Chapter 20
CHAPTER
TWENTY
SILAS
The first week after the combine was pretty great. Brooke and I spent as much time together as we could when we weren’t in class. It was awesome. But this week has been a different story.
She hasn’t said it, but I feel like she’s fallen in love with me—or at least pretty damn close to it. It’s safe to say that I’m in love with her.
Head over ass.
But I want my declaration to her to come naturally. I want it to feel right for both of us. I don’t even care if she says it back. I just want the timing to be right. She did agree to give me until the draft, and we’re just two weeks shy now.
My class schedule hasn’t let up, and even after the draft, I’ll have close to a month before I graduate. So, between school and meetings with my coaches here at Walker and my agent, that hasn’t left much time for Brooke and me to spend together this week. And it sucks.
Her dad came down to see her today and took her out to lunch.
She invited me to join them in an effort to show her dad that we really do care about each other, but I just couldn’t make it work since they were going while I was in class.
Then I had an appointment right after class and went to a car dealership after that.
I bought a truck to make it easier for me and Brooke to get around. With everyone’s schedules and personal lives, it’s just not as easy to catch rides.
It’s nothing fancy, but it’s nice, and it will be good for us for now.
I thought she would be home by now, but she’s not here. In fact, no one is in the house, which always feels kind of odd when it’s so quiet in here. Not that we’re loud and rowdy, but someone is usually hanging around.
When I walk into the bedroom, there’s a moving box sitting on the bed–more stuff of Brooke’s from her dorm.
Inside, there’s an Alexa, some books, a stuffed animal, and a cowboy hat that I’ve seen her wear a few times.
It looks like it’s getting a little smooshed by the books, and I don’t want it to bend the brim, so I lift it out of the box and smack it a few times against my thigh to see if I can loosen the crease from the book.
I glance back into the box to see if anything else needs to be taken out and see a manila envelope with the words Arbuckle Annulment written in the center.
What the fuck?
My hands are shaking as I reach for the envelope—this stupid envelope that I can’t believe exists at all.
I set the hat on the bed like I need both hands free for whatever this is about to do to me. Then I pick it up.
The paper is heavier than it should be.
I slide the contents out and try to read, but the words blur together, the letters swimming like they’re actively trying to avoid me. I blink hard, forcing my focus, catching only fragments at first.
Mental capacity.
Duress.
My stomach drops.
Sure, we’d been drinking. But neither of us was drunk. Not even close. We knew exactly what we were doing. Hell—she knew exactly what she was doing. The marriage was her idea. She suggested it. Pushed it forward. Asked me if I was serious before we ever stood there and said the words out loud.
And I was. God, I was so on board it scared me.
What hurts—the thing that actually sinks its teeth into my chest—isn’t the paperwork. It’s not the legal language or the implications or the threat that this could all disappear with a judge’s signature.
It’s that she didn’t tell me she was drawing up the papers.
I had no idea she was seriously considering this. No warning. No conversation. No chance to stand in front of her and tell her I’m not something she needs to protect herself from.
I lower myself onto the edge of the bed, the papers crinkling in my grip.
I thought she was giving me a chance.
We talked. We agreed to take it slow. To see where this went. I thought—I really thought—that her feelings were growing. That the way she relaxed around me meant something. That the smiles, the late nights, the quiet mornings weren’t just politeness or fear or obligation.
I thought we were choosing each other.
And now I’m holding proof that maybe she’s been preparing an exit the entire time.
My hands tighten around the pages, knuckles white.
If she’s scared, I can handle that.
If she needs reassurance, I’ll give it to her.
If she wants space, time, patience…I’ll bleed it if I have to.
And if she leaves me because she doesn't want me then I’ll have to let her go because then she’s not mine to keep.
But this?
This feels like she never trusted me enough to let me in.
And that might be the part that breaks me.
I need to read through this more carefully, so I pull out my glasses from my backpack.
Just as I slip them on and pick up the papers again, Brooke walks through the door.
“Hey,” she says, sounding tired.
She hasn’t looked at me yet, so I don’t respond.
Her back is to me as she pulls off her sweatshirt and tosses it into the hamper by the closet. Then she kicks off her shoes and sets them inside the closet.
“Is that your new truck out front? I’m sorry I couldn’t go with you to get it. Lunch with my dad took longer than I’d thought. Then I pretty much had to run back here to get my backpack. I barely made it to my afternoon class on time.”
When she turns to face me, she sees the papers in my hand. “Silas.”
She doesn’t look guilty, but she does look wary. “You went through my box?”
“I did.” I drop the papers on the bed. “Your hat was getting bent, so I pulled it out so it didn’t get ruined. But then I saw the words Arbuckle Annulment on the outside of the envelope, and … I don’t know … I wanted to see why my wife had annulment papers. And I gotta say, I’m surprised.”
“Silas, it’s not like that. I didn’t do anything. My dad brought them today.”
“Your dad?” I ask incredulously.
“Yes, my dad. He had mentioned it on the plane ride home from Vegas, and I kind of forgot about it, honestly.”
“How could you forget that your dad wanted to help us dissolve our marriage?” My brows rise, and I hold out my hands.
“Forgot isn’t the right word.” She shakes her head.
“Have you told him how you feel about me? Does he know you agreed to give this until the draft before any decisions were made?”
“Me caring about you has never been in question. Why are you acting like this? This”—she holds up the papers—“doesn’t mean I want to sign them.”
“Maybe not, but why did you take them? You could have had him take them back with him if it wasn’t something you were considering.”
“I’m not! Silas, I hope you know that none of this has anything to do with what he thinks of you.
He’s just worried. He’s being a dad. Us getting married, you have to admit, was really out of character for me.
I’m not that person. I’m not the girl who throws caution to the wind and gets married in Vegas.
So, I get why he would be worried about it. Don’t you?”
Logically, yes. But I’m trying to process all of this.
“So then, why did you marry me?” I take off my glasses and set them on the dresser.
“I don’t know!” she yells.
We stare at each other silently, and I watch her chest rise and fall.
“Silas, I’ve spent my entire life doing everything so fucking carefully so I stayed in the shadows.
The guilt that I carry over the abuse Beck suffered because of me is suffocating.
I’ve gotten really good at bottling my emotions and putting on a happy face so that neither of them worries about me because they’ve been protecting me from the ugly parts of our lives since I was little.
So, neither of them saw how all of our trauma was eating me up inside.
They have no idea about my panic attacks.
They don’t know that the thought of disappointing either of them is crippling to me.
” She crumples to the bed. Her head in her hands.
“I wanted a night that I could just be someone else. Hell, my own therapist and my brother both told me to let loose in Vegas, and for a minute, as I watched that newlywed couple walk off the Ferris wheel before we did, I thought, I want that. I want that kind of bliss, even if it’s for one night.
” She looks up at me with tears in her eyes.
“I’m sorry you got swept up in it. I would never want to hurt you. ”
“Do you care about me, or was I just a body? Could it have been someone else you said I do with?” My heart stutters at the thought.
She shakes her head and stands. “No, I wouldn’t have wanted to do this with anyone else. And, yes, of course I care about you. I did then, and I do even more now.” She tries to take my hand, but I pull away. “Silas,” she chokes on a sob.
“Brooke, when you said, ‘Let’s get married,’ I didn’t expect for us to be where we are now.
I knew I had feelings for you. I knew I wanted to have you in my life as more than just my friend.
And maybe it was on the fly for me, too, but selfishly, I saw it as an opportunity to see if you could feel the same about me as I did you.
But if you’re truly considering this, then I just …
” I place both hands on the top of my head, pacing.
“We’re not playing house, Brooke. I want to be the first thing you touch in the morning and the last thing you taste at night.
This is very real for me. And I thought it was for you too. ”
“It’s real to me too. Can we just forget this for now? We both have a lot going on, and as I explained to my dad, it’s not something I’m considering. Let’s just focus on school and you getting ready for the draft.”
“I think … I just need to think about all of this. It took me off guard because I hadn’t even realized this was an actual conversation you had with your dad.”
“It was on the plane on the way home. We haven’t talked about it since then until today. This wasn’t my doing.” She cries.