’s comment surprised Kole. “Um…yeah. I mean, I guess. It’s still early, but—”
“But, the doctor told you a couple weeks ago that you’re in remission, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Which means, it could be several years before you have another symptom. Correct?”
That surprised Kole even more. He must not have hid it well, because his friend actually looked offended.
“What? You don’t think I can read? Jesus, man. My entire fucking job is to find out information. Hell, we’ve all been reading up on RRMS.”
“All?”
“Yes, all. Sarah, me, Jake, Trevor. Everyone at R.I.S.C.”
Kole swallowed against the newly formed lump in his throat. Knowing they’d taken the time to try and understand the disease meant a lot. Just not enough to make a difference.
“Then you all know what’s going to happen to me.”
“No, we don’t. And neither do you. That’s my whole fucking point, Kole. No one knows.” Nate drew in a deep breath and continued. “Look. You know as well as anybody how short life is. You could get hit by a car walking across the street. I could’ve died in a car crash on my way here. Hell, Sarah could—”
“Do not finish that sentence,” Kole growled, his hands in fists at his side. He couldn’t bear the thought of something happening to her.
Nate sighed. “My point is, you can’t let the possibility of those things happening keep you from living the
life you want. Dude, we live and breathe statistics. The odds are on your side, Kole. You’d jump all over the chance to complete an op with those numbers backing you. We all would.”
“This isn’t a fucking op, Nate. It’s my life. It’s Sarah’s life.”
“Yeah, it is. Which means, she should get to decide whether or not she still wants to be with you.”
Kole hated it when Nate made sense.
“What if she was the one who’d been diagnosed?”
Nate’s question had him physically taking a step back. “Don’t,” he warned his friend. Kole couldn’t even entertain the possibility of Sarah having to go through this.
“I’m serious. How would you react if Sarah came home and told you she had RRMS. Would you leave her?”
Kole’s gut churned to the point he thought he’d be sick. “Shut. Up.”
“No,” Nate continued. “I want to know. If the situation were reversed, would you walk away from her and never look back?”
“What the hell is the matter with you?” Kole growled. He took a step forward, ready to knock his friend’s ass to the ground, but Nate kept talking, as if Kole hadn’t said a word.
“It’s not unrealistic to think that Sarah could get sick, someday. Could be any number of things, but let’s say it’s RRMS. Sure, the chances are likely she could go another decade without experiencing any major complication, but the risk is still there. She could be the one to have vision or memory issues. She could be the one whose leg goes numb.”
Kole shook, his entire body fighting against the picture Nate was drawing in his mind. Jesus, he didn’t ever want to imagine Sarah sick or hurting. Not my Sarah.
“How would you feel if that happened? Would you leave her?” His friend kept pushing. “Come on, Kole. Answer the fucking question. Would. You. Lea—”
“No, I wouldn’t fucking leave her!” Kole’s voice boomed throughout the tiny cabin. “I’d be there for her, every single day. Through the doctor’s appointments and relapses, and…all of it.”
Nate shrugged his shoulders. “Why?”
Kole scowled. “What the hell kind of question is that?”
“One that warrants a goddamn answer, because I’m starting to think you’ve had this whole thing right, all along. Why should Sarah stand by your side, knowing what could happen? You aren’t married. Haven’t done the whole ‘in sickness and in health’ bit. She’s free to walk away and never look back. Maybe Sarah should find someone else. Someone who isn’t sick. Some other guy to share a life with. Her bed with.”
Before Kole realized he was moving, he had the front of Nate’s shirt in his fists and was pushing him back against the door.
“Shut your fucking mouth, or I swear to God I’ll shut it for you.”
Nate grunted from the impact, but that still didn’t stop him. “You’re only pissed because you know I’m right. It’s going to happen, Kole. If you keep pushing her away, Sarah will eventually move on with someone else. Someone who isn’t hiding out in the middle of fucking nowhere because he’s so stuck on all the what-if’s he can’t see the truth for what it really is. The numbers are on your side, man. You can still have a normal life with the woman you love. Hell, you can still be a part of R.I.S.C., if you’d just get your head out of your ass for two seconds and listen to what everyone’s been trying to tell you. Or, you can stay here and drown yourself in fucking whiskey. Your choice.”
Kole wanted to beat the hell out of the guy, but his fists remained locked. Shit. Fuck. Shit.
During the few sober moments he’d had since coming here, Kole had done his research on relapsing-remitting MS, too.
Everything he’d told Nate was true, but what his friend and Sarah had both said was also fact. Kole just hadn’t been able to see it until now.
He’d been so focused on all the worst-case scenarios he hadn’t allowed himself to believe he could still be normal. That he and Sarah really could have a happy, normal life together.
Nate’s words resonated within him, and Kole finally realized…in his haste to protect Sarah, he’d hurt her in an unimaginable way.
Maybe Nate was right. Maybe his future with Sarah wasn’t lost, after all. He squeezed his eyes shut.
“Shit.”
“Ah, back to reality, you are,” Nate said, using his annoying-as-fuck Yoda voice.
Kole opened his eyes and glared at his friend. “Fuck you.”
Nate smiled arrogantly. “I think what you meant to say was, ‘thank you’.”
Releasing the other man’s shirt, Kole stepped back and ran a hand through his scraggly hair. “I really fucked up, didn’t I?”
“Eh. Even golden boys slip up once in a while. I’d say you were due.”
A rough chuckle escaped Kole’s throat. It was the first time in weeks he’d even come close to laughing.
“You smell like a fucking distillery. Why don’t you go take a shower, and I’ll clean up the mess in there.” Nate tipped his chin toward the kitchen. “Then we can talk.”
“More talking. Can’t wait.”
“Yeah, well, Sarah told me some shit tonight that doesn’t sit well with me. Pretty sure you won’t like it either.”
Kole’s entire body stiffened as those protective instincts flared to life. “Is she okay?”
“She’s fine. I just want to make sure she stays that way.”
“Nathan.”
“Easy, man. She’s good. I promise.”
Kole studied Nate for half a second longer before turning and heading for the bathroom.
After a quick shower, he fixed himself a cup of the coffee Nate had made for them and took a seat on the couch. Sitting across from him in a recliner, which had seen better days, Nate shared what he’d learned from Sarah.
For the first time in weeks, Kole had something else to hate besides MS.
“I’ll kill him,” he ground out as he shot up from the couch.
“Dude, cool your jets. Sarah said Prescott never touched her or anything. He hasn’t even made any actual threats. The guy just has her a little spooked, that’s all.”
“That’s all? She turned the bastard down, and now he’s suddenly showing up everywhere she goes.” Steaming, Kole paced the room a couple times before grabbing the back of the couch and locking his arms. “The guy’s fucking stalking her, Nate!” he practically growled.
Nate held his hands up defensively. “Believe me, I’m not happy about it, either. I told her she should’ve come to me before tonight.”
“She should have come to me when this first started!” Kole ran a hand over two weeks’ worth of growth and took a breath. “Why didn’t Sarah talk to me about this?”
Never one to pull any punches, his friend raised a brow. “You really have to ask?”
Kole exhaled loudly. “No.” Straightening his spine, he locked his hands behind his head. “I’ve been so wrapped up in my own shit, she probably didn’t think I’d even care. Goddammit.”
“I think it was more that she didn’t want you to worry. Sarah told me she’d planned on telling to you when we got back from that first op, but then you were hurt, and—”
“I found out I had MS,” Kole finished for him.
Nate nodded. “And you know how your girl is. She’d keep the weight of the world on her shoulders, if it meant lessoning the burden on you.”
“I need to go home,” Kole blurted, before turning toward the only bedroom in the cabin.
Standing, his friend said, “I was hoping you’d say that.”
Shoving only a few essentials into his duffle bag, Kole decided he’d come back for the rest later…after he knew Sarah was truly safe.
“Want me to let her know we’re on our way?”
Kole shook his head. “I’ll call from the road.” He just prayed she answered.
Sarah rose to her tiptoes to look through her apartment door’s peephole. Whoever had knocked was standing too close for her to tell who it was. The front desk was supposed to call before sending any visitors ups
tairs. Although…
They wouldn’t call if it were Kole.
He had a key, but after the way he’d left, maybe Kole didn’t feel right just walking in without her permission.
Smiling, Sarah quickly undid the locks and opened the door. The corners of her lips dropped quickly when the man on the other side turned to face her.
“Hello, Sarah.”
“Ian? W-what are you doing here?”
She glanced into the hallway, hoping someone else from the firm was with him. When she saw he was alone, the hairs on the back of her neck instantly stood on end.
“I apologize for just dropping in like this, especially at such a late hour.”
This whole situation was way off. Ian shouldn’t even know where she lived, let alone have access to their floor.
Sarah also didn’t miss the way he’d bypassed her question and refused to let it slide.
“I asked you a question. What are you doing here? And how did you get my address?” Then, because she had to know, Sarah asked, “Did you follow me?”
An unapologetic smile crossed Ian’s face. “I know it’s poor taste, but I really needed to see you, Sarah, and I didn’t know any other way.”
“Poor taste?” Try psychotic, asshole. Sarah shook her head. “You shouldn’t be here, Ian. You need to leave.”
She started to shut her door, but the toe of Ian’s expensive shoe shot out, wedging his foot between the door and the door jam. Her breathing picked up, and her chest became tight with fear.
“Sarah, wait. Please. I know it’s highly unusual for me to show up at your home like this, but I was really hoping you’d allow me to come inside and speak to you. It’ll only take a couple minutes. It’s important.”
Not a chance. “Your showing up here isn’t just unusual, Ian. At the very least, it’s inappropriate. I’m sure whatever you need to talk about can wait until Monday. Now, if you’ll please remove your foot, I’d like to close my door.”
Anger flashed behind his privileged eyes. It was only there for a second, but long enough for Sarah to see it…and it terrified her.
Giving her that camera-ready smile of his, Ian. Sounding somewhat sincere, he said, “You’re absolutely right. I can see my coming here has made you uneasy. My apologies.”