Her walls were up. I saw it in the defensive stance, in the slight change in her pupils. I’d seen it countless times when people were brought in for questioning and they were putting on a poker face, hoping we wouldn’t see past it.
“Yes, it is human. You feel everything deeply, Paige. You love hard, you fight hard. And I’m afraid you’ll resent me, that you’ll come to think I’m not right for you,” I repeated, then shut my mouth.
I was making things worse. Absolutely worse. Paige crossed her arms again, averting her gaze. When I made to touch her shoulder, she pulled back yet again.
“I think all that pain medicine has affected your ability to think clearly. If you ever get your head out of your ass and decide to make sense again, come talk to me. I’ll be staying at the inn.” She rearranged the strap of her bag on her shoulder. “Tell everyone else I had an emergency and I couldn’t stay.”
“Paige!”
She whirled on her heels, rushing out the front door of the bar. I recovered from my stunned stupor a few seconds later. What had I just done? Was I an idiot?
Judging by the fact that I was barely restraining myself from going after her, throwing her over my good shoulder, and bringing her back, the answer was a resounding yes. But I also wanted her to have no regrets. Right now every instinct told me to go after Paige, wrap my arms around her, and apologize for the fool I’d been, for hurting her. Somehow I managed to return to the counter, fighting my own instincts. Going after her right now was the worst thing I could do. I wasn’t thinking clearly, and I’d upset her.
“Well, that was the most stupid thing I’ve ever heard,” Jace said.
I turned around. Blake and Jace and had just returned.
“You overheard us?”
Jace knocked against the wall separating the front area from the back. It sounded hollow.
“Thin walls, cousin,” Blake explained.
“And you weren’t exactly whispering,” Jace added. “So... what was that all about? I’ll tell you right off the bat, I’m siding with Paige.”
I rubbed my hands up and down my face, sitting on a barstool. Jace joined me, and Blake poured bourbon in a glass, threw in some ice, then slid the drink to me.
“It’s five o’ clock in the afternoon,” I pointed out. “Early for hard liquor.”
“Said no one ever. Besides, you just let that woman walk out of here. Clearly you need this,” Blake countered.
Jace nodded. “Keep them coming. Maybe he’ll get smarter once he’s drunk. Or we’ll be able to knock some sense into him.”
Blake had taken out the good stuff. Two glasses later, I was already feeling every muscle in my body relax, and I wasn’t drunk.
“Cousin, I heard everything you’ve said, and it still doesn’t make sense,” Blake concluded after I explained my reasoning.
Jace jerked his thumb in Blake’s direction. “I agree. Sounds to me like you jumped the gun.”
“You two are driving me insane.”
Jace shook his head. “No, you drove yourself insane all on your own. We’re just pointing out the crazy.”
Blake’s phone buzzed, and he excused himself, walking in the back to answer it.
I spun the empty glass, eyeing the bottle.
“You can’t control everything in life, Will,” Jace said quietly. “I know you’d like to, we all would, but most of the time you just have to trust that things will work out.”
It was easy to rebuff my brother when he was being loud and obnoxious, but I knew he was speaking from a place of concern right now. When Jace dished advice, I paid attention.
“In soccer, we train and prepare, but when we go out on the field, all we can do is play the game. Paige is one hell of a woman. She’s smart, and she’s crazy about you. Don’t let her go.”
Blake returned and made to pour me another drink, but I shook my head, moving the glass out of his reach.
“On a scale from one to ten, how sharp are your groveling skills?” Blake inquired. “Because I’m the Bennett expert at it, and I don’t mind sharing my knowledge to help out a brother, or a cousin. I’m happily married, but I stuffed up royally before I got where I am.”
“I don’t need—”