Page 61 of When He Fights
Dear Bryan,
I am sorry that you are an ass.You shouldn’t pick on people smaller than you.If I see you doing it again, I’ll just have to break your nose a second time.
Your (never-gonna-be) friend,
Kane
His mom had insisted he write the notes, but she’d never actually read them.Or if she had read them…for some reason, she’d still let him mail the suckers.
She’d done her best with him.He’dlovedhis mom.And then, one day, she’d just been gone.An aneurysm.No warning.No stopping it.Just—gone.
Sometimes, you didn’t realize what a giant, gaping hole someone would leave in your life, not until the person was gone.
After Ana had left, there’d been another hole in his life.One so big that it threatened to swallow him alive.
He’d written a letter to Ana at the time.A note apologizing for the way he’d left her.A note spilling out his guts.Only, he’d never given her the note.
Dear Ana,
I’m sorry that I am not there with you right now.But at my core, I’m a cold-blooded bastard, and you need more than me in your life.I’ll drag you into the dark, and you belong in the light.Hell, you are the light.At least, you are to me.
You told me that you were falling in love with me.When you said those words, all I wanted to do was grab onto you and never, ever let go?—
Ana started to back away.Kane couldn’t have that, so his hands flew out and curled around her waist.He pulled her toward him.
“Kane!”
He jumped off the exam table.Spun around and put her on it.Then he began to carefully inspect every single inch of her.Just in case he’d missed something before.Kane believed in being thorough.Particularly where she was concerned.
Ana batted at his hands.“What are you doing?”
“Looking for cuts.”He tried to lift up her t-shirt.
She shoved it right back down.“I told the EMT on scene, I told you like four times already—I amfine!”
“Yeah, but you could have been lying.All those times.”He tried to lift the shirt again.
She shoved it down once more even as she gasped, “How dare you accuse me of lying!”
“Oh, come on, sweetheart, you could probably have lost a limb and you wouldn’t complain.Do you remember how you were after the attack at that lame-ass, no-tell motel?I had to force you into the ambulance even when you had blood streaming down your side.”A memory that would be forever burned into his mind.
Luckily, though, he didn’t see any blood on her body.
This time.
“You were the one cut by flying glass,” Ana reminded him.“Not me.How could I possibly be cut?I had my own personal human shield covering every inch of me.”
He checked her neck.Lifted her hair.Damn straight, he was her shield.
“I do not have any cuts,” Ana enunciated clearly and slowly.“You do.Thus, the stitches.”
He let her hair fall.“I think you should strip.”
Her hand slammed into his chest.“I think you should get your sanity back.I am not cut.I am not shot.I might have a bruise on my ass from hitting the floor when you tackled me, but otherwise, I assure you, I am perfectly fine.”
The door squeaked open behind him.
He ignored the squeaking door.“Let me see your ass.”
