Page 1 of Reckless Abandon
Chapter 1
I hold the gun in my hand in front of me, cocked and loaded.
It trembles from my shaky nerves and it makes me seethe with anger.
I can’t even pull the goddamn trigger because I am a coward.
The same coward I’ve been all my life. The same one that walked away from the girl I loved and his best friend because shit got too real and I couldn’t deal.
The same boy who turned into a man, hiding in the military because he was too fucking scared to face his guilt. The same one that made piss-poor decisions that had a ripple effect on the rest of my life.
The consequences that would unfold.
The mistakes that would be made.
If I could take back some of the things I’d done in the last ten years, I would. Without a doubt. All but one.
But that’s not how life works, is it?
And now here I sit, overlooking the Smoky Mountain range, my feet dangling off a dock at my parents’ lakefront home, regretting almost everything. Regretting all the stupid things I’ve done, the decisions that can’t be undone and the things I couldn’t save.
I couldn’t save my friendship with Sage.
I couldn’t save my sister from the cancer that ate away her insides. Or my mom from having to suffer through the deaths of her only daughter and her husband.
I couldn’t save those on my watch and in command, who died and left widows and fatherless children behind.
I couldn’t save my doomed-from-the-start marriage.
And I couldn’t save myself from breaking London’s heart when I left her, kneeling on the ground, tearing out her heart through her tears. The pain to see her like that was so great it cost me a piece of my soul.
I was a coward then and I’m a coward now.
The gun in my hand is the only thing that reminds me that I’m a man and I have courage. That I’m doing the right thing and will save my son from looking up to a man he calls Daddy and finding out later the devastating truth. That his father is a lying piece of shit and a no-good, worthless man.
My breath is stilted as I lift the cold, metal gun and press it into my temple, as I have to consciously drag air into my lungs.
The irony in all this is that London once called me her protector. She thought I was some goddamn hero. As did my family and friends, and those in my pararescue unit in the USAF that I served with. And now my crew in the Tennessee forest fire rescue squad. All those men and women who thought the pins, stripes, medallions, and plaques that have been bestowed upon me over the years prove that I was meant to be revered.
If only they knew…
I’m nothing but a shell of a man, hiding behind a made-up heroic façade.
Closing my eyes, a myriad of memories flash through my head. Like the explosions in the night sky that I escaped countless times in missions in my special ops pararescue unit.
In a blink of an eye, the last ten years appear, at first bright and bold and then clouded with the black stain of death, regret, and guilt.
Everything changed that prom night ten years ago. Every moment and step I took after that was marred by the stupidity of my youth. My ignorance and arrogance. My recklessness. And my naivete of how people – and hearts – can change in a single moment.
My heartbeat ramps up, beating wildly on a collision course as I waffle back and forth over what I must do.
If I want to save my son – theonlyone that I can honestly save at this point in my life – I must take control of this one final decision.
I mentally count down my last seconds on this earth.
Ten.
Nine.
