He shook his head again.
“Why not?”
“I’ve never wanted to before.”
Emotion swirled through me. This man was such a conundrum. In the span of five minutes, he could scare the hell out of me and then make me melt into a big puddle of honey.
“We can’t see each other anymore,” he said again.
Nope. Not an option. “Do you remember anything?” I asked. “Do you remember why you wanted to put your hands on my throat?”
He rubbed at his forehead. “I never wanted to put my hands around your throat, Jade. Please believe that.”
“I do believe that. But do you have any idea why this happened?”
He sighed. “I dream sometimes.”
“About when you were in the Marines?”
He scoffed, shaking his head. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Please, I want to understand. I’ve always wanted to. Let me help you.”
“I can’t let you anywhere near me, blue eyes. If I ever did anything to hurt you…” Remorse and fear were etched into his features.
“But you didn’t, Talon. I stopped you.”
“What if you hadn’t been able to stop me?”
I still didn’t think he would’ve done me any harm, but I did have to consider that question. What if I hadn’t been able to stop him? The answer came to me instantly, and in the depth of my soul, I knew it as pure truth. “Then you would’ve stopped yourself.”
“Neither one of us can be sure of that,” he said, putting on his socks and then his boots. He sat on the futon, his neck glistening with perspiration. Sweat dripped from his brow.
He was scared.
I had never seen Talon scared.
I stood, my knees trembling, and went toward him. I maneuvered myself between his legs and stroked his hair as I stood. “It’s okay.” I kissed his head. “It’s okay to be scared sometimes. Everyone is.”
“Not me.” He shook his head vehemently. “I haven’t been scared for twenty-five years. Until now.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Talon
Had to get out. Had to get away from her. For her. Couldn’t risk hurting her.
Fear coursed through me like a bass drum beating slowly, surely…like a clock ticking deliberately…my impending doom on a timer, each sand in the hourglass one more second until I hurt Jade. How many more grains would fall until I damaged the only thing I’d ever wanted in the world?
Why would she want to be with me? I had just tried to strangle the life out of her!
“There’s nothing to be scared of,” she said in her calm, sweet voice.
But I knew better. I knew what I was capable of. What I dreamed about.
Of killing those three bastards.
I had thought that joining the military, commanding an EOD unit and finding and disarming bombs, possibly killing—which I had done on more than one occasion—would satisfy the need to rid the world of those three demons who took me all those years ago.
It hadn’t.
I still had the dreams.
She was stroking my forearm, her touch both soothing and scathing. My hair stood on end.
I didn’t deserve her loving touch.
God…if I ever hurt her…
But you didn’t.
Her words echoed in my mind. I turned around and looked at her. She was still naked, her beautiful body glistening in a sheen of perspiration. Her golden-brown hair was in disarray and hung around her shoulders like tousled silk. Her blue eyes were searching, looking for something in me…something she would never find.
I had been kidding myself for too long. I could never have Jade. I could never have a life with her. I was too broken. Too fucked up. And I would never put her in danger.
I hated myself at this moment. Wanted to go find a bridge and hurl myself into the oncoming traffic below.
I’d tried taking my own life before, when I ran into that enemy fire under the guise of saving my men. Only I hadn’t been killed, and I’d been touted as a hero.
Some hero. I couldn’t even keep the woman I love safe—safe from that fucking ex of hers…or safe from me.
I didn’t want to leave her. I had promised I would stay by her side until court on Monday morning.
“Talon”—she squeezed my forearm—“there’s something good in all this, you know.”
I shook my head and let out a small laugh. “What in the world could be good in all this, blue eyes?”
She smiled and trailed her fingers down my forearm, clasping my hand in hers. “You were sleeping.”
I couldn’t help but chuckle. I was a notoriously bad sleeper, and when I did sleep, I was usually plagued by nightmares. Just as I had been this evening.
“Think back,” she said. “Think back about how you were feeling when we had just finished making love. That slow, sweet passionate love that was different from anything else we’ve shared. What were you feeling right then?”