I cut him a look. “And what does it say to you that she’d rather stay there than with you lot right now?”
Mase grumbles some more. “It says that you lack the balls to just pick her up and bring her home.”
“If I did that, Mase, it wouldn’t have been your home I’d have taken her back to.”
He goes quiet.
I bite my tongue because I really shouldn’t have said that but with any luck, with the state he’s in, he won’t remember in the morning.
“Honorable discharge.” The words are so quiet I almost miss them.
My stomach sinks and I turn to face Mase, the devastation of what that means to him caving into me. “What? Why?”
Mase just shakes his head. He pushes up off the stool and turns to the door. “I need some air.”
I watch him go. I want to stop him, but I know there’s nothing I can do right now to make it better. If Mase has lost the army, no wonder he’s been such a raging asshole lately. That and even on the best of days, seeing the Vipers sends him into a tailspin. We spent most of our twenties watching out for Lola and I don’t think either of us will ever get over the fact that we failed.Fuck.
I plant my elbow on the bar and drag a hand over my face.
Kelsey stops in front of me, wiping the surface with a cloth. “Thanks for coming.”
I give her a half-hearted smile. There was a while there I thought Kelsey was the one for me. It was after Lola had left Pine Rock and I was desperate to forget about everything that had happened. Things were awkward for a bit after Kelsey andI broke up, but we ended things on a good note and I still pop around to see her kid, Oscar, every now and then. “Thanks for messaging,” I say, because she didn’t have to. She could have called the cops.
She throws the cloth in the sink and tightens her ponytail. “What’s going on with him?”
I run my tongue over my teeth and sigh. “Lola’s back,” I say, because really that’s all I need to say.
“Ahh.” Kelsey leans back against the counter and crosses her arms. Then she cocks her head and purses her lips together.
“What?” I ask, because we were together for a year and I know that look.
“I was just thinking, you remember when we broke up and I said it was because you didn’t love me?”
I watch her, wary. I do remember that. She’d said that I was in love with the idea of having a family, of being a father to Oscar and having someone to come home to but that I wasn’t in love with her. “I asked you how you knew.”
She nods. “And I said I didn’t know, but I did. I knew because you never looked like that when it came to me. All it takes is her name Roman.”
I shake my head. “It’s not like that. She deserves better than me.”
Kelsey picks up a tray and starts collecting glasses off the bar. “See that’s your problem,” she says as she stops by me, “you think you need to earn people’s love, that you need to fix everything to be worthy of it. But that’s not how love works.”
Her words sit uncomfortably in my stomach. I don’t know what to say to that so I leave a tip for Mase’s drinks and head out onto the deck.
Mase is leaning against the rope fence, staring out into the night as the Heart Home Lighthouse shines a gold path onto thesea. A bruise is blooming on his cheek. “Thank you for today,” he says as I come up beside him. “For taking care of Lola.”
I shove my hands in my pockets and close my eyes. I doubt Mase would be thanking me if he knew exactly how I wanted totake careof Lola. I grab my keys and step off the deck. “Come on, you can crash at mine tonight.”
Maybe having Mase there will stop me from dreaming about his sister because I need to stop this fantasy.
I should have learned my lesson six years ago. One misjudged kiss ended up with Lola in the hospital. Still, no matter the consequences of that night I can’t bring myself to regret everything that happened.
I dream about that kiss.
Lola doesn’t even remember it.
That should be reason enough for me to leave this the hell alone. Plus, Mase’s got enough to worry about right now, he doesn’t need me chasing after his little sister. No. I need to keep my distance. Even if that’s the last thing I want to do.
Chapter Nine
