Chapter 14 #4
Though he shouted at her, he still wouldn’t look at her.
Toni, really wishing she had long legs like him, was not going to give up.
“You think I don’t know that? You think I was blind to what happened in there?
I saw it, Liam! I saw your face and your eyes.
I know how close it was. But you didn’t! You powered through!”
She caught a true glimpse of his face in the headlight of the van and saw just how pale he was. His eyes looked haunted, even more so than the first day they met.
“Don’t romanticize this like one of your books! I didn’t come to some mystic realization that I loved you more than heroin! I acted on instinct, nothing more. He hurt you, I hurt him back. I didn’t protect you. I didn’t guard you or help you. I didn’t choose you.”
He jerked in another direction, successfully avoiding her. Toni could only imagine what they looked like with her half-running to catch up to his long strides. At least she was still wearing the boots from their bike ride and wasn’t trying to trail him in her heels.
“You think I still don’t know that?” she asked him again. “I know exactly what happened in there. I know you had no idea that heroin was laced and that you likely didn’t intend to kill Cross. I also know how much you wanted to kill him.”
“You knew what I was, what I am,” he called back to her. “You know damn well he wasn’t my first kill and he likely won’t be my last.”
“I know!” Toni shouted, starting to lose her breath. She was not a runner like he was.
“Then why are you even here? Why are you even talking to me?”
Toni had a hand on her ribs as a stitch started to pull in her side. “Well, last I checked, I was a killer, too.”
Ranger actually snorted at her words. “You can’t compare us. We’re nothing alike.”
Toni ignored that, still trailing after him like some fucked up game of tag. “Oh, I’m sorry, Mr. Big Bad Solider Man. Would you feel better if I enlisted in the army and then we can compare our top three kills?”
Ranger let out a loud groan before rounding on her.
Somehow they’d traced along the lawn so many times that they were on the side of the house, opposite the driveway.
Though darker on this side, she could still make out his features clear enough.
“You think I’m talking about the Army? I was a killer long before I wore a flag on my shoulder and Uncle Sam signed my paychecks.
You think I’d allow a worthless worm like my birth father to survive what he did to my mom?
The day he got out of jail, I followed him to a bar, dragged him out into an alley and beat him to death.
I was sixteen. That is who I am, Antonia.
That is who you are trying to claim saved your life.
” His jaw tightened, but at least he didn’t look away from her.
“Want to know the ironic part? I have hated that man my entire life,” he shrugged, “and it turns out I’m just like him. ”
Toni’s heart broke for the young man he’d been, for the wounded man he was now.
She carefully stepped forward, not wanting him to bolt again.
Reaching for his arm, Toni lowered her hand to his.
His fingers felt cold as ice, and he held them still as she laced her fingers through his.
“Well, since we’re both guilty of patricide, you better hope it’s not hereditary if we ever have kids. ”
Ranger blinked down at her before a chuckle escaped him. He shook his head. “Why are you here, Antonia? Why are out on this lawn chasing me down? I’m not worth it.”
She grabbed his chin firmly in her hand, bending his head downward toward her.
“We just survived hell and we’re both still standing.
You’re crazy if you think I’d be anywhere else.
” Toni squeezed his hand. “Baby, I’m not asking for miracles.
But I knew exactly what it was I was getting into when I jumped into your bed.
Actually, it was more like the side of your tow truck, but that’s beside the point.
I’m not with you because you’re an addict.
I’m not with you because I have this grand illusion that I can cure you and we can ride off into the sunset together.
I am with you because you make me feel whole, complete.
I know what just happened could have turned very differently.
I know that there will be bad days in our future.
Hopefully, not as bad as your sponsor trying to murder us,” she mused.
“I think that counts as an extremely bad day.”
He grunted. “Understatement. Pretty sure I need a new sponsor.”
Toni laughed, a feeling of lightness filling her at his ability to joke.
“Liam, I don’t know if I love you. A part of me feels it’s too soon to say while another part of me wonders why I haven’t said it yet.
All I know is I am willing to fight to figure it out.
” She jiggled his chin gently. “The question isn’t whether you’re worth fighting for.
It’s whether you’re willing to fight for the future I know we can build together. ”
“If you don’t marry that woman, I will!” came from Toni’s left.
Toni and Ranger turned in unison to see the entire club present on the front stoop of the house watching them like their love life was a soap opera on TV. Seeing as Jigsaw was the only single man present, she could only assume he was the one who’d shouted.
In response to his brother’s proposal, Ranger linked an arm around Toni’s middle and pulled her into his chest. He sent a scowl towards the house that was menacing enough that the men scattered, acting like they just realized they had things to do and a body to clean up.
Laughing, Toni turned into his hold. “I’ll take that as a ‘yes’.”
He nodded. “I asked you once for patience, and I’m going to ask you for some more.
The last time I told a woman I loved her, I didn’t mean it.
I said it because she expected to hear it, even though I knew it was a lie.
I can’t and won’t lie to you, baby. When I say those words to you, it’s going to be a sure thing and there will be no going back for either of us. ”
“There’s no going back now,” she assured him. “And I can wait for the words, because I’d rather they be true than meaningless.”
Ranger stared down at her. “I want to kiss you, but I just threw up twice in the grass…” He grimaced.
Toni nodded. “Good call. I’ll definitely take a raincheck, though,” she added with a smile.
Resting his forehead against hers, Ranger held her like she was the only thing keeping him standing. “Definitely, and I want my cut on you. I might not be able to give you those words, but I can give you that.”
“I only want it if you’re ready to give it to me.”
He nodded against her. “I wouldn’t have said it if I wasn’t.”
A loud whistle drew their attention back to the front stoop where Ghost was waiting. “Hey, love birds, now that you’re not running around like chickens with your heads cut off, maybe you’d like to explain just what the fuck happened here?”
* * *
180 Days Sober
Ranger stepped up to the podium. Between his fingers, he rotated the green chip around, his eyes transfixed on the roman numeral “VI” engraved inside a diamond and a circle on the front. It weighed no more than a quarter, and yet Ranger wasn’t sure if he’d ever held anything so momentous before.
“I remember the day I got my scroll. I kept thinking that it wasn’t real.
There was no way I passed Ranger School and RASP.
I must have had an accident somewhere along the way, I was now in a coma, and this was some lucid dream.
How could I possibly have survived that?
In case anyone had any visions of grandeur, think again.
Sixty-one days of Ranger School followed by eight weeks of RASP, Ranger Assessment and Selection Program.
One hundred and seventeen days total of brutal training.
Sleep deprivation, food deprivation, rucking for miles with packs that weighed on average seventy pounds, climbing, rappelling, high altitude training, hand-to-hand combat…
All while smelling like we’d crawled around in a sewer. It was hell.”
He held up his six-month coin to show the overpacked hall of his fellow NA members, Colby the Arrogant Asshole and Ranger’s new sponsor, his club brothers and their families, his mom, his very pregnant sister, and Toni, who was beaming up at him like today was the proudest day of her life.
“There wasn’t a day that went by these past one hundred and eighty days where I didn’t miss that hell, and yet, once again I survived.
I made it. I know this isn’t the end. I know my struggles will continue.
But I also know that if I can make it through that, I can make it through anything.
” He tapped the podium in front of him, nodding to himself.
“My name is Liam, and I’m a heroin addict, but most importantly, I’m okay.
I’ll be okay, because even if I trip and stumble, or even fall down, I know I will get back up again.
I know I’ll keep fighting, not just for me, but for those who love me and whom I love. Thank you for letting me share.”
* * *
221 Days Sober
“How long is this going to take?” Ranger grumbled, not for the first time.
“When you grow a uterus and the ability to push a baby out a ten centimeter hole in your body, you get to judge how long the birthing process takes,” Toni drawled from behind her book. “Until then, sit down. You’re wearing a hole in the floor.”
Ranger sat, feeling jittery and anxious. “Maybe I should go back there. What if she needs something?”
“Something that her husband, mother, and an entire team of doctors and nurses can’t get for her?”
Ranger let out a noise of frustration. “You’re not helping.”
Toni lowered the book and raised an eyebrow. “Would you prefer I distract you by taking you into that broom closet and having my wicked way with you?”