Finding Oliver’s hand at my side, I took it into mine, giving a light squeeze.
The man’s lip curled into a sneer. “So this is what you’ve been up to since Vincent? Found yourself a new mark to bleed dry?” The man’s gaze shifted to me. “Let me guess, you’re older, protective? You look like the type. Strong. Dependable. Good at fixing broken things. Here’s your cautionary tale: he’ll chew through your kindness, and the second someone shinier glances his way he’ll vanish. I know. He did the same thing to my friend. One day,poof. Gone. After everything Vincent gave him.”
Oliver trembled against me, his grip on my hand tightening so hard his nails created crescent indents in my skin. His breathing had adjusted to a speed so rapid I worried he might pass out from lack of oxygen.
“I warned Vincent about you,” the man continued, turning his derision back to Oliver. “But he was blind. Obsessed. He would’ve done anything for you, and this is how you repay him? You left him in pieces. You’re the same worthless, manipulative little gold-digging slut I always knew you were.”
I’d heard enough of this nonsense. Placing myself between the man and Oliver, I squared my shoulders. The man had a fit, athletic build, but he didn’t match my height or breadth, and I let that difference crowd him.
“That’s enough. I will not tolerate you talking about Oliver that way. Have the decency to keep such foul language to yourself,” I said through gritted teeth, exhaling through my nose like some sort of angry bull about to charge the gate, ready to launch some poor rodeo jock into orbit.
“Wow, you’ve got it bad, don’t you? That little—”
My hand balled into a fist at my side. Violence wasn’t my thing unless someone needed protecting, but hearing this asshole tear into Oliver turned me into something ugly and wired. Every stupid, animal part of me itched to land a punch.
“I wouldn’t finish that sentence,” I warned, my voice as calm as the eye of a hurricane but with all the destruction behind it. “It’s obvious to me you don’t know Oliver at all, and you sure as hell don’t know me. I’ll take my chances, thanks.”
“Suit yourself,” the man said with a flippant scoff. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” He turned on his heel and walked off.
I turned back to Oliver. The radiant man from moments ago had left the building, the brilliance sucked from his eyes, left flat with shock.
The sight had anger searing through me once more, making me wish I’d decked the guy. Shifting closer, I untangled our hands, placing my arm around his back. “Come on,” I whispered, guiding him out of the aisle and toward a quiet corner of the store behind a display of socks. It wasn’t much, but it offered a little cover from potential prying eyes.
“Don’t believe a single thing he said,” I murmured, running my hand up and down his spine. “None of that is you. None of it.”
“I...” He shook his head, throat working like he’d tried to swallow broken glass. “I didn’t expect... I didn’t... I wasn’t ready.”
“I know. You shouldn’t have to be ready for something like that.”
“God, Luke. He called me a—”
“I heard,” I said, voice low, anger still festering that the man had had the balls to call Ollie that, and in public no less. Prick. “And he’s wrong. Dead wrong, Oliver.”
“Why does it still feel like I have to defend myself? Why do I still feel guilty?”
“Because people like Vincent love twisting the story so they remain in control. But listen to me, you don’t owe anyone—not Vincent, not his so-called friend, no one—your pain, your story, and definitely not your peace.”
“I thought I’d buried all this. That I’d started over. That I’d become someone new.”
“You are someone new. You might not see it, but I do. You’ve grown so much in the past months, but that doesn’t mean your past disappears. It means it doesn’t define you anymore.”
He buried his face into me, the humidity of his breath warming the fabric of my shirt. There it was again, that pull in my chest that didn’t fit anywhere I knew to put it. I comforted people after moments like this in my job on a regular basis, but never like this. Never with this ache that made me want to keep holding on when protocol would tell me to let go.
“I don’t know what I would’ve done if I’d been alone when he showed up. I think I would’ve shattered,” Oliver said, his voice muffled into my shirt.
“You’d have held your own. Your therapy and group sessions woulda kicked in, and you’d have remembered you don’t gotta take shit from nobody, and given him a piece of the new you. Still, I’m glad I was here. It helps to have a friend nearby when things get real.”
“You sure did show him. I’ve never seen him so intimidated before.”
“And I’d do it again, to anyone who dares make you think you’re less than you are. No one, I mean no one, gets to talk to you like that in front of me.”
“My hero,” he said, pulling back to look into my eyes.
The look and the sentiment had my insides gushing. It wasn’t the first time I’d been called that, but it was the first time I liked the idea of the title. Being Oliver’s hero was some kind of badge of honor. “You okay?” I asked. “Do you want to call it? We can put everything back, head home, reschedule the trip for some other time.”
“No. No, I still want to go camping. I need to go. I’m not going to let Vincent or anyone tied to him keep me from living my life. I’m actually looking forward to this. I’m not handing over one more thing to that past. I won’t let him take from me anymore.”
“See?” I said. “Strong. Brave. Resilient.”
