Page 28 of Bound By Threads
Her lips press together in a thin line, and then she exhales.“Maybe, but everything feels like it’s changing. I don’t even know where I fit anymore. I mean, everything’s been great with you guys, with his parents, and I don’t know where I would have ended up had it not been for them. But things can’t stay the same. They never do.”
“You think we wouldn’t chase you down if you left?”I question her, not taking my eyes off her even as she moves away for a moment.
I watch as she shuts her eyes tightly, as if the idea of leaving physically hurts.
If Lottie decided to leave, I don’t think she’d ever know a minute of peace once we found her. Archer would use every contact he’s ever made in the Marines and with his family to track her down, then shackle her to him so she could never leave again.
It isn’t a bad thing if I put a tracker under her skin as she sleeps, is it?
The idea of Lottie leaving me... us, it has my heart pounding wildly in my chest and bile rising in my throat. Somehow, this woman who barely reaches my shoulders has wiggled her way into the heart I once swore would never beat for another. Not after I watched my dad treat my mom the way he did, breaking her heart weekly when he came home smelling of other women.
“I think that I’m not made for this world,”she signs, her face open and honest, and my heart cracks at the vulnerability on it.
I want to tell her I think she was made to be my world, my entire universe, and that I would happily spend my life exploring it as long as I had her.
But she’s not mine, and she never will be.
She’s Archer’s girl — the reason he is leaving the Marines this week after five years.
Lottie is no longer the eighteen-year-old girl he brought home. Now, she’s a woman who has fire in her eyes rather than the shadows that once haunted them.
“You belong more than you think, Siren.”
Her fingers tighten around the pole, whitening and flexing against the cold metal, but I see the tremor in them.
Her eyes flicker over to me again, and for a brief moment, I see the vulnerability that was there when I first met her, hiding behind them.
I step closer, my gaze never leaving hers.“You’re overthinking.”
Her fingers loosen, but she doesn’t look at me immediately. When she does, her eyes are distant.“I’m not sure I know who I’m supposed to be,”she signs.
It hits me harder than I expected. My chest is tightening so much that I think I’m having a heart attack, and I swallow against the lump in my throat.
Lottie has been the fire, the girl who stomps through the bullshit and lights up everything around her, drawing us all in. But now? Now, it’s as if she’s lost in the smoke, trying to find her way out.
I cross the space between us, stopping in front of her.“You don’t need to have all the answers, Siren. You don’t have to be anything other than who you are.”
The rawness in her eyes cuts deeper than any words I could offer.“But what if what I am isn’t enough for you all?”Her hands shake as she signs.“I don’t know how to keep pretending that I’m okay.”
I take a deep breath, steadying myself and talking myself down from grabbing her and hauling her into my arms.“You don’t have to pretend. I love you...”I catch myself,“We love you for who you are. We just want you to be happy.”
She shifts uncomfortably, her eyes moving away from mine like she’s scared that if I look too close, I’ll expose everything inside her.
“I feel like I’m losing control, Oscar,”she signs, her hands moving faster now, her frustration seeping through.“Archer’s coming home, and yet again, everything is going to change. He’s never the same, somehow always worse, and I won’t be able to fix him.”
I want to understand where the fears are coming from, but I know nothing about Lottie’s past. I know Archer saved her and brought her home to a family that she desperately needed, but every time her past is brought up, she shuts down.
When he first brought her here, I asked what led to her being in danger, and none of us seen her for days. She only allowed Archer to bring her food to her room, and he nearly lost his mind when she suggested she would get the first bus out of here to the furthest possible place she could.
Archer is no longer the same as he was two years ago, either. The fear of losing Lottie while he’s on deployment and isn’t around to save her has messed him up, but he needed to join the Marines like his father and his grandfather to join the family business. Every time he comes back from deployment, he’s tired, distant, and broken in ways that none of us could understand. The man who leaves isn’t the same as the one who returns, and it’s harder for all of us every time, particularly for Lottie.
“You don’t have to fix him,”I tell her.“He’s not your responsibility to fix. You can’t save everyone, Lottie.”
“No, I can’t save anyone. I learned that the hard way,” she signs before she can stop herself. She stares at me for a moment, tears glistening in her eyes, before she turns away and heads to the soundboard, where she turns the music up so loud I can feel the bass under my feet.
She shuts herself off from everything, her eyes fluttering closed as she surrenders entirely to the music. The pole becomes a weapon in her hands as she pulls herself upward, then descends just centimeters from the floor.
Chapter16
