Chapter Thirty-Five
Whitney
I walk beside this girl who I know because of a few conversations with my brother when he’s feeling low. As soon as I saw her sitting there, I knew who she was.
“Trevor’s told you about me?” She questions as we wait for the elevator.
I nod, grinning as I wrap my arms around myself, rubbing my biceps. Now that we’re away from the group of people, I’m cold. “Yeah, he doesn’t talk about a lot, and he talks even less about the women he’s interested in, but you he’s told me about a couple of times. He cares a lot about you.”
I don’t know if I should break his confidence. What if he doesn’t make it out of this alive and she’s stuck wondering what he thought of her. Given the fact I haven’t been honest with Ryan, maybe I’m not the right person to ask.
“I care a lot about him,” she affirms quietly. “It’s just like we could never make it work.”
“Trevor’s stubborn.”
She smiles. “So am I. Neither one of us wanted to be the person to give. Both of us wanted to take.”
“He hasn’t told me what happened with the two of you,” I caution her, because I don’t want her to feel like I know and inadvertently tell me something she wouldn’t normally. “I just know he regrets it.”
“I regret it, too,” she steps onto the elevator and we pick the lobby.
“You always think you have so much time. I mean the last few times we’ve seen each other, we’ve flirted and he’s texted me, but I never wanted to give in.
I never wanted to admit I was the one willing to give in,” she kicks the ground with her black boot.
“He wants me to give up my job,” she says, surprising the hell out of me.
“He what?”
She shoots me a look with a sarcastic smile. “Yeah. The cop wants me to give up my job.”
There’s got to be a reason behind this, but I don’t want to be nosey. She’s trusted me enough to come this far.
The elevator comes to the lobby floor and we exit, walking to the coffee shop.
As we stand, waiting to place our orders, I take a good look at her.
It’s her hair that bestowed her nickname; the red is blazing and tattoos cover her arms. On some people they could be trashy, but on her, they belong.
She’s small – probably five-three to my five-seven.
She looks young, but if I were to hazard a guess, she’s probably the same age as Trevor and Ryan.
When she glances back at me, I’m struck by her green eyes.
I can see why my brother has been a goner for this girl.
“Want to sit over here?” I ask after I order. “We can drink our coffee and then head back up.”
“Sounds good.”
We sit down and there’s another silence. It’s not uncomfortable, but I get the feeling both of us are trying to be nice to one another and not delve too deep. I desperately want to know why he wanted her to quit her job, but I won’t ask.
“Everybody around town seems to know your story,” she starts as she takes a drink of her coffee. “I guess it’s only fair I give you mine. I can’t believe Trevor and I have been able to keep it a secret.”
Neither have I, but I don’t say the words out loud. “You tell me whatever you want to tell me. Don’t think you owe me anything because I’m the topic of the town gossip mill right now.”
“A year ago I was on a call. The person we were helping was having a mental episode. He pulled a gun and held it to my head. Trevor responded to the scene that day,” she starts mixing her coffee together before taking another drink.
“At that point, we’d been together a few months, ya know just kinda messing around.
We’d slept together, but there hadn’t been any promises or talk of us being exclusive. ”
I put a hand on my stomach and rub gently. “I know exactly what you mean.”
“Long story short, I got out of the situation, obviously, but Trevor told me if I wanted to be with him, I’d need to get another job. He couldn’t stand that I was in danger,” she sighs. “I think it reminded him of Iraq and something that happened over there, but he’d never talk about it.”
Trevor had definitely come back a different person, as had a lot of the people who went over there with him, but he flat-out refused to talk about it.
“So that’s it? The two of you stopped seeing each other?”
Her cheeks heat and turn pink. “We tried, but there’s like this invisible rope that constantly pulls at us, bringing us together. Every time though, he asks me to quit, but I love what I do,” she shrugs. “I was born to do this.”
“Just like he was born to do what he does.”
“Exactly,” she nods. “But now with this? How do I live with myself if something happens to him and I was too stubborn to spend what could have been the most amazing year of my life with him?”
I have no answers, so I just reach over and grab her hand. If Trevor doesn’t pull through this we’ll all have regrets, and I can only hope that’s not all we’re left with in the end.
More than anything, I just want to hug my brother and tell him I love him again. Two small acts in everyday life that mean everything when someone’s life hangs in the balance.