Page 109 of Resisting Temptation (Men of Honor 3)
I watch guilt fill his eyes and self-loathing twist his expression just before he pulls out of me fast, dropping me to my feet. He pulls his pants back up and turns away. “Leave, Red, now.”
“Please, won’t you just…”
“I fucking said leave!” he rages with finality.
I stare at him and realize I am not going to reach him. Not tonight, and maybe not ever. I swallow past the agony suffocating my throat. “Okay, I’ll go and I won’t come back if you don’t want me to. Because the thing is, Cade, I love you more than anyone in this world and I will until the day I die, but I can’t make you love me.” His tortured gaze snaps to mine and I pull in a painful breath through the sobs robbing me of oxygen and try to finish what I need to. “You aren’t capable of loving anyone until you deal with her death.” Not being able to stay a second longer, I turn and rush out of the building, my heart bleeding with regret.
That night, as I cry myself to sleep, I pray. I pray for my broken heart, but, most of all, I pray for Cade, pray that he will find peace and find his way back to me. Because I am not sure I can live without him again.
CHAPTER 31
Cade
Monday afternoon I’m in my office sitting at the desk, trying to focus on the paperwork in front of me, and not the pain that has been restricting my chest for the last two days.
After snapping at everyone, and scaring the clients, I decided to lock myself in here before I fuck up worse than I already have. I should just go home and try to sleep since I haven’t had any for almost forty-eight hours. But every time I close my eyes, images of Red’s pained expression haunts my mind. Despair and self-hatred plague me when I think about the way I took her. I drop my head in my hands and grind my teeth against the painful thought, knowing I’m not any fucking better than the motherfuckers who forced themselves on her.
A light tap sounds on the door before it opens and reveals Christopher. I look at the clock and realize he’s here for his shift.
“I didn’t expect you to show up today.,” my voice is rough, sounding exactly how I feel. I know it’s a shitty greeting and I feel like an asshole, but I’m still too pissed off to care, too…wrecked to say anything else.
“Why, because you ran off on your responsibilities you think I am going to as well?” he replies low and angry, looking ready to punch me in the face. I don’t blame him, I want to punch my own self in the face, but now is not the time for me to get into this with him; my head isn’t on right.
“Go home, kid, go be with Faith and your sister today.” Just saying her name has the tightness in my chest escalating.
He storms up to my desk and knocks a bunch of shit off. “Fuck you! You should be with them. You promised you wouldn’t ever hurt her and now, for the last two nights, I have to hear both of them cry themselves to sleep because of you!”
Agony, and a good dose of self-hatred, consumes me as I stare into his furious gaze. Knowing there is nothing I can say to make this situation right, I decide to stay quiet rather than regret anything that will come out of my mouth.
When I don’t respond, he gives up. “You know what? Fuck you! You can go fuck yourself, we don’t need you!” He turns and storms out, slamming the door behind him. My own temper starts to flare; rage beginning to simmer in my blood again and I welcome it because it feels a lot fucking better than the pain. I get up and start packing up my shit when the door flies open again. I expect it to be Christopher, but it ends up being Evans.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” he asks, low and dangerously.
I shake my head and try to keep my cool, not wanting this to get any more out of hand. “Just stay the fuck out of it, Evans.”
When I walk toward the door to leave, he pushes me back with a strength that shocks the shit out of me and spikes my temper to a whole other level. “I’m not fucking staying out of this, not anymore. My whole life, I’ve watched you destroy yourself; I have even left you alone to do it, but no more. Not when you are fucking up other’s lives now. You put yourself in those kid’s lives and Faith’s, you can’t just walk away!”
Even though everything he says is true it doesn’t calm my rage, it only escalates it and I can feel myself close to the edge. “I’m fucking warning you, Evans, now is not the time to fuck with me.”
He shakes his head and expels a disbelieving breath. “It never is and it never will be. You need to get over it. We all miss her, man, but she’s gone and she isn’t ever coming back.”
That’s it. I snap, violence burns through me and I lunge at him, giving him a fast, right hook to the jaw. He braces himself and expects it, but the blow still knocks him back.
I’m still going for him when he comes back at me full force. We collide and land outside of the door, our fists raining down on each other fast and hard. He gets in a few good blows but I don’t feel them, only the violence consuming me.
“Shit! Benson, help me.” Jaxson rushes over in the chaos and it takes some good maneuvering on his and Benson’s part, but once our bodies start tiring, they manage to break us apart.
Jaxson’s arms are wrapped around my shoulders and locked at the back of my neck, restraining me. “Stop. You need to calm down, man, this is our fucking workplace. Pull yourself together.”
