Chapter 1 #3
“No! I don’t need you doing that. I just… Hawk, I need a hug. Please.”
“Okay, okay. I’ve got you, Sissy. Come here.
” Hawk wrapped his arms around her and she sobbed into her big brother’s chest. Just like she had all the times her parents would scold them for fighting.
Just like she had the time they were riding bikes at their family’s camp one summer and she fell over, scraping almost all the skin right off her shin.
This felt a million times more painful, though.
Like her whole body was raw. “I really want to put my fist in his face.”
Her laugh came out watery as she shook her head. “Don’t b-be an idiot. I’m a grown woman.” Her hand came up to wipe under her runny nose. “God, I need a tissue.”
Hawk chuckled. “Yeah, you do. You’re a mess.”
“Thanks.”
“Come on. Your messy ass is going to sit on the couch while I bring you some tissues and hot cocoa, and then you’re going to tell me how the hell I missed my best friend hooking up with my sister for all this time.”
Hawk’s arm banded around her shoulders, guiding her towards the couch. She sat, patiently waiting for tissues, then her mug of hot cocoa, before spilling every last one of the secrets she’d been keeping from him.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have ever let it get this far.
It was just supposed to be fun.” She sighed, her sight laser focused on one of the pictures Hawk had displayed in a tiny frame on their television stand.
It was his SEAL team, before one of their last missions, with another group of men she didn’t recognize.
Stone was standing next to Hawk, his hand gripping her brother’s shoulder.
“I don’t… I don’t know what to say. Except that I love him, and I don’t think I’ll ever know how not to. I’m sorry. I messed everything up.”
“Don’t be sorry for loving him, Mae.” Hawk scraped his hand down his face. “And you didn’t mess anything up. It sounds like Stone needs to get his face rearranged and then maybe he can screw his head back on right.”
“Don’t hurt him. Not using my honor as a reason. We are both grown adults. He told me from the beginning nothing serious could ever come from what we were doing. I didn’t listen.”
“Classic Mae Morgan.” Hawk’s shoulder dipped and bumped into hers, a small smile breaking out on his face.
“Yeah, classic me. Anyway, you should go back to sleep. I’m going to take a shower, crawl into bed, and not move for the next month.”
“You think the girls will let you do that?”
She shrugged.
“You think I’ll let you do that?” he asked.
“You don’t get a say.”
“I do when I know your stinky ass would start smelling up the apartment.”
God, her brother was still just as annoying sitting there, a fully grown man, as he was when they were both still kids.
“Funny.” Her reply was meant to be sarcastic, but her small smile gave her away.
“I still need to talk to him.”
“Hawk—”
“No way, Mae. It’s gotta happen. And if you’re up here crying, he can be awake too, explaining to me why the fuck he broke your heart.”
That moment was always going to come. Stone had known it from the very first kiss they shared.
It was just for fun. It was just to get it out of their systems. This–this insane, written-in-the-stars attraction he felt to Mae–was wrong.
She was a grown woman who could absolutely put the fiercest warrior right in their place, but Mae was still his best friend’s little sister.
There was always an endpoint. But understanding that didn’t make seeing her tears any easier.
It didn’t make the hours of arguing feel any less distressing.
Knowing he’d broken her heart fucking shattered Stone.
He never wanted to do that. Because even in the moments when he swore it wasn’t happening, Stone had fallen in love with Mae.
God, he hated himself. The look on her face, down on her knees begging him to change his mind…
it was going to haunt him for the rest of his life.
His stomach pitched, but that only made him want to run harder.
Faster. Longer. The pounding punishment of his feet against the pavement was the only thing that would save his sanity now.
Hawk was going to find out. And then he’d lose his best friend.
To be honest, he’d expected his phone to be blowing up by now. He would completely understand Mae going back to her apartment with Hawk and waking him up to spill their secret. He’d wasted almost two years of her life.
But at the beginning, he’d had hope. They were walking towards a white dress and wedding bells.
He was thinking of buying a house and hearing little feet running on the floor in the mornings to get to him.
But the shadows came for him. And he wouldn’t let their poison touch her. Not like he already had.
Shit, he wouldn’t stop Hawk’s punches. He deserved them.
At least Silver Springs was quiet at that hour.
It almost always was when he’d run early in the morning.
Unless one of his buddies decided to join him, there usually wasn’t another soul that he’d cross paths with.
It was normally a very peaceful way to start the day.
But there was nothing nice about that morning.
His stomach churned more, a pain he never wanted to leave him, because it served a purpose. A reminder of how much Mae meant to him. Enough to protect her from everything, including himself.
Stone stopped in front of Dolly’s, his hands resting on his knees as he tried to suck in all the air to try and clear the ache in his chest right in the diner’s parking lot.
How had he let things get so bad? He was the first person to push his teammates into therapy. And yet, he’d resisted for so long. What a fucking hypocrite! There was nothing stopping him from having it all, except his own stubbornness.
He’d had to let her go. Waking up as his hands wrapped around her arm so crushing it had left bruises… Christ. He’d wanted to turn himself in for assault, but Mae was so quick to dismiss what had happened.
Headlights flooded the building from behind him. Stone turned, looking at the vehicle that had slowed to barely a crawl as it moved towards him. Somewhere in the back of his mind, alarm bells started going off. There was no reason someone should have their high beams on like that.
He shielded his eyes as the car pulled over, the window slowly rolling down. A shadow sat in the passenger seat, but after a few blinks to adjust his eyes to the darkness, recognition blazed through him.
“What are you… it’s been you this whole time?”
“Payback, old friend.”
Stone froze as an arm reached out through the rolled down window. The gun pointed directly at his chest went off without a second thought.
His body jerked, launching into the air as he tripped over his own feet in surprise at the impact. The car sped off, leaving him suspended in his confusion. Stone looked down, his hand pressing against the pain his body was starting to process. When he pulled it away, blood came away with it.
Shit.
Two shots.
Two bullet wounds.
From the way it was hard to breath, there was likely one shot that did some damage to his chest. The low burning in his abdomen from the other said the second shot was in his belly.
The weight of his body finally caused his legs to buckle.
As his body crashed down to the road, Stone was faintly aware of his proximity to the curb.
But there was nothing he could do. His body was moving infinitely slower than his mind, until the moment his head smashed into the concrete, and everything went black.
“Doc!”
“Doc!! Damn it!”
Someone was calling for him. Stone wanted to answer. Desperately. He wanted to open his eyes. To crawl out of the darkness. But there was something, some reason, why he couldn’t.
“Mae…”
Hands gripped his arms, rolling him onto his back. Blinding pain ignited again in his chest. Why was this asshole hurting him?
At least he didn’t have to deal with breathing dirt anymore. Although, from the rapidly deteriorating state of his body, he’d bet that soon, he wouldn’t be breathing at all. Stone’s eyes rolled off the dark, unforgiving night sky, to the man next to him. The one trying to save his life.
The one who should be trying to end it. Hawk.
“Shit. You’re fucking bleeding out. Fuck…. I need…”
“Stop,” he moaned. “Mae…”
“No. Fuck no. You’re not dying with things still left to say to my sister.
Like how you’re fucking sorry you broke her heart and it was the biggest fucking mistake of your life.
HOW MANY RINGS DOES IT TAKE FOR FUCKING 9-1-1 TO ANSWER!
Don’t you dare think you are leaving this life without me getting to beat the shit out of you for making my sister love you and then breaking her heart.
And don’t get me started about how pissed I am you didn’t tell me about you guys. ”
“Mae…”
“I need an ambulance. Silver Springs. Ford Avenue, in front of Dolly’s diner. My friend has two bullet wounds he’s bleeding out from. One in his chest and one in his abdomen. He’s not… it’s going to be okay, Stone. Just stay with me. There's a lot of blood, and he’s out of it… right. Yes.”
Acceptance washed over Stone. This was it. The moment he’d witnessed too many people go through in his life. Those souls had been taken in war. And his was being taken for the war he started within himself.
“Keep your fucking eyes open. Help is coming. Don’t you even think of making me responsible for telling Mae you’re gone from this world. Don’t do that to me. That’s a fucking order, Frogman!”
“Not… my… command.”
“Fuck you…” The world around Stone began to dissolve away in a swirl of darkness. “No, hey, Doc, no no no. Keep your eyes focused on me. Okay? You just keep looking at my pretty face. It’ll keep you going. Focus on me.”
His vision was gone, nothing but darkness now.
There was no feeling in his arms or his legs.
In fact, every part of his body felt distant.
Muted. Warm. Like he was floating through an early morning fog.
Stone’s chest no longer hurt. Neither did his head or his belly.
And the truth in that moment crushed him.
He was dying.
Fast.
There was one last thing he needed to say. The only thing that mattered. As he fought to breathe, fought to speak, she was the only thing on his mind. He might not be able to see, but he could feel her there, her warmth, right by his side.
Stone smiled as Mae laid her hand on his cheek, kissing his forehead.
Come on, handsome. Let’s go home. Her voice sang out around him as the last, hardest working parts of his body finally gave up.
“Love you… always.”