Chapter Three
Ana
Luke reaches for the bathroom door and I catch his arm, just the act of touching him, having him right here with me again, unnerving in how natural it feels. It drives home my certainty that I lied to myself and everyone else when I acted as if I was fine without him.
I was not fine. I was never going to be fine.
I just felt, as I still do, that no matter what Kasey did, he was my brother, and being with Luke, the man who took his life, was wrong. But it’s time to admit to myself that being without him feels just as wrong.
Luke turns to me, a question in his eyes that I quickly answer. “I know, of course, I know, now is not the time for this, but later isn’t either if one of us ends up dead. I know I told you I don’t know how to be with you, but I really, really don’t want you to leave again, either. I just needed to say that.”
His eyes burn into mine, seconds ticking by before he pulls me to him, folds me against his warm body, and cups my head. His mouth closes down over mine, his tongue licking long and deep in a stroke I feel in every part of me before he says, “Neither of us is dying tonight. And for the record: you’re not okay, as you claimed, or you’d know that without me saying it. You can deny that later. But just so you know, I am okay. But I haven’t been, not one moment I was away from you. Now let’s get the hell out of here.”
His words wash away shards of my broken heart, but there are so many broken pieces I fear will never mend, not for me or him. For the moment, I simply hold onto him in every way possible and nod my agreement. He opens the door and captures my hand, and unbidden, when I should be focused on safety first, I’m transported back to our first date. We’d exited the restaurant and he’d caught my fingers in his and then turned me to face him. “I’ve never been the hand-holding kind of guy, Ana.”
“But you’re holding mine?” I ask, not sure where he was going with this.
“Not because I want to hold you to me. Not because I think you need protection, you’ve proven you can bring me to my knees,” he laughs. I laugh and he adds, “I just want to. It’s the damnedest thing.”
Luke’s touch brings me back to the present as he leads me down the stairs toward the lobby, and both of us scan the areas below while my mind draws a familiar realization I’d forgotten until now. I’m not weak without Luke, but I am stronger with him. In the past, when we were side by side, I always knew that whatever war we faced, we’d win together. But then my stepfather died, and Kasey died, and my world was falling apart. I didn’t know anything anymore, including myself.
By the time Luke and I are back downstairs in the hotel lobby, Luke has Blake in his ear, verbally guiding us out of this mess. Luke’s attention is on Blake and our surroundings, but I don’t miss the way he holds onto me a little too tightly. As if he’s ready at any moment to take another bullet from me, or rather, for me. Ultimately, everything he did was for me. My brother would never have been with him on that mission had Luke not taken him at my request. Kasey never had his head on straight. Luke was his polar opposite and I’d actually believed that only good things could come from Luke mentoring him.
Luke knew better.
He should have told me no.
God, I wish he would have told me no, but I’d never say that to him. That would be like putting everything on him again. It’s not all on him. I knew what Kasey was like. I knew too well, and somehow not enough, which is called blind emotion. I let emotion push everything about how I handled Kasey. And it was ultimately what placed the gun in Luke’s hand. I need to say that to him, and so much more.
I’m just not sure it matters.
I think back to a night after we first met, once I’d submitted to the fact that there was no walking away from Luke. I didn’t even want to try. We’d had dinner with my family. My father was warm and wonderful to Luke, but Kasey was another story. I flash back to the moment I’d heard my father call him Lucifer, ten times too many.
“Luke,” I correct, hitting my limit. “His name is Luke.”
My brother snorts. “Like the name erases Lucifer from his blood. You really think if we call him Luke, we erase every reason he earned that nickname?”
“He’s a pilot,” I start, but Luke squeezes my leg under the table.
“Call me what you want to call me,” Luke says. “You’re right. A name doesn’t define me.”
“Doesn’t it?” Kasey challenges. “Because from what I’ve heard, it damn sure does.”
Luke’s fingers flex on my leg again, but he says nothing. Not a word. Later that night, I want to ask him what my brother had meant. Before I can say anything, Luke does. He walks me to the passenger side of his vehicle and turns to me. “I told you I wasn’t like the men your father trains. I didn’t lie. I’m worse. Or I was. I got out of that shit for a reason. And if you want to hear the gritty details, you have a right to hear them. I don’t want to tell you.” He scrubs his jaw. “I really don’t want to tell you, but I also don’t want you to hear it like you did tonight.”
I don’t feel shocked or horrified at his confession, which is both raw and vulnerable. And brave, I think. I matter to him or he wouldn’t have dared travel this conversational path. I step into him, his hard body aligned with mine, and press my hands to the hard wall of his chest. He is warm. The night is cold. My life was cold without him. “Thank you for your honesty. And tell me when, and if, you’re ever ready. I won’t listen to anyone else. What you choose to say is all that matters to me.” I press to my toes to kiss his cheek.
He scoops up my hair with his fingers, and right there, in front of my stepfather’s house, kisses me with the kind of passion that wets a girl between the legs, and has her nipples puckering and tingling.
I’d assumed the best of him that night, and every day forward, at least until Kasey died. Now Luke believes I see nothing but the worst of him. So, while he says he’s going nowhere again, I say differently. As we exit the hotel into a chilly night, I fear that trust, or rather our lack of trust, now defines us.
And yet, it doesn’t stop him from aspiring, and succeeding, in his recent effort to be my hero. He swooped into my life again, to save me from a similar death to that of Jake. Even now, as we exit the hotel, I don’t miss the way he places his body on the side of the road, sandwiching me between him and the wall, sheltering me—ensuring any attack finds him, not me. I never doubted this man’s willingness to die for me or even for my brother. I don’t know why I questioned anything about the day Kasey died, or why Luke had to kill him. It was grief, I think. Just the freakout mode, of knowing my brother was no longer on this Earth. But if I’m honest, just the idea of Kasey dying at Luke’s hand still destroys me, even if logically I know he had no choice but to do what he did.
I told him I don’t know how to fix us, and I don’t.
The problem is that he doesn’t know how to fix us, either.
And no one else can do the fixing for us.
For the moment, I settle on scanning our surroundings and staying alive so we get the chance to try.