Chapter 27 Liam
LIAM
I made it about halfway through the day before I felt his menacing presence behind me.
Glancing over my shoulder, I tossed the hammer down on the workbench and faced Bailey’s brother.
“Tell me the rumors around town aren’t true,” he snarled.
Lying to him might save my ass for today, but he’d be back tomorrow to kick my ass, and I’d let him.
“What exactly do you want me to say?”
Taking a menacing step forward, I’d never seen him so pissed in all my life. But I had it coming, even if I hadn’t considered Brody in all of this.
“Tell me that you didn’t let another woman hang all over you at The Beaver last night. Tell me that my baby sister didn’t show up at your house this morning, only to find that skank practically naked in only your shirt.”
His voice got louder with every word spoken. Hell, at this point, I couldn’t blame him at all for wanting to kill me.
“Tell me that you did not give the impression that you wanted to spend the rest of your life with my sister, only to drop her after less than a fucking week!”
The anger rippling off him didn’t scare me. Hell, I’d been around worse men in my life, but this was Bailey’s brother. We’d always gotten along pretty well, and I’d gone and ruined that. Things would never be the same again.
“Not that it’s any of your business, but it was never going to work out.”
He barked out a laugh, taking another step forward. “Is that what you told yourself when you decided to let her down by having another woman sit on your lap?”
“I already told her,” I snarled. “I fucking told her to leave. She wouldn’t just walk away.”
“So you found another way,” he scoffed. “You broke my innocent sister’s heart all because you wanted to prove a point?”
“Your sister is far from innocent,” I snapped.
“Maybe not, but she sure as hell didn’t deserve what you did to her.”
No, she didn’t. In fact, she deserved the very best, but that would never be me. Not when I knew the shit that would follow me around for the rest of my life. She would be better off as far away from me as possible.
“Is there a point in all this? Do you really think Bailey wants or needs you to come out here and scold me? We’re not in high school. She’s a big girl, and she can handle the truth.”
“The truth?” he laughed. “Is that what we’re calling this?”
My breath caught in my chest at the look he shot me.
“Liam, I’ve known you my whole fucking life. You’ve looked out for my sister since the second grade.”
“Third,” I corrected.
“And there’s not a single person on this earth that you would let hurt her.
So, tell me why you threw it all away in one night.
Tell me why you would hurt her like that when I know for a fact that you’re in love with her.
Tell me what the fuck is going on because I know there is no way you would ever let anyone, including yourself, ever make her feel like she wasn’t worth everything in the world! ”
I had nothing for him. As I stood there, desperately scraping to find some answer that would make him believe me, the truth of the matter snuck its way to my lips.
I almost said it. Almost told him every fucking detail, but what would that do?
Nothing.
I had hurt her, even if I hadn’t meant a single second of it. She would never forgive me for what I had done. It was over now. I’d seen to that when I took Ellie May home with me.
“It was too much,” I said, going with the simplest answer.
“I wanted to see where things could go, but you know nothing ever happens at the pace you want in this town. Hell, your mother was already planning our wedding. We’d been together one night, and my life was already laid out. I didn’t even have a say in it.”
“It was too much? That’s your excuse?” he gritted out.
“I could see the stars in her eyes, Brody. She might not have been planning the wedding with your mom, but she wanted it. It was all too much.”
“So, you talk to her about it. You tell her things are moving too fast.”
“She showed up at the hospital, ready to baby me. She was going to take the entire fucking week off work, and for what?”
“To take care of you, asshole! Because she cares about you. You were in an accident in her car.”
God, if only he knew the truth. He would fucking hate me if he knew the lengths Austin would go to in order to hurt me.
“And that was nice of her to want to help, but I don’t need any woman fawning over me every second of the day. I want someone who will be there at night to cook my food and do my laundry. I want a woman who will go to bed with me and fuck me.”
He flinched at my words.
“But I do not want a woman whose only goal in life is to get married and spend every fucking second of the day thinking about me.”
I needed him to fucking leave. Every second he was here made it harder to keep it together, not to tell him just how much I fucking hated myself for what I had to do to her.
But as long as I kept her away from me, Austin wouldn’t go after her. The sick fuck would do anything to destroy me, and she was the catalyst.
“You know what?” he huffed. “I think some part of you wants to believe that. Cuz it’s easier, right? You tell yourself all those lies, and eventually, you might think you did the right thing.”
“Brody—”
“I don’t know why the hell you’re doing this. I’m not sure I ever will. And I still fucking hate you for what you did to her, but it’s all a lie. One day, she’ll find out, and by then, it’ll probably be too late for you.”
“It already is,” I yelled, but not at him.
No, I was yelling at myself, reminding my head that I had already fucked things up with her, and there was no going back now.
His eyes scanned me from head to toe, and then he shook his head in disappointment. “Fucking pathetic, Liam. I never took you for a coward.”
He turned to leave, but I wasn’t through with him yet. “That’s it? You’re just walking away after I fucked another woman?”
“Is that what this is about?” he asked, glancing over his shoulder. “You want someone to punish you?”
Desperately. If he kicked my ass, I might feel just a little like I got what was coming to me.
“You came here to defend her honor, but you’re not even taking a swing.”
“She wouldn’t want me to.” Then his eyes locked on my arm still in the sling. “And it’s not worth it to break a man who’s already broken. I hope you know what you’re doing, Liam.”
An angry retort was on the tip of my tongue, but I never let it fly. There was no point. He was right. I was broken, and the whole fucking town knew it. Only an asshole would throw away a woman like Bailey.
“Well, that didn’t go as you planned,” Jeff said from behind me. “I bet you thought he’d come in here and kick your ass, make you forget about your misery for just a few minutes. Hell, maybe he’d even put you in a coma. That would really end the pain, right?”
Grinning, he hoisted his tool bag up on the table with a thud.
“Did you fix the steps at cabin 3?”
“You know, I got you wanting to run her off. It made sense. Kiss another woman and she’ll be so pissed, she won’t want to be around you.
But sleeping with another woman…” He shook his head.
“I gotta hand it to you, when you try to destroy your life, you do a fantastic job. I never saw that one coming.”
“You know why I had to do it.”
“I know why you wanted to do it, which isn’t the same thing. With a little time, you might have figured something out.”
“It would have been too late by then.”
“Right. You were so sure he would leave her alone,” Jeff chuckled. “But you didn’t take into consideration that Austin’s crazy.”
I almost turned and walked out.
Almost.
“What do you mean…I was so sure he would leave her alone?”
“A little birdie in town told me that Austin cornered her at the shop today. That little birdie is our sister, by the way. Yep, Bailey came into The Beaver and told her all about how Austin grabbed her by the hair and dragged her against him. She slammed a wrench into his face, which I guess did the trick.” His eyes met mine. “For now.”
Fuck.
I bent over, dragging in a shattered breath as I thought of him putting his hands on her. Cornering her.
“Where the fuck was Wyatt?”
“Oh, he showed up, but apparently, he blamed Bailey for it. Yep, said something about how she was supposed to be working. Can’t imagine he would have her back if Austin ever really tried something. That family sticks together, you know.”
So, it was all for nothing. I had hurt her and that fucker was still going after her.
“Then I’ll take his eyes off the prize,” I snarled. “I’ll make sure he doesn’t even fucking think about going after her again.”
“Yeah? And how are you gonna do that, big brother? You have exactly one good arm. How the hell do you plan on making sure he doesn’t do anything else to her?”
“I’ll figure it out.”
“What’s that?” he jested.
“I said, I’ll figure it out!”
“Right, like you did last time. I really liked that. The whole performance was fucking amazing at the bar. But this morning…I gotta hand it to you. Fucking brilliant.”
I didn’t even think as I grabbed the hammer with my good hand and flung it across the barn, screaming until the thumping in my head turned to a dull roar. My lungs heaved from the exertion and my shoulder throbbed, but for the moment, I felt better.
“Yep, I bet that did the trick. He won’t bother her at all now.”