Page 39 of Building Courage

“Sometimes.”

She bit her bottom lip. “You’ll text or call if you get the call?”

He nodded. “Of course.” He nuzzled her neck, and she shivered.

“I have to go, Tucker.”

“Are you afraid of what might happen if you stay?”

“I leaped into something once, and it didn’t end well.”

He got that more than she knew. Would it set her mind at ease if he told her about his own experience? “I did some leaping myself. She said she was divorced, and I believed her until her husband showed up.”

“Oh my God!”

“Yeah. I felt like an idiot for trusting her and guilty as hell. He was a Marine, so the guilt was tripled because I felt like I’d betrayed a brother and the code.”

“What happened?”

“I slipped out of the house without him seeing me. Not one of my better moments. She called me the next day and wanted to hook up. I couldn’t believe it. She didn’t take what I said too well, called me a bastard, and hung up. Luckily, I haven’t heard from her since.”

“How long had you been seeing her?”

“About a month.” He raked his hand through his hair. “I’m still angry as hell. And I feel sorry for the guy. I thought about going by the house and telling him what she was up to, but I was deployed a week later.”

“How long ago was this?”

“Eight months ago.” He turned toward her. “I should’ve found a way to tell him.”

“That might’ve been a dangerous move, Tucker.”

“Yeah, but it chaps my…” He caught himself. “She got away with cheating on him, and lied to me and tricked me into being a party to it. And what was worse, she wasn’t sorry about it.”

“If it hadn’t been you, it would have been someone else. You were just collateral damage, someone she used to fill something missing inside herself.”

Whoa! Did she get that idea through experience?

She continued. “Cheating is a form of abuse, especially when it’s done as a way to hurt the partner, and that’s what it sounds like she was after. Skipping out like you did before her husband got there to witness it, messed up her plans. You at least spared him that.”

That was one way of looking at it. Was all this coming from first-hand experience?

“Cheaters use their infidelity to tear down their partner’s self-esteem and as a form of manipulation. They even play the blame game. They’ll claim they only did it because their partner drove them to it.”

“Are you speaking from experience, Brynn?”

She shook her head slightly. “It’s just an observation.”

She was silent for a moment, studying her bare feet as though they were fascinating. He sensed she was as far away as she could get and still be in the room. She rose to slip on her shoes.

He stood and fought the urge to try and hold her. In her current mood, that might not be what she needed or wanted. She looked up at him and rested a hand against his chest. There was a practiced casualness in her tone. “The next meal will be on me.”

“Okay.”

“I need to warn you. It probably won’t be anywhere near as good as yours.”

“I’ll take my chances.”

She finally smiled. “Will Friday at six be a good time?”

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