Though the fight is over, I am still heaving, my words making me feel like I’ve been running for miles. “But I can’t do that. I’m so sorry, but I can’t let you go, not for your own safety because for the first time in my life, I’ve found something, someone who is just for me, and I want to keep you because I’m a selfish bastard and I just don’t care anymore.”
“You’re fucking this up,” JJ mutters off from behind me in a tone only meant for me to hear, but Goldie’s eyes flit to him for a moment.
Fuck, he’s right, I need to be better. I have to or I'll lose her.
“Ted, we can’t do this anymore. I can’t do this anymore,” she says, her voice barely audible.
I can hear the raggedness in her voice, see the tears welling up in her eyes, and I know she's breaking just as surely as I am. I want to reach out, to draw her to me and shield her from the harsh realities that are tearing us apart.
“Since you waved at me from the porch that first day, I knew. I knew you were going to completely set my world on its ear. I tried to deny how I felt about you and keep you far away, even when you kept leaving little gifts and tried to give me that perfect pink cake. You have to know I regret not taking that little cake every single day because it put days in between me getting to know you, stupid wasted days that you still filled with your sunshine by needling me with singing telegrams. The closer I got to you, the more inside your world I was permitted, the more I was able to confirm your heart was as beautiful as I first thought. It has room for everyone you meet, even me. But if I only get to be near you, my world is brighter, peaceful and full of a joy I have never imagined for myself. I want to make you cakes, take care of you, treat you like you deserve and be there for you.”
Goldie’s face crumples. I said the wrong thing. I don’t know what but it was the exact wrong fucking thing.
“Goldie. . . ” I start, but she cuts me off.
“I can't be another burden, another responsibility, another person you have to save.” The tears flow freely now, and each one feels like a dagger to my heart. “Look at you, carrying the weight of the world, fixing everything for everyone. I can't. . . I won't be another chain holding you down. You can’t fix my life and I can’t expect someone else to. I don’t want any of that.”
She's looking at me with clear, decisive eyes. Her words are a sword cleaving through my already fractured armor.
I can feel something within me breaking, a dam giving way to a flood of emotions that threaten to drown me. The warrior, the protector, the beast—all of them warring within me for dominance as I grapple with the harsh reality of her words.
The beast within me roars in anguish, a primal sound that echoes the torment ripping through my very soul. But beneath the ferocity, the violence that is my second nature, there's a part of me, a part that has known nothing but solitude and the harsh realities of a world soaked in blood and betrayal, that understands.
"I. . . Goldie, please," I stammer, my voice cracking under the strain of the emotions tearing through me. I want to fight, to claw and scratch my way back to her, to hold onto the sliver of light she has brought into my dark world.
The sensation of blood drying on my hands registers in my brain. What am I thinking? I am the beast asking the beauty to stay with him though he’s a murderous monster. As I look at her, really look at her, I see a woman who deserves so much more than a life marred by violence and uncertainty.
With a ragged breath, I nod.
"I understand. I won't bother you anymore."
As she disappears back into the house, a distance between us stretches out, a chasm that threatens to swallow me whole.
I feel like I'm imploding, a black hole sucking in everything good and beautiful that I had dared to dream could be mine. But it’s done because that’s what she wants, what she needs.
I’m not right for her.
Chapter39
You Have My Tiny Little Knob
TED
“I’m sorry, bro,” Eli says, setting a hand on my shoulder. The only light in the kitchen is from the hood over the stove. Everything else is draped in darkness which feels fitting as I sit at my kitchen table pouring out another four fingers of bourbon. I’ve already drained half the bottle, hoping for. . . what?
To forget? To numb myself?
None of it’s working. The only thing I’ve accomplished is I’ve cemented I feel like absolute fae shit.
I jerk, shrugging off Eli’s hand. “Don’t touch me. This is all your fault.”
My little brother backs away, rubbing a hand across his shaved head in that patent awe-shucks way. I’d given him leniency before, so many times I can’t even count now.
“If I didn’t have to clean up your mess, I wouldn’t have—”
So many things. Put Goldie in danger, killed people, sacrificed everything I wanted for myself.
“I know,” he says quietly, eyes on the tile floor.
