Page 42 of Faith
Zeke swallowed roughly. He’d forgotten about Montgomery. All the things he said to Nina… He meant every word, but he didn’t mean to say it all in front of Montgomery.
Nina let her hand fall from Zeke’s jaw and took a step back. She held his gaze for another moment, then turned to join her brother in the living room again.
Zeke waited a minute, then resumed his duties in the kitchen. The motions were repetitive and soothing with his emotions raw and exposed, like he’d peeled his skin off and had to live without the protection it provided.
Nina pleaded with Montgomery to let her see some of the women Rose Protection Agency was keeping safe. Montgomery’s excuses were fading with Zeke’s ability to keep himself under control. When his friend agreed to let Nina see one or two of the women, Zeke bit down on the inside of his lip until he tasted blood.
He wanted to keep her away from that world. Away from the others who’d been through what she went through. He wanted her safe.
“Hey, Mont. Watch this for a minute, will you?” Zeke called as he headed toward the garage.
“Yeah. You okay?”
“Just forgot something in the SUV. I’ll be right back.” Zeke left the house before either of them asked anything else.
Zeke wanted a minute. He needed it. He walked around the side of his SUV and opened the front door. He climbed in and closed the door, waiting until the interior lights faded to black once more.
Zeke pinched the bridge of his nose and let all his emotions leak out. Slowly. He couldn’t lose it with Mont right on the other side of the wall, but he had to mourn for Nina. For the life that was stolen from her. The life she could have had if he’d been strong enough to say no to her.
Love made him weak back then. It made him unable to challenge her. She didn’t walk all over him, he led her that way. He was young and foolish and thought giving her what she wanted was the way to get her to love him.
He learned that wasn’t the case. It was never the case. Love meant being there for people no matter what. It meant being willing to sacrifice yourself for them. It meant putting them first, and knowing they would do the same for you.
Montgomery was the only person who’d ever done that for Zeke. His brother. His best friend. His boss.
And now they had Nina back. They would both do anything for her. But letting her go, knowing she wanted to, put a fear in Zeke that he couldn’t shake. He had to make sure she didn’t leave. She couldn’t leave. He wouldn’t survive if she left again.
Even if that did make him just as bad as Gwendolyn Lennox.
10
Nina staredat the garage door until Zeke walked back inside. She didn’t like him being out of her sight. Not seeing him for a few minutes. It made her itchy, like her skin was too tight. It made no sense.
When Zeke walked inside again, he kept his gaze down, hidden from her and Monty. Monty breezed past Zeke, returning to the living room where Nina sat. Monty didn’t notice a thing, but Nina did.
She was more determined than ever to chase her brother out of the house and get Zeke alone. Something changed, and she needed to know what.
Monty kept up the conversation during dinner, sharing more stories about their past and telling Nina she missed nothing. She asked about the home they grew up in, the house where both their parents died.
“I sold it after he died,” Monty said. “I couldn’t stand going back there. Not after he lived there. I wasn’t sure I wanted to be there after Mom died and you left, either, but all my memories of the house were bad ones. But the money, I can sell half thecompany to give you what you should have. I only got all of it because you were gone.”
Nina shook her head as Monty spoke. “No. It’s yours. I don’t want anything from him.”
“Sounds familiar,” Zeke said with little humor in his voice.
“What do you mean?” Nina asked.
Zeke nodded at Monty, and Nina slid her gaze to her brother.
“I fought it for a long time. I didn’t want his money. It felt tainted, like he was.”
“What changed your mind?”
Monty smiled at Zeke and clapped his shoulder. “He did. Reminded me of one of the things we talked about all the time when we were serving.”
The two men shared a moment that left Nina feeling separate. She was, and she would have been anyway, but all the moments they shared when she was gone were a reminder that she missed so much. “Are you going to tell me what it was?”
Monty smirked. “We protected sisters and mothers and wives and children when we served. We did our fair share of damage, but we believed we were doing the best thing, and every time we saved someone who’d been abused or harmed, we said we were saving another Nina. Someone else’s most important person.”
