Page 93 of Lacey's Fight

Problem was, she didn’t know what was best for her.

* * *

August 17th

7:07 P.M.

Was it possible to miss something you never even had?

As Ben watched, Lacey was enveloped in hugs by her sisters who ushered her into a waiting SUV, and he could absolutely attest to the fact that yes it was.

Lacey had never been his. He’d thrown what she had offered back in her face, and in a deliberately cruel way.

At the time, he hadn’t been able to see past his fear of allowing himself to care about someone he didn’t already have to. Grief and guilt had been barriers he hadn’t known how to overcome.

It wasn’t until she wasn’t there anymore that he realized she had already changed him in ways he thought he couldn’t be changed.

Unfortunately, he had realized what a mistake he’d made in letting her go when it was already too late.

She couldn’t stand to be around him.

Had avoided him and ignored him when she couldn’t get away from him.

Was he fighting a losing battle?

He’d promised himself he wouldn’t walk away from her again, but if it was what she wanted would he do it?

After everything she had been through, it didn’t seem fair to her to force himself on her. She’d had enough of being forced to do things she didn’t want to to last a lifetime. Adding to that seemed plain cruel.

“She just needs time.”

Ben turned to find Coach standing behind him watching the SUV Lacey had climbed into drive away from the small private airfield Prey owned. Lacey seemed to like the man, she’d spent the majority of the flight back home talking with him, he’d even made her laugh a few times.

Even as he wished he was the one who had brought that pure joy to her face, Ben had loved watching her relax and become the woman he’d grown to know again. Despite her spine of steel, her bright light, and her determination to put other people’s needs before her own, there was a fragility she fought so hard to hide.

He didn’t want that for her.

He wanted her to be free.

Free of her fears, her insecurities, and of the pain of the past.

But that was something you could never truly rid yourself of. The marks of the past were part of you, they stayed with you until the day you died. There was nothing you could do to erase them, but you could learn to live with them. Perhaps it was in the learning to live with them that their hold on you finally began to fade.

He was doing his best to learn to live with his scars.

Grief would always be sitting heavily on his back. He’d lost the woman he loved, and guilt would always be there too, a constant companion whispering in his ear that he didn’t deserve happiness. That one moment of laziness had stolen a life.

But if he didn’t learn to live with his scars then he was as good as dead already.

That seemed dishonorable to Jemima as well as a waste. He would have swapped positions with Jemima if he could have, but he couldn’t. He was still alive, he had a family who loved him and was always there for him. A team who hadn’t abandoned him even though he’d given them every reason to. And he had the woman who had so selflessly offered him her body for no-strings attached sex even though she had no idea what she was getting herself into.

“I’m not sure there’s enough time in the world for her to want to talk to me. I was … a jerk,” he admitted. Okay, so he had been way worse than just a jerk, but putting a label on his bad behavior didn’t change it.

“She’s met jerks before,” Coach said, amusement in his hazel eyes. “She’s not going to break.”

No.

Lacey would never break.

---