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Chapter Five

Wyatt

“She’s fucking haunting me,” I whisper to myself, staring down at the divorce papers on top of my desk as they taunt me with their presence. Last I checked, those papers were stuffed into the bottom drawer of my desk so I wouldn’t have to look at them or think about them and yet, here they are, tormenting me and I can’t force myself to look away as an all too familiar pain pierces my chest and a memory from the day these showed up in the mail assaults me. I hadn’t heard from Piper in six years and I thought I was moving on with my life when a scrawny kid knocked on my door and told me I was served. The rest of that week is a blur because I don’t think I stopped drinking long enough to even begin to sober up until Storm came over and told me to get my shit together. I threw the papers in the desk and told myself I would deal with them later but later never came.

Staring at her signature at the bottom of the page, I blow out a breath and shake my head. How? Even after all these years, I don’t understand how could she take everything we had, everything we were starting to build together and just throw it all away on some fucking guy. I sink into the chair and lean my head back, running my hand over my face before I unlock my phone and pull up the email she sent me during that deployment that shook my world and ruined everything.

Wyatt,

This isn’t working for me anymore and I met someone new.

Take care of yourself.

Piper

I barely resist the urge to chuck my phone across the room and toss it onto the desk instead. Why the fuck do I even still have it? When I first got that email, I thought it was a joke and sent her an email back telling her she wasn’t funny but the next day, there was no reply and the day after that, still nothing. I lost my shit and three other guys had to drag me back to my rack where I spent the night imagining all sorts of scenarios where my wife had been kidnapped or something. The next day, I called my dad and asked him to go check in on her. He drove all night and when he got to our house in North Carolina, he found it empty and all her stuff gone. Truthfully, I still didn’t believe it. I knew there had to be some kind of explanation but when I came home from deployment six months later and walked into that house, it hit me like a ton of fucking bricks. At first glance, it looked almost exactly like I left it but when I started going through things and noticed her clothes missing along with the few mementos that were most important to her, it really drove home the fact that she was gone. The thing that really took it over the top for me, though, was her wedding ring sitting on the kitchen table with a note that just said, “I’m sorry.”

As I stare at the papers, I swear I can feel her here with me, like she is just in the next room or standing over my shoulder with that sweet smile on her face and I shake my head. She is a ghost in my heart, pieces of her embedded in my soul that I’ll never be able to get rid of, and I have to wonder if all this dating I’m doing is pointless. Could I ever really find the kind of connection I had with Piper? Do people get more than one of those in a lifetime?

Glancing at my watch, I whisper a curse. My dinner date with Violet is in fifteen minutes and I was already running late when these damn papers caught my attention and now I’m stuck here, unable to pull myself away from her.

How fitting…

Can someone who is still alive even haunt you? She sure as hell feels like a ghost in this house and in my life but she is still very much alive. At least, I think she is. She sure as fuck was four years ago when she sent these papers. Shaking my head, I run my hand through my hair and drop my gaze to the bottom of the paper where I’m supposed to sign.

Jesus Christ.

What the hell is wrong with me?

Why haven’t I ever gotten around to signing these damn things?

Standing up, I grab a pen off of the desk and position it above the dotted line as I read over the first page. My gaze gets stuck on Petition for Divorce printed at the top and I suck in a breath, my mind going back to the same question I’ve been asking for ten years. Why?

Just sign the goddamn papers, Landry.

Get this shit over with… finally.

My heart races as I lower the pen to the paper but before I can sign my name, my phone pings with an incoming text and I drop the pen like it’s on fire before grabbing my phone with a sigh.

Violet:

Running a little late but

on my way now

“Shit,” I hiss as I turn away from the papers and grab my keys off of the counter before turning back to glance at them one more time.

Whatever.

The goddamn papers are just going to have to wait until I get back.

As I leave the apartment and walk out to my bike, I try to push thoughts of Piper and our divorce out of my mind. It would be nice if I could go on one motherfucking date without thinking about my ex-wife first. Is that too much to ask?

Climbing on my bike, I start it and some of my stress melts away as the engine rumbles to life beneath me and I check the address of the steakhouse Violet wanted to meet at before pulling away from the curb. I don’t know much about Violet since we only talked long enough to realize that we both wanted to go out and get to know each other better but she seems cool and she’s fucking gorgeous, based on the photos she had on her profile. Hopefully, this one goes better than the last or I really will just delete that damn account and say “fuck it” on the whole wife and family thing. Like I said, maybe people don’t get more than one soul mate in their life and despite it all, I still believe Piper was that for me. But that doesn’t mean that everything will work out and you get the happily ever after. And it sure as hell doesn’t mean that I have to be miserable for the rest of my life… right?

Driving through the streets of downtown Baton Rouge with the wind in my hair, I imagine what my life might have been like if I’d never married Piper, if we had just drifted apart after graduation but the more I try to picture it, the harder and harder it is to see. What she and I had… there was no way we would have just drifted apart. Which leaves me wondering yet again, what the hell happened in that six months I was gone to make her throw everything away but I know I’ll never get the answers to those questions. She made damn sure of that when she walked out of my life with nothing more than a half explanation and a shitty ass apology.

As I pull into the parking lot of the steakhouse, I pull into a spot near the back of the lot away from other cars and push my ex-wife out of my mind once and for all. Or, at least, try to. Like I said, she’s fucking persistent and if I haven’t been able to accomplish it in the last ten years, I don’t know what it will take to finish the job. But I can attempt to forget about her for the next couple hours, at least, so I don’t ruin this date. Shoving my hands in my pockets, I walk across the lot and stop next to the front door of the steakhouse, leaning back against the building where Violet and I agreed to meet. As I wait, my mind drifts back to my last date and I blow out a breath as I shake my head. Maybe I should have taken a page out of Shiloh’s book and asked Violet what she was looking for before we ever agreed to meet. The last thing I want to do is have an amazing date and see a future with someone only to find out they aren’t looking for a relationship.