Page 88 of Tripped By Love

Marco

GLASS

“I’ll let you look inside me, through the stains and through the cracks,

And in the darkness of this moment,

You see the good and bad.”

Performed by Thompson Square

Written by Nite / Copperman

Cassidy and I had checked out andwere on the road in less than fifteen minutes. I was kicking myself for letting her come. For not having stopped her from packing and joining me on this hell drive back to Austin. Not only because I wanted to drive at speeds that weren’t safe?and I wouldn’t with her next to me?but because I refused to let something in my world be the reason she lost her contract with Ralley. I wouldn’t be the reason she lost the new dreams she’d been making for herself. Dreams where she had more time for Chevelle and herself…and me.

My chest constricted, pulling taut over my lungs and my heart.

I’d known better than to leave Jonas in Austin. Just like I’d known better than to let the assholes from my unit leave without following them all those years ago. When would I ever learn to trust my instincts? There were so many times in my life where I’d failed because of it. Nash Wellsley had been the one who’d truly saved Brady from his stalker. I’d been the clueless newbie who’d just stood on the sidelines while Brady’s PR manager had been drugged and almost shot. I hadn’t even been around the day some asshole reporter had threatened Tristan and caused Cassidy to tumble from the steps, chipping a tooth and scarring her brow. Every single time something bad had happened to people in my life, I hadn’t been there.

I’d tangled myself with Cassidy, thinking I could keep her, wanting her more than I’d wanted anything for myself. But I didn’t deserve her. I hadn’t earned the right to keep anything good in my life that close to me. Not when I couldn’t keep them safe.

But damn, the thought of not keeping her was like a grenade going off inside me.

Cassidy was quiet in the seat next to me as we raced down the darkened road. The night sky slowly washing into gray. Beams of light shimmering against the few remaining storm clouds and turning the sky into a watercolor painting of pink and orange.

“Are you okay to drive?” she asked. “You didn’t get much sleep.”

“I never get more than four or five hours,” I replied before I could stop myself.

She inhaled sharply, my past and my guilt floating between us.

“Marco…this isn’t your fault,” she said quietly, reaching out to touch my arm. I flinched, and she drew back.

“I knew I shouldn’t have left him,” I said, swallowing hard over the lump in my throat. “That is one hundred percent on me.”

I’d been distracted by Cassidy. By thoughts of us twined together. By ideas of love and forever-afters. I was a solitary animal. I’d just forgotten that. I’d promised her I wouldn’t leave her, and yet that was exactly what I should have done. I should have accepted the single night she’d wanted and let her be. Even as I thought it, my body continued to revolt against the idea.

I couldn’t look at her, but I saw her fists clench out of the corner of my eye.

“You can’t protect everyone,” she said with a growl to her voice. “That’s just as asinine as my parents thinking they could shield me from every single fall growing up.”

My teeth ground together, emotions filling me, and when I didn’t respond, she just kept going, trying to convince me of something she’d never be able to succeed at.

“It stabs me to my core when Chevelle gets hurt trying something, like when he busted his chin climbing the steps at the studio. But if I didn’t let him try, if I didn’t let him fail, he’d never know how to pick himself up again.”

“That’s completely different. You’d never let him do something you knew could end up killing him. You wouldn’t let him walk into a pool when he didn’t know how to swim.”

She didn’t say anything.

“I knew he’d do anything to protect Mel,” I grunted out. “Even walk into a gunfight with only his fists.”

She inhaled sharply. “Was he shot?”

I shook my head. “That isn’t the point.”

She was quiet again for a moment, and then she said softly, “Tell me something. Have you ever stopped beating yourself up for not defending Petty Officer Warren?”

I didn’t have to answer. It wasn’t something I could ever forgive myself for. Something I could never forget. Not when Petty Officer Warren would live with it in her nightmares until the day she died.