
Beware of falling in love with the boy across the street.

Disappearing from their dangerous life in Chicago, Ginny and her mother went from riches to rags by way of a new life in the sleepy, rural suburbs of New York. Under the illusion of safety, Ginny blossomed into a beautiful young woman with hopes and dreams for a future her mother was determined she would have.

Lucas Young, her best friend's oldest brother, was the dashing hero in all of her dreams. The man she fantasized about sweeping her off her feet and giving her the happily ever after she had only heard about in her mother's fairytales.

Sometimes, reality wasn't what we wanted it to be, though.

What would happen when Ginny found out Lucas wasn't her Prince Charming after all? Instead, he was a rough and tumble soldier in extremely tarnished armor who had a propensity to break her heart.

Maybe happily ever after wasn't meant for everyone.

Warning: _This is the first book in a three-part serial spin-off from the Ex Ops Series. Each of the three books will feature a piece of Lucas & Ginny's story and leads directly into the next installment. _IN OTHER WORDS, THIS STORY ENDS ON A CLIFFHANGER. _Also, be fair warned this half of their story will make you laugh, cry, and possibly throw your e-reader at the wall._
Raves for the novels by

JESSIE LANE

Secret Maneuvers

"...I couldn't put it down. It's not just the love story between Belle and Bobby, the suspense, the action, the drama, the friendships, the loyalty... I could go on and on. There is relatability to the characters, it's a well written, well thought out and developed plot... I loved this one, by far one of my top ten reads so far this year!"

\- Chelsea Camaron, USA Today Best-Selling Author

"First loves, second chances, and too many heart-stopping moments to count!! Secret Maneuvers is without a doubt sure to be a huge hit, because this story is romance magic from page one up until the very end!! I lost count of how many times I had to use the highlight feature on my iPad with this story, there were just so many great moments and lines that I wanted to go back to! Whether they were tender or filled with raw emotion, hilarious or beautiful, this was just one of those stories that gives you a little of everything to endure and enjoy!"

\- The Autumn Review

"The author manages a lightness and humorous atmosphere, even though the story is highly emotional at the same time... Not only does it have bone-melting romance but thrilling action scenes as well. The writing is, as always, engaging and draws you in on page 1. I'm excited to find out who is next in the Ex Ops series! If you haven't read Jessie Lane yet, what are you waiting for?"

\- Swept Away By Romance

Stripping Her Defenses

"STRIPPING HER DEFENSES Blew. Me. Away! I liked this one even better then the first book, SECRET MANEUVERS. The characters were engaging, the pacing perfection, and the story-line was dynamic. This is Jessie Lane's best work yet!"

\- Reading Between the Wines Book Club

"In this installment, Lane addresses the serious topics of depression, death, and how to deal with being married to a military spouse. A deep emotional tidal wave ebbs and flows throughout the story as Lane flips back and forth to let us see the reasons behind a failed marriage and the steps one woman takes to reclaim her life and self-worth. Steamy sex scenes spice things up the storyline while heart to heart dialogue keeps the story from becoming just another "trope." Humor injects randomly to offset the somber tones while interesting new characters are introduced to announce a spin off series Lane is creating with fellow writer, Chelsea Cameron."

\- Smexy Books

Ice

"There is angst, yes. There is drama, yes. There is suspense, yes. There is sexiness, yes. But I think what it is, the reason behind why I liked this so much is the reason behind the MC. The driving force, the reason why they do what they do, why they were founded. I don't know that I have read a book like this one before."

\- Books chocolate and lipgloss

"The action in this book truly has you on the edge of your seat. Chelsea and Jessie have you smiling and then nervous with each page turned. There was one scene that I was shocked and gutted. It was hard for me to read (and I have read some shocking, gruesome scenes) but this one...WOW this one was truly shocking!"

\- Halos and Horns Book Blog

Hammer

"This story was so much more than I expected... I just love a badass with a warm gooey center!"

\- Belle's Book Bag

"I have waiting for a year for Hammer and it was WELL worth the wait. Camaron and Lane did not disappoint in this story. I actually think they kicked the volume WAY up in this one with Hammer and Desirae. This story was intense and sexy... If you enjoy a different type of MC romance, then definitely add this series to your TBR list."

\- The Book Chick
Sweet Agony

Ex Ops Series #3 / Sweet Series #1

By Jessie Lane

Copyright © 2016 by Jessie Lane

Published by Whiskey Girls Publishing

All rights reserved.

Edited by C&D Editing, Asli Fratarcangeli, Read Head Editing & Shannon Webb

Cover Design by Cover Me Darling

For more information on Jessie Lane:

http://jessielanebooks.com/

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Copyright © 2016 by Jessie Lane

SMASHWORDS EDITION

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of Jessie Lane, except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976. If you no longer want this book, you may not give your copy to someone else.

The purchase of this e-book allows you one legal copy for your own personal reading enjoyment on your personal computer or device. You do not have the rights to resell, distribute, print, or transfer this book, in whole or in part, to anyone, in any format, via methods either currently known or yet to be invented, or upload to a file sharing peer to peer program. It may not be re-sold or given away to other people. Such action is illegal and in violation of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. If you no longer want this book, you may not give your copy to someone else. Delete it from your computer. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Trademarks: This book identifies product names and services known to be trademarks, registered trademarks, or service marks of their respective holders. The authors acknowledge the trademarked status in this work of fiction. The publication and use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

This book contains mature content not suitable for readers under the age of 18. This book contains content with strong language, violence, and sexual situations. All parties portrayed in sexual situations are over the age of 18.
Other Titles from Jessie Lane

Ex Ops Series

Secret Maneuvers

Stripping Her Defenses

Mission Delivery

Sweet Agony

Sweet Recovery

Sweet Eternity

Bullets and Bluebonnets

Regulators MC Series

(co-written with Chelsea Camaron)

Ice

Hammer

Coal

Big Bad Bite Series

Big Bad Bite

Walk On The Striped Side

Big Bad Bite Returned

The Demon Who Loved Me

Star Series

(co-written with M.L. Pahl)

The Burning Star

The Frozen Star

Standalone Stories

Close Encounters of the Sexy Kind

(co-written with Abbie Zanders)

Purrfect Santa

(co-written with Chasity Bowlin)

The Alpha's Secret Family

Lone Wolf Wanted

Sassy and a little Bad-Assy

Bears Do It Better
Sweet Agony

Sweet Series Book 1

&

Ex Ops Series Book 3

Jessie Lane

Dedication

This book is dedicated to every reader who stuck with me, encouraged me, and understood my struggles with depression in 2015. I'll never be able to express how truly grateful I am for each and every one of you. I'm humbled that you would show me so much love and understanding. Thank you.

I'd also like to send out a HUGE THANK YOU to Barbara New and Katrina King for bidding to be characters in Lucas and Ginny's story to benefit my Shot Through the Heart Fundraiser. You ladies are totally amazing.

Love,

Jessie Lane

Acknowledgements

This book is a year in the making. Which is seriously crazy, because the book isn't that bloody long. Life decided to throw me a number of major curveballs though, so at least in the end, I finally get to share Lucas and Ginny with you.

In that time, I had a handful of people cheering me on, picking me up every time I fell down, and pushing me forward. My best friend Chelsea Camaron, I don't know how I would have made it through 2015 without you. I know Lucas and Ginny definitely would not be here without you! Thanks babe, for being there when I needed someone the most.

Fellow authors and super-duper friends I adore: Lani Lynn Vale, Abbie Zanders, and Ryan Michele. My editors Asli, Alizon and Kristin: you ladies are amazing and I appreciate you so much. And some readers who are totally kick-ass and check in on me to make sure I haven't disappeared into the sunset on my crazy-train: Barbara New, J-Action Jackson, Donna Piecora, Sonya Covert and Angie Stanton. If I missed anyone, I'm terribly sorry! Please don't burn me at the stake.
Table of Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Note From The Author

About The Author

Connected Books

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Prologue

Lucas

Letting the love of my life go was not the hardest thing I had ever done. No, there was something much worse—pushing her away when every fiber of my being told me she should be mine yet couldn't be.

See, when you let someone go, there was that whole cliché phrase everyone heard at least once that, if the person loved you, they would come back to you, and then they were yours forever. When you pushed the person you loved away, however... Well, that was a whole different story.

My parents had raised me to cherish and protect the ones I loved. The bonds formed in my lifetime had always run strong. The very core of who I was came down to the ideals of loyalty and responsibility. Some might say it was the first born child mentality. I didn't give a shit what anyone called it. When it all came down to the bare bones of reality, those strong bonds were eventually what led to me ending up as I was now: alone.

Ginny DuBois was the girl who had lived across the street during my childhood. She was my baby sister's best friend, the scared girl with big blue eyes and the face of an angel. She had worked her way into my heart, and once she'd had it, I had never wanted it back. Too bad she didn't know what she had been carrying with her for all this time.

I had resigned myself years ago to not having her the way I wanted. To be brutally honest, it was more than mere want with Ginny. She was the only craving I couldn't fulfill, an addiction I couldn't ease. Eventually, I realized she was the oxygen I needed to breathe. And now, it felt like I had been slowly suffocating for years.

You see, my strategy to keep her at a distance was to protect her from the dangers and heartbreaks of the life I lived. It didn't mean I ever planned on letting her go, at least not entirely.

Not having her the way I wanted her was never supposed to mean not having her in my life at all, only keep her at a safe distance. Never once had I planned on living a life where I didn't see her sweet face every once in a while. I had planned on enough contact to make sure she was breathing easy, living life, and simply happy. Now I saw why "they" said the path to hell was paved with good intentions.

The sweet agony of my plan to give her up had blown up in my face when she had disappeared without a single trace.

The sooner I found her, the sooner she would know just how deep my feelings ran. The time had come for her to know what she'd had all along.
Chapter

1

Lucas

Thirty Years Old

Present Day

Why couldn't I be in Miami on vacation? Instead, I sat in my commander's hotel room with almost all of my team members, waiting for the two Sullivan brothers to show up so we could begin our meeting on the status of our mission here.

Leaning back in the hotel's shabby green arm chair, my hands folded over my stomach, I gave the impression that I was relaxed and nonchalant. It was a façade I had perfected years ago during my time in the Special Forces as a Green Beret. On the inside, I was ready to strike at any perceived threat, responding to any call to action from my commander or fellow team members.

I might not be in the Army anymore, but my life as a deep undercover operative in the black ops unit was not so different. There were only a handful of people who even knew of our existence, including the president of the United States and our CIA handler who had formed the Ex Ops team. My missions were always top secret, dangerous, and sometimes paramount to national security, but they were also off the government's books. When they couldn't send in the SEALs, Green Berets, Rangers, or the Marines, they sent us.

There was always the chance that we might be caught by our enemies, and if that ever happened, the president himself would deny any knowledge or approval of our actions. That was something we all had known when we signed on for this unit.

For some, such as my teammate Arturo Chavez, there was no family or anyone who would miss them if they disappeared. For others, like me, there was too much that had been seen, so you distanced yourself from everyone as much as they would allow, including immediate family, to keep them from the inevitable loss.

I'd let my parents, two brothers, and one very annoying little sister think I worked in private security and investigations. They didn't need to know any differently. After all, the reality of my job would only cause them undue worry. It wasn't that they wouldn't understand; it was that I didn't want to explain my decisions.

The Army had fulfilled my need to serve my country. The Ex Ops team allowed me to truly make a difference in the world when politics made things tricky for the higher ups. I still had to follow orders, and my life felt like one giant secret after another, but it felt damn good to know I served as one of the men they called in to kick ass instead of giving up.

There were only two things that bothered me about my job.

One, the men in my unit were some of the best men I had ever met in my life. I could trust every single one of them to have my back. The problem was I'd lost too many guys I had called "brother" on missions gone wrong. Somewhere along the way, I had shut down my emotions—call it emotional survival. I still did my job and still watched the other men's backs, but I no longer invested myself in their lives like I had with other people before. Keeping myself separate allowed me to focus more on the mission and worry less about who wasn't going to come home at the end of the day.

That might make me sound like a heartless bastard, but it made me a deadly predator. Being on the top of my game meant there was a greater chance every man on my team might come home. It also meant I could move on to the next mission without my mind and emotions tied to the last. In my world, this was a necessary skill.

I'd had more than one superior officer complain that I was too much of a lone wolf when I was still in the Army. Nothing about me had changed since then except for the fact that I had joined a unit where it was easier to hide my solo tendencies.

Regret number two about my job?

It often kept me so busy I had little time to devote to looking for the girl who had gotten away. I watched as some of the guys around me found their second chances with the things they had fucked up, and it gave me hope I shouldn't allow myself to have. The more time that passed, the more the hope crawled inside me.

I had pushed her away, but I damn sure hadn't let her go. I just needed to find her so I could tell her that. With every mission, I felt like I needed to right the wrong even more. The longer I waited, the more I wondered if I would ever get the chance.

"Young, did you get any further intel from your connection?" Commander Wall's question pulled me from my dark thoughts. He was talking about my connection to the Regulators Motorcycle Club. I had served with Ice, the prez, in the Army. Brett 'Ice' Grady and some of our old Green Beret teammates had their own thing going on now in the Regulators MC.

I shook my head. "Trust me when I say they're tight-lipped bastards. If they know anything more than they told us, Ice isn't sharing it. I highly doubt that's the case, though." I didn't think they would withhold anything that might help us in the current situation. Too many women in their territory were disappearing. They wanted the operation shut down as much as we did.

Jaxon gave a curt nod. "Good. As soon as Declan and Riley get here, we can debrief and plan our next move."

Commander Jaxon Wall was a former SEAL. He lived and breathed to lead this unit. The man had no personal life to tell of or ties that could lead anyone back to anything on him.

I scanned the room. Bobby Baker was present. He, like me, had come from the Army. As a Ranger, he had taken a bullet to the leg, which had resulted in his medical discharge. Beside him sat Arturo Chavez, the Marine who had come out of MARSOC—Marine Corps Special Operations Command—with a reputation as one ruthless motherfucker. Wyatt Brooks was leaned back on the rear two legs of his chair. The former Air Force Pararescueman now served as our team medic. Chase Anderson stood silently in the corner, watching. Having been recruited from the CIA, he was the one member of our team who had not served in the military.

Logan Price was tapping some random beat on his thighs with his thumbs. He had also served in the Marines as a sniper in MARSOC. The good ol' Texas boy swore he could shoot a flea off a cat's ass at a thousand yards. That might have been his way of joking about his skills, but I doubted any terrorist would find anything about him a laughing matter. Besides, maybe he really could knock a flea off a cat's ass. Either way, we were all currently waiting on the Sullivans.

It came as no surprise that the Sullivan brothers were late. The two men were some of the best the Navy SEALs had to offer, but they were also hell on wheels. Riley Sullivan was self-destructive and had apparently been that way since his marriage had ended in divorce after his wife lost their first child in a car accident. Declan Sullivan couldn't stop sticking his dick into any pussy thrown at him.

We were all recruited from different walks of life to assemble as the proverbial boogie man to scare those in the world who wouldn't normally fear anything or anyone. The problem was, dealing with scum like that on a regular basis tainted a man's soul. It covered us in a film of darkness that made it hard to see the light of day sometimes.

Baker was lucky enough to have a woman he could go home to at the end of a mission, someone to help him erase the bad. The rest of us had to drown our demons in other ways. Regardless, every single man here wouldn't turn down any mission we were given if it helped an innocent in need. Hence, why we were here in Miami—to avenge Annabelle, Laura, and every other woman who had been kidnapped, tortured, and much worse by this particular ring of slavers who were selling women like cattle—after we had gotten a tip from one of my old Army connections.

Hoping to finally shut down the man who was behind it all, I could feel my trigger finger twitching. I was ready for action. As much I liked the positives of being around scantily clad women in the strip club the Regulators MC owned and riding a kickass bike as an undercover biker in their group, I needed to be busy. This sitting idle shit was for the birds, because when I wasn't busy, my mind travelled to the one person who was always at the back of my thoughts, haunting me like a bad dream I never woke up from.

Ginny.

Ginny

Twenty-Seven Years Old

Present Day

I had to get the hell out of Chicago for a few days before I went crazy! Or even worse... before I moved in with my new fiancé and that shiny new cage of mine. Not that Sanjay had been cruel or frightened me in the manner my own father did. It was because, if he was in business with Richard Wellington, then he couldn't be trusted.

I wished I could comfort myself with the idea that nobody could be worse than my father, but I was smart enough to know that just wasn't true. Subsequently, on the off chance that Sanjay Kahn was worse than Richard Wellington, I was going to take a vacation.

I needed a chance to live it up one last time before coming back to Chicago and submitting myself to a future as Mrs. Kahn. One last chance to pretend I was wild and free without a care in the world. One last chance to pretend for a few precious days that I was Ginny DuBois again.

Only, this time, Ginny DuBois wasn't going to get her white knight drunk and seduce him. Nope. This time, Ginny DuBois was going to get drunk her damn self and have a no strings involved screw-a-thon for the first time in her life.

It sounded like a damn good vacation plan to me.

Now I just had to figure out how I was going to talk my father into letting me go.

Movement out of the corner of my eye caught my attention and reminded me that Barbara was cleaning up my suite. Somehow, my vodka-soaked brain knew that was a good sign for my vacation. Barbara had always been the one to help me with whatever I needed in the past. Lord knew I probably needed all the help I could get, and not just because I was essentially a prisoner of my own father.

Poor Barbara had gone from cleaning up cartons upon cartons of ice cream after I first arrived to now picking up vodka bottles. Half the time, she also had to help me get into bed from this very living room chair that I so often passed out in. It wasn't like I was proud to be a drunk, but unlike ice cream, it helped me get through this hell I called my life.

"Yoo-hoo! Bar-bar-ra!" I waved in her direction, knowing I was acting ridiculous and not caring. "Help a girl out. What's a good excuse to take an impromptu trip out of Chicago right now? Something dear ol' Daddy will let me do?"

The maid never missed a step due to my antics, continuing to dust. Although, I did see the left side of her mouth kick up in a smile she couldn't quite contain.

"Looking to get away, Miss Wellington?" she asked almost primly.

"Yes!" I shouted excitedly.

Barbara whipped around at my loud shout and put a finger to her lips in a shush motion. Her eyes were glued in the direction of the door that connected my suite to the other rooms. My father and/or his men could come through it at any given second.

When no one appeared, Barbara quickly made her way to my side of the living room while supposedly dusting along her way. She leaned over and whispered, "Did you hear about the new line Donna Karan is showing in Miami next week?"

Lost as to where Barbara was heading with this, I answered somewhat groggily, "No? What of it?"

The maid's grin grew a bit more, and she shook her head at me as if she thought I was impossible. "Did you forget? You're about to meet your intended's parents. Surely, you need a new wardrobe for that?" she inquired somewhat tauntingly.

The idea took a few seconds to truly penetrate my drunken brain, but when it finally did, I gave the air a sloppy fist bump. "Eureka! You're a genius, woman."

Barbara picked up my empty vodka glass and headed toward the kitchen. "Now take a nap and sleep off what you drank. You'll need your wits about you when you talk to your father about it later."

Leaning back so my head was propped up on the plush, high-back of the chair, I closed my eyes and felt a genuine smile spread across my face. Barbara truly was a genius, and knowing my father, he wouldn't say no to his daughter's desire to go buy some new clothes to impress her future in-laws.

However, while dear ol' Daddy thought I was shopping the runway, I was going to have my toes in the sand as I drank a margarita under a palm tree and scoped out a hot piece of man flesh to erase my self-appointed celibacy.

Before I lost consciousness, a vision of hazel eyes set in a familiar, tanned face, embellished with a teasing smile, and short, soft, brown hair so dark it almost looked black floated across my mind. As my heart clenched with a sorrow I was too drunk to brush off, I made myself a silent promise to find the hottest blond I could, pretend he was that actor who played Thor, and ride his proverbial hammer until I forgot what this pain had ever felt like.
Chapter

2

Lucas

Just the thought of her name caused my chest to seize with fresh pain. Respecting her wishes not to contact her had been the hardest thing I had done in my life, but somehow, I had managed. At least, until the day my sister had called me, sobbing because neither she nor my parents had heard from Gin in months.

They had no forwarding address, and she apparently had disconnected her cell phone a few weeks after she had left New York, practically disappearing overnight from our hometown. That was years ago now.

Guilt, rage, and unnamed emotions flooded me upon finding out she had pushed my family out of her life. Her request that I not contact her had been granted, so why had she felt my sister and family had to be punished for my mistakes?

At night, when the memories of bombs, burning bodies, and war haunted me, it was thoughts of the young woman from across the street with a soft touch, a halo of shining hair, and vibrant hues of marker smudged on her skin from her endless drawing that kept me from going completely insane.

She had never known it, but she had been my lullaby. Just the thought of her had soothed my soul, bringing me a small slice of peace to keep me from picking up my weapon and ending it all. But since she had disappeared, reality had crashed down on me.

Finding her and giving her the sort of life she deserved was going to be my redemption from all of the sins and regrets of my past. If I could get her to forgive me and love me again, that would be my reward for surviving what others around me had not. I just wished I could have figured all of this out and pulled my head from my ass before I had broken what I knew now, without a doubt, was mine to protect: her heart.

It was killing me slowly every day not to see or speak to my angel, but I kept myself going with one little hope: one day, Gin would return to me.

It might be an impossible dream, but it was all I had left to keep me going.

A knock on the hotel room's door brought me out of dark thoughts, and I looked over to see Baker opening it. I couldn't see his face, but I could hear the smile in his voice when he spoke to the person on the other side.

"Heard you caught yourself a pretty, little kitty."

Riley Sullivan's gruff voice replied swiftly, "Shut the fuck up, Baker."

The older Sullivan brother walked into the room and gave us all a chin lift. After he scanned the entire room, he asked, "Where's Dec?"

I coughed, trying to cover up my laugh. The man should have known exactly where his brother was. It was where he always was—inside some woman.

Declan Sullivan was by far the biggest man-whore I had ever met. That was saying something since most men in the military spent what little spare time they had on the hunt for a beautiful woman to bury themselves in.

Giving Jaxon a sideways glance, I answered, "I believe he was enjoying some _Candy_. He should be here soon."

Snorting at my barely veiled answer, Baker plopped his ass in the chair next to Riley. "So... found the old ball and chain, did ya?" he asked of Riley.

This time, I did laugh and didn't bother trying to hide it. "Yeah, shaking her ass and flashing her tits on the stage. I thought Sullivan was going to go all caveman and drag her away. It was a fuckin' miracle he didn't blow our cover. Of course, after seeing what she had to offer, I can't say I blame him. I'd want to drag her off the stage, too, if I could," I taunted him, knowing it would be easy right now.

After being divorced for eight years, Riley had run into Kara during the mission we were involved in. Although I didn't know all of their story, I got the distinct impression that there had been enough pain between the two of them to rip them to shreds then sever them completely apart.

"Stuff it up your ass, Lucas. I can't wait for the day some woman's got you by the balls," Riley snapped.

He had no idea how close to the truth he was. Except, it wasn't my balls Ginny had in a vice grip; it was my heart. "Not happening, man," I finally replied darkly. "When I find my girl, I'm not letting her drag me around by my dick. I'm going to show her who's boss. If that means chaining her ass to my fuckin' bed, that's what the fuck I'll do." When we were teenagers, I had been terrified of crossing the line. I had thought I was too old for her, so no matter how much she'd thought she was in love with me, I couldn't make that move. Now, when I found my angel, she was going to get a hard and fast lesson on just how domineering I could be.

Riley's eyebrows shot up his forehead, seeming surprised by my vehemence. "You make it sound like you've already got a girl."

I shrugged, a little uncomfortable at baring my personal business, and tried to act at least a little nonchalant. "Something like that."

Baker leaned forward with a curious expression on his face. "When did this happen?"

"A while ago," I answered vaguely.

Baker's eyebrows shot up. "What's a while ago? After our mission in Mexico?"

Shrugging again, I said, "Before then. Actually, I've known her most of my life."

Ginny

"I highly recommend you do not pack that scrap of fabric you call a dress, Miss Wellington."

Barbara was jittery as I threw clothes in my suitcase as fast as I possibly could. "Look, Barb, it's like this, I'm going to live it up while I can. Never in a million years did I think dear ol' Daddy would let me go to Miami. Since he is, I'm going to make the most of it. Plus, this was your idea, you know." Turning to my long dresser, I started pulling bras and underwear from my drawers, watching in the mirror as my maid pulled the slinky red dress out of my suitcase and threw it under my bed, thinking I wasn't paying attention.

"Yes, well," Barbara huffed after committing her devious little dress theft. "I told you to go to Miami. I didn't tell you to go dressed like a common street walker."

Turning back to my suitcase, I dropped my underwear in then faced my companion. The woman my father had introduced to me as my maid was a matronly woman in her late forties with short brown hair and a kind face. Today, like every other day she took care of me, she was wearing her short-sleeved, button-up, drab gray dress with a black apron. She reminded me of Mary Poppins sometimes. If only a spoon full of sugar could fix my problems.

Stepping closer to her, I did something I had not done since arriving in Chicago five years ago. I let my emotional barriers down.

Grabbing both of her hands, I held them cradled between my own. She jumped at the contact, and her eyes widened in surprise.

Squeezing her hands softly, I whispered, "Barbara, you don't know me... not the real me, because I haven't been able to be the real me since the moment my father took my mother. I know you probably think I'm a nutcase who drinks too much and lives my life with my head buried in the sand, which in a way is true, and I know I'm rambling, but hear me out. I'm dying here."

Barbara's eyebrows snapped down in confusion at my abrupt declaration, and she tilted her head to the side.

In a frantic whisper, I continued, "My mother is being held prisoner by a man she loves as much as she fears. My father is a deranged criminal control freak who's determined to dictate my life down to the type of clothes I wear and whom I am going to marry. In a short matter of time, I'm going to become a pawn in a business deal that will cement my fate to a man I barely know.

"I need this, Barbara. I need the beach, music, and a good time. I need memories of a time when I was free to get me through the years ahead of me, serving as some man's trophy wife. I just need to be _me_ for a few days. Not Virginia Wellington, but the person I consider the real me: Ginny DuBois."

Barbara's eyes were shiny with unshed tears. That didn't stop her from cocking one of those very prim eyebrows of hers and asking me, "And Ginny DuBois needs a little red dress to make her look like a harlot?"

I couldn't help laughing. "No, Ginny DuBois needs a little red dress to get laid. Now pick my dress up from where you threw it underneath the bed, dust it off, and put it back in my suitcase, lady." Turning away from Barbara again, I smiled at the snort she gave my command.

As I walked into my connected bathroom, I could hear the rustle of her picking my dress up and shaking it off. She might not like my plans, but something told me she understood my need to get away and lose myself for a little while, even if it was obvious she didn't approve of it.

Grabbing makeup and hair stuff off of the bathroom counter, I took it back to my suitcase where Barbara stood, staring at its contents in contemplation.

As I dropped the items into my bag, Barbara asked, "Are you certain it's physical intimacy your Ginny DuBois needs? Wouldn't she rather run? Disappear from this life?"

I was shaking my head before Barbara finished her sentence. "I won't leave my mother. Not permanently. Nothing in the world could keep me from coming back to my mom. This little vacation is different. It might not be the smartest decision, but it's mine. And yes, Ginny DuBois needs to brush the cobwebs off her girly bits and live a little before I'm wearing a shiny new gold shackle on my ring finger."

Gentle fingers wrapped around my hands to stop my movements of sorting things away. I went stock still at the contact.

I looked over at Barbara to figure out what was going on, and she gave me a sad smile with teary eyes. "I wish I could give you the life you deserve, Virginia. One filled with happiness and a man who loves you as much as you deserve."

Now it was my turn to give her a sad smile. "No worries, Barbara. I don't believe in love anymore. If having the man I loved break my heart wasn't enough of a lesson, then meeting my father again scared the idea right out of me."

A tear escaped and trailed down Barbara's cheek. It took everything I had not to cry with her.

Brushing off the sad realities of my life, I turned my thoughts to the plane waiting to take me to Miami. Sure, my father wasn't letting me go by myself. I would have a few of his men accompanying me to make sure I stayed "safe." That aside, I didn't think those men would give a crap if we made a detour to a club or two. I had only been granted a few days of freedom, and I was going to make the most of it. That didn't leave any time to dwell on long lost loves and a boy I had lived across the street from once upon a time who had broken my heart.

Pasting a big, fake smile on, I turned the direction of our conversation. "Could you go and grab my sketchpad? I want to draw on the plane."

My ever-efficient maid wiped the tear from her face and gave me a small smile. "Of course, Miss Wellington." She left my bedroom and headed for the living room where my art supplies were spread across the coffee table.

A picture started to form in my head as I zipped up my suitcase: warm, lightly brown skin tanned by the sun; a hard, muscled body lying on the sand; cool, salty ocean water washing up and over the mystery man's feet and legs, leaving him glistening in the sun. I couldn't see his face, but he was hard and beautiful in that uber-masculine way that I imagined soldiers were. I was totally going to draw him on the plane ride to Miami. If I were lucky, I would also find someone just like him to steal a few carnal moments with on my last shot at freedom.

As I looked over the shades of pencils in my kit, my eyes got stuck on red, and my mind went back to a time when things weren't so complicated, back to where it all began.

Once upon a time, Ginny DuBois' life had started anew, free from the four walls of fear and thrust into a world where she could be a normal young girl. Once upon a time, Ginny DuBois had been able to believe that fairy tales could come true.
Chapter

3

Lucas

Nine Years Old

I hated mowing the stupid yard.

It felt like a million degrees outside, and sweat was constantly dripping off my face. Dad said I had to because I was the oldest, and my two little brothers were too young to do it, which didn't make sense to me. Michael was eight, and Noah was seven. If I could mow the grass at nine, why couldn't Michael mow when he was only a year younger than me?

My little sister Olivia was six, so I could understand why she couldn't mow, not that Dad would make her. My parents treated her like a freaking princess. Last time I checked, princesses did not play with G.I. Joes, and Olivia wouldn't leave mine alone.

As I turned the riding lawnmower and made my way down the side of the house to mow the front yard, I saw a flash of brown out of the corner of my eye. Looking over, I saw my neighbor and friend, Johnny Whitmore, throw a football to his dad, making me sigh in disgust. I would much rather be playing football than doing stinking chores.

Shaking my head, I looked back to the grass in front of me.

While I cleared the front of our house, I turned right and started the box design my Dad had showed me how to do. When I reached the end of that row, I turned right again and started moving down the side of our driveway toward the road.

Moving along at what felt like a snail's pace, I caught sight of a flash of shiny blonde hair walking up our street. I turned my head and saw a little girl about the size of my sister holding hands with a lady who looked like her. The girl wore a white dress, and the sun glared off both her hair and the dress.

As they moved closer, I could see that neither of them looked very happy. The little girl looked kind of scared as she turned her head back and forth to glance around the neighborhood, as if she were looking for someone. Her mom looked really tired, making me wonder if she was sick or something.

By the time the mower reached the end of the row again, the girl and woman were at the edge of my yard. When I turned right, it put us going in the same direction. I knew I should be watching where I was driving because Dad always said that was really important, but I couldn't take my eyes off the girl.

She was... pretty.

She turned her head in my direction and caught sight of me then stared right back. I could tell her eyes were light, but I couldn't tell if they were blue or green. She sort of reminded me of the angel my mom put on top of our Christmas tree every year.

I had never really thought girls were pretty before, maybe because I thought they were silly with their giggling and their dolls. No matter how much I knew girls had cooties, I still thought this one was the prettiest girl I had ever seen, not that I would admit it to anyone. My brothers and Johnny would make fun of me for, like, forever if they heard me say that.

The girl pointed her finger at the area in front of me, and I scrunched my eyebrows in confusion. Looking at where she had pointed, I saw the lane of grass I was mowing coming to an end, and Johnny's dad's bushes were right in front of my path. Holy crap!

Jerking the wheel right, I managed to get the mower turned before crashing into the bushes and breathed out a sigh of relief. Dad would have gotten so mad at me if I had messed up the Whitmore's bushes. Adults were so weird about the plants in their yard. Who cared? The green stuff always grew back!

Glancing behind me, I watched the girl and her mother as they walked into the house right across the street from mine. I'd had no idea anyone had moved in there. Maybe now Olivia would have someone to play with instead of bugging me. That would be so cool.

I turned back around and focused on where I was driving then eyed the rest of the yard. Seeing how much I still had left to do, I sighed in disgust. This was the never ending yard of doom. I wished the stupid mower would go faster. Could you attach a rocket-fueled jet pack to a riding lawnmower? I bet that would be the fastest mower on the planet if somebody did that. And, if I had the rocket-fueled mower, I bet I could mow this stupid yard in half a minute. That would totally leave plenty of time to play football with Johnny, which would be awesome.

Looking back up at my house's front door, I watched my mom as she swept off our front steps. Then a wicked cool idea popped into my head as I thought of our new neighbors across the street. Maybe, if I told Mom that they had moved in, she would bake cookies to give them. I had seen her do it once when people moved in down the street. What was more, if she baked cookies, I could totally steal one when she wasn't looking. Now _that_ sounded like an awesome plan.

I went back to concentrating on mowing the grass. The faster I got this stupid yard mowed, the faster I could go on to _Operation Cookie Snatch and Run_. My dad was in the Army and always told me he was lucky to go on all of these cool, top secret missions. Well, this could be my first top secret mission.

When I grew up and joined the Army, I could tell the generals I worked for that I had already successfully completed a mission. They would totally be impressed with me and stuff.

By the end of the long day, I had mowed the lawn and devoured two chocolate chip cookies I had managed to sneak. _Operation Cookie Snatch and Run_ had worked as a double bonus, because I got cookies and learned the name of the little girl across the street.

Virginia DuBois, better known as Ginny.

Boy, I hoped Ginny kept my sister busy so she would stay away from my GI Joes.

Ginny

Six Years Old

Mom said we were safe now. I hoped she was right. I was tired of seeing Daddy mad and mean. I wished and wished and wished he wouldn't yell so much or hurt Momma. Well, I guessed wishes did come true. This just wasn't exactly what I had imagined.

The new house was scary at night, but I was doing my best to be brave like Momma had asked. She'd said Daddy wouldn't find us here. I just had to be strong and trust her. I wasn't brave like Prince Charming when he rescued Princess Aurora in _Sleeping Beauty_. I told Momma that, and she said I didn't have to be that brave, just brave enough to let her protect me.

Momma trying to protect me from Daddy had gotten me thinking: _who's gonna protect Momma_?

I had asked her, and she had given me a sad smile and told me not to worry about her. She didn't need a prince to rescue her like Sleeping Beauty did. I thought that was sad. My momma was definitely pretty enough to be a queen, and every queen should have a nice, strong king who loved and protected her. I had told her that, too.

For a minute, I had been scared I'd said the wrong thing because Momma had cried a few tears.

My daddy had always gotten this really mad look on his face any time someone said the wrong thing. He also had gotten really, really mean and scary to anyone who'd made Momma cry. I wasn't scared Daddy was going to yell at me again for making Momma cry, because she had told me he was far, far away from where we were, and we were safe from him. That didn't mean I liked seeing my momma cry, though.

When I had told her I was sorry I had made her cry, she'd cried a little more and hugged me. Then she had whispered in my ear that she might not have a king, but she just knew I would find my prince one day.

Momma had it all wrong, though. I didn't want a prince. They were too stuffy.

No, I wanted a knight in shining armor. They were the _best_. They fought dragons and rode pretty horses. They rescued princesses and fought with swords and lances. Knights were way better than a prince, even though they didn't get to wear a cool crown.

I saw a little boy riding a lawnmower today when Momma and I had gone for a walk. I had totally pretended he was a knight riding his trusty steed. He was going to have to learn how to drive his lawnmower, though, because he almost crashed into those gigantic green bushes on the edge of his yard. That would have been just silly since knights couldn't crash their trusty steeds!

After dinner, Momma and I had been able to meet the little boy's mother. She had told us her name was Mrs. Young and had given us a plate of chocolate chip cookies. While I ate one of the cookies, Mrs. Young had told us she had four children, including a little girl named Olivia who was my age. Then she and Momma had started talking about me going over there in a day or two to meet Olivia.

I had been super excited at the idea of finally meeting another girl my own age and wanted to jump up and down in excitement, but I'd made myself sit very still. Daddy had always said a lady had to be "composed." I didn't know what "composed" meant, but I'd figured out I couldn't jump, shout, or get too excited about anything, because anytime I had before, Daddy had gotten mad. So, I had sat very, very still in my chair so Mrs. Young would think I was a lady. I didn't want anything to ruin my chances of meeting Olivia.

When I had grabbed my second chocolate chip cookie, I'd asked Mrs. Young the name of the boy who had cut her grass today. She had given me this funny kind of smile when she'd told me it was her eldest son, Lucas.

I didn't know why Mrs. Young had given me that funny look, but I did know I should totally tell Lucas he needed lessons on how to be a knight. Maybe he would be able to drive his lawnmower way better after his lessons.
Chapter

4

Lucas

Fifteen Years Old

"Lucas, go across the street and tell Ginny and her mom that we're ready to start up the grill for the cookout."

Giving my mom a polite "yes, ma'am," I walked out of my house and started across the street to the home of my little sister's best friend. While I kicked a rock in the road, I grumbled to myself about having to follow Mom's orders. Why couldn't Olivia walk over to get Ginny and her mom?

Ginny was a nice girl and all, but I had been avoiding her like the plague for months now. I had overheard her and my sister talking about me one day as I passed Olivia's bedroom door. Specifically, I'd heard about Ginny having a crush on me.

How embarrassing was that? A twelve-year-old girl had a crush on me. My sister thought it was hysterical and started singing, "Lucas and Ginny, sitting in the tree." I didn't find it funny. Ever since then, Olivia had practically shoved Ginny at me every chance she got. What the heck was she thinking?

I shook my head in disgust. Ginny was a freakin' kid. No way did I want anything to do with her like that. She was practically a sister to me. Besides, I had better things to do than be annoyed by little girls, like play football on my high school team, chill out with Johnny after practice, or if I were really lucky, spend time with my girlfriend Amber in one of the empty classrooms.

Last week, we had ducked into the music room that wasn't being used during the free period we shared, and she had let me stick my hand up her shirt and feel her boob. I was hoping she would let me get under her bra next week.

I walked up to Ms. DuBois's door and was about to knock on it when a flash of blonde caught my attention. Off to my right, there sat Ginny on her bench swing under the giant maple tree in her yard, her head bowed down in concentration on the pad of paper in her lap and her hand moving around as she drew. I wasn't surprised to find her there. If Ginny wasn't with my sister, she could be found drawing. In fact, I would say she probably spent half of her life with a pad of paper and a pencil in her hands.

Instead of knocking on the door for Ms. DuBois, I left the doorstep and walked over to where her daughter sat. She never once lifted her head, and I knew she didn't notice me approaching. Typical Ginny, she was lost in her own little world, forgetting about everything around her. Her head seemed to be in the clouds anytime my sister wasn't talking her ear off.

I thought about saying her name to get her attention, but the last time I had done that while she was tuned out and drawing, she'd ended up screaming out in surprise, slashing across her picture with the marker in her hand and ruining it. I would stand here and wait. If I did it long enough, she would eventually realize someone was right in front of her. Hopefully, it wouldn't take her too long, though. I would hate to miss out on the steaks my mom was preparing for the grill.

Looking down at her hand moving across the white surface, I almost snorted. Yet again, she was drawing some sort of fairy tale crap: a prince in armor, fighting off a dragon with nothing except a sword and shield.

On one hand, I had to admit Ginny's artwork was amazing. So good, in fact, that she had received numerous awards and ended up in the gifted and talented program in her school. No one could argue that she didn't produce awesome pictures.

On the other hand, all the girl drew was stuff like princesses, white knights, castles, and all that nonsense all underage girls seemed to dream of.

Would it kill her to draw something cool, like a sports car or a football player?

I stood there silently for a while, watching her shade in the dragon's scales, before I heard the squeak of the screen door and her mom calling my name. Ginny's head snapped up, and when she saw me standing right in front of her, she screamed in surprise.

If it weren't for the split second that I caught a frightened look on her face, I would have laughed. That scared look had seemed a little more than being surprised, though, making me wonder what exactly Ginny had to be afraid of. This was not the first time I had caught her doing something like that, either. Like the time I had found her when she had accidentally locked herself in my mom's linen closet.

Ginny had gone in there to get clean sheets to put on the air mattress she slept on when she stayed over. Our house was old, and the door sometimes got stuck. My family had gone out in the backyard for a cookout, and only I had heard Ginny banging on the door to be let out. She had been a trembling, sobbing mess by the time I had gotten the door open. I was pretty sure that terrified look would be burned into my memory, but I had never been able to get her to tell me what she had been so freaking scared of.

When she had been little and first moved into our neighborhood, she'd clung to her mom like she was afraid the woman might disappear or something. Olivia had mentioned Ginny had nightmares, and that was why she didn't like to spend the night at our house.

All of that meant I was gentle with the girl who lived across the street, especially in times like now, which were often. I didn't want to make her self-conscious to her reaction.

I pointed down to her paper. "You missed a spot on that scale."

Immediately, her cheeks blushed, and she snapped her head back down to look at the non-existent spot.

Turning to look over my shoulder, I waved at her mom. "Hi, Ms. DuBois. Mom said the food was going on the grill, and you guys should come over."

She gave me a warm smile as she called back, "Sounds good, Lucas. Will you walk Ginny across the street with you while I grab the cake I made?"

I almost groaned in despair. After all of that time avoiding her, now I was stuck with her until I could unload her on Olivia. I had finally gotten my sister to stop finding reasons to send her to my room or sing that stupid song. Walking over with Ginny might start it all up again.

Waving back, I told her mom sure and then turned back to Ginny, sticking my hand out to quickly ruffle her hair.

"Let's go, kid." Jumping back, I missed the swipe she made to slap my hand away, and I laughed at the annoyed look she shot my way.

Not giving her time to say anything, I turned and slowly started to walk away. The sounds of her shuffling her stuff around and then her footsteps as she raced after me let me know she wasn't far behind.

Before I got halfway across the yard, she strolled up to walk slightly behind and to the side of me. I got that funny feeling like someone was watching me and looked at her out of the corner of my eye, only to see her bite her bottom lip and duck her head. She had been watching me... again.

Sighing, I wondered how I could nip this little crush of hers in the bud. I couldn't have my baby sister's best friend following me around, looking at me like she was planning our wedding. She was like the other little sister I never wanted. I didn't mind it when she hung out at the house and kept Olivia company, but I got totally weirded out every time she blushed at me like that. The sad thing was, this obsession Gin had for me had been going on for years. I'd done my best to be nice about it all, but lately it was getting on my last nerve.

I didn't know what else to do or say to get it through her head that I would never look at her that way. I sure as hell hadn't bothered to hide my interest in other girls. Part of me had hoped that, if Ginny saw me talking to other girls, she would get the point that I wasn't interested in her. No such luck. The thought of being a jerk to her sucked, yet I was starting to think it was what I had to do.

As I plotted the best way to set Ginny straight, a young, feminine voice calling my name caught my attention. I looked up to see my girlfriend walking toward me with a big smile. She had on tight jean shorts and a tank top that barely covered that bra I wanted into so badly.

I stepped onto the sidewalk, calling out to her, "Hey, babe."

The final B sound was barely out when a small body crashed into my back. The push wasn't enough to throw me off balance, but it did remind me I had a problem trailing me.

Reaching back, I grabbed one of her arms and pulled her fully onto the sidewalk by my side then waved toward my front door, telling her, "Go inside."

A disappointed look came over her face as I turned back to face Amber, basically dismissing her.

Amber's eyes looked at her curiously. "Who's that?"

Shrugging a shoulder, I replied, "Just the kid across the street, my little sister's friend."

Amber laughed at my kid reference, but my stomach dropped a little at Ginny's gasp. It was a totally dick thing of me to do, but I wasn't about to tell Amber everything about Ginny. The more people thought Ginny was just the girl across the street, the less I had to deal with.

I heard her footsteps as she scurried away. I didn't bother to see if she was upset. Ginny would forgive me later; it was just how things were.

A hand on my chest distracted me from my thoughts, pulling my focus back to my girlfriend.

She took a quick peek at my house before leaning forward to whisper, "Do you think you could give me a kiss before your parents catch us?"

It was my turn to look up at my house. I didn't see anyone watching us, but I didn't want to take the chance of getting caught making out with my girlfriend. My mom would blow a gasket.

Shaking my head, I told her, "No way. My parents would catch us for sure."

Amber dropped her lips into a pout that made me think of kissing, and kissing made me think of getting my hand up her shirt again. That was when the mother of all ideas came to me.

Grabbing her hand, I dragged her down the sidewalk at a fast clip.

"Where are we going, Lucas?"

"To the shed in Johnny's backyard. It has a door that's unlocked, and Johnny's gone with his family for the whole weekend."

Amber giggled again. The sound grated on my nerves, but I could deal with it if she let me get her bra off this time.

Ginny

Twelve Years Old

"Why are you watching that loser through the window, girl?"

My best friend was awesome. Olivia totally didn't get my obsession with her eldest brother, but as she liked to say, "I love you, anyway."

She probably thought my crush on Lucas would come and go, but I didn't think it ever would. Olivia just didn't understand. In fact, I knew my crush on him would never go away, because it wasn't just a crush. It was _more_ , so much more.

It took me a couple of years to realize it, but I finally figured it out this year. Lucas Young was my knight in shining armor.

That might seem like a silly thought to some, but to me, it made perfect sense. See, Lucas had always been there to save me, even when he didn't know it.

He had literally saved me when I was seven when Olivia and I had been kicking a soccer ball around in her front yard, and she had accidentally kicked it into the street. Being a typical kid, I hadn't been paying attention, so I had run out into the street after the ball, right into the path of a car. Somehow, Lucas had been there to grab my hand and pull me out of the way before it could run me over.

The next time, Lucas had saved me from myself.

I was a certified klutz. I could trip over my own shoe laces. I could bang my knees into furniture that seemed to transport itself directly into my path. I could also walk into sliding glass doors. It seemed I also had to prove I could lock myself in a closet that had no lock.

Don't ask me how it happened because, to this day, I still didn't understand. What I did know was, one minute, I had been stepping into a slightly oversized linen closet, and the next, I had been stuck in a pitch black closet, having a total melt down.

Being trapped made me feel like the walls were closing in on me. I couldn't breathe, couldn't escape the memories. Flashbacks of my mother shoving me into the back of my closet to hide when my father would come home angry and violent had bombarded me. The harsh sounds of a hand slapping skin and my mother's cry of pain had echoed in my head.

I knew my mother had only been trying to protect me from seeing my father slap her around, but she had inadvertently made me terrified of tight, suffocating, dark spaces.

Those were all memories I had done my best to forget, perhaps pretend it had never happened. However, when I had found myself trapped in the darkness, I had been forced to remember. The more I had remembered, the harder it had become to breathe, and my head had felt like it had been drowned in fogginess.

Then Lucas had been there. He'd gently pulled me out of the pitch black closet, out into the brightly lit hallway, and into his arms. That was when I knew Lucas Young really was my knight in shining armor, and I loved him.

That was two years ago, and my feelings for him had only changed in the sense that my love for him had grown. I loved Lucas Young with my whole heart, and one day, he was going to marry me. He just didn't know it yet.

It stunk that he was outside, talking to that girl who looked at him like she wanted to kiss him.

Olivia poked my arm because I wasn't answering her then pushed me over so she could look through the blinds of her bedroom window, too. When she saw Lucas talking to the girl, she gasped.

"Ooooooo... He's talking to a giiiiiiiiirl! Was she out there when you came over?"

Nodding, I answered, "Yeah. He told her I was just the kid across the street." I tried to keep my tone even and failed. It killed me to think he didn't see me as anything more than the neighbor.

My best friend gasped again. "He didn't!"

Embarrassed, I mumbled, "Yeah."

She grabbed my shoulders then slowly turned me away from watching Lucas. "Ignore him, Ginny. My brother is a total punk. I don't see why you like him so much."

I tried to hide how much Lucas's words had hurt me, but I guessed I didn't do a good enough job, because Olivia offered, "You want a hug?"

I shook my head and whispered, "Ice cream."

Olivia giggled. "Because ice cream cures everything?"

"Yep."

She smiled at me. "Ice cream is way better than my brother any—" Olivia turned toward the window as she was talking and then gasped at whatever she had seen out there.

Wondering what it was, I quickly turned to see Lucas dragging the girl behind him down the sidewalk and disappearing into Johnny Whitmore's yard. I wasn't sure why they were going over there, yet I had a feeling it was something they shouldn't be doing.

Olivia turned and started stomping toward her door.

"Where are you going?" I asked.

Without looking back at me, she answered, "To get you ice cream and rat my brother out. Mooooooooom!"
Chapter

5

Lucas

Sixteen Years Old

Something happened after I turned sixteen, and I saw Ginny in a new light.

One night, I went to bed grumpy because she had been blushing while my sister giggled half the day in our backyard pool while I had been shirtless in my swim shorts. Then, the next day, I had been walking with my friends down the street to the movie theater, and as we'd walked, we had passed Ginny sitting by herself under a tree in a local park. Once again, she had been oblivious to everything around her, totally focused on the pad of paper as she drew.

The sun had made her blonde hair glow like a halo around her head, reminding me of the Christmas tree angel I had thought she looked like when I'd first laid eyes on her. Even in her slouched form, I could make out the delicate lines of her petite body that was starting to show the barest hint of curves.

Something about the scene had hit me square in the chest. She was beautiful... and at that moment, I had the overwhelming urge to tell everyone she would be mine. Slowly, my mind had taken everything in.

I'd almost groaned out loud when I had seen her straight, white teeth bite her bottom lip in concentration. The vision of her doing something else with those lips had made my dick harder than the first time I had seen a nudie magazine.

Of course, my shithead best friend Johnny had to ruin the moment by saying something about how he thought Ginny would have a nice rack one day. The comment, something both of us had said more than once about other girls, almost caused me to trip over my own feet as a strange anger overtook me. Suddenly, I had wanted to punch Johnny in the face, knock him the hell out. The feeling was completely foreign to me. Why the hell would I want to punch my best friend over a girl who was like a sister to me?

As I had ignored Johnny and continued staring at the girl who was lost in her own little world, the truth had crashed over me like a sledgehammer to the head. You weren't supposed to feel this way about your sister. You weren't supposed to even feel this way about a girl who was just a friend. Hell, I had never even felt that way about one of my girlfriends.

Holy shit! It was the way Dad felt about Mom.

That was when I had realized I had a major complication.

I was sixteen, and she was thirteen. If I touched her, that would have been grounds for statutory rape. There had been a senior last year who had gotten himself tangled up with a freshman. When things went too far and her parents found out, he'd landed himself in a mess of trouble. Not to mention, absolutely no one around us would approve. Sure, her friends might have thought it would be cool for her to date an older guy, but my friends and all the kids at my school would laugh their asses off. What was more, no adult would be cool with that kind of age gap.

I might want Ginny with everything inside me, but I wasn't stupid. I had plans, dreams. I was already talking to the Army recruiters. As soon as I graduated, I was leaving suburbia New York.

Making a decision that probably wasn't the smartest, I had followed my gut. Instead of ignoring her, I had quickly come up with a reason to ditch my friends.

"Look, man," I had said to Johnny. "Olivia'll give me hell if I don't make sure Ginny gets home before dark." I'd shrugged, trying to play it cool. "She's got some shit on me for missing curfew last weekend." I had started to jog toward Ginny, calling out over my shoulder, "I'll catch up later."

All this had been an effort to have a fleeting moment with a girl I should have stayed away from. If only I had known it wouldn't be the last time I didn't have it in me to resist the pull toward her...

Ginny

Thirteen Years Old

She was missing something.

As I stared at the mermaid on the page, my mind raced. What was missing? I'd drawn and colored her in gorgeous shades of blue and teal; given her the typical human face and upper torso with a fishtail yet added scales around her eyes; webbed her fingers; and given her wispy, delicate fin-tipped ears. I'd even put a gorgeous shell in her hair.

Sure, the piece overall looked a bit monochromatic since the mermaid sort of blended in with the ocean around her, but in my head, that made sense. Something as mythical and rare as a mermaid wouldn't be a bright shade of color or have a peachy, human skin tone. No, they would need to hide from the land dwellers who rode on boats across the ocean, so they should be camouflaged to their environment.

Still, as my fingers lightly traced over the petite lines of the mermaid's face, I knew something was totally missing. She needed to standout somehow. Her shell was already shades of white and peach, so what else could I do to make her stand out?

Her hair! That's what needed more color!

I grabbed my red and purple artist markers, excited about the new vision in my head. The mermaid would still have blue, green, and teal in her hair, but she needed some warmth and an exotic look. Sort of like the fish that had a spot or flashy scale to attract their prey, her hair would flow behind her like beautifully colored ribbons, both enchanting and deadly.

Before my eyes, my creation was coming to life finally. A sense of excitement energized me. My hand was steady as I used a boysenberry purple to shade random strands of the mermaid's hair. Sitting here in the warmth of the sun with the sounds of birds singing around me and my imagination roaring to life, I felt like this moment was perfect.

Maybe being lost in my moment was the reason I never heard anyone walk up or sit down next to me. But sure enough, when I went to drop my boysenberry purple and pick up another color, I almost jumped out of my own skin when my rose red marker appeared in front of my face.

Screaming like a banshee, I tried to jump back, only to succeed in knocking my head against the tree behind me.

The marker disappeared, and a strong hand gripped my shoulder to keep me still.

Turning my head to see who it was, I was shocked speechless to see it was the one person who made my stomach do somersaults and my heart stop beating.

Lucas Young. My best friend's eldest brother. The boy who would rather ruffle my hair and call me a kid than see me as the girl who only had eyes for him.

Not that I could blame him. He was a junior, and I wasn't even a freshman yet.

Everything about us was totally opposite. He hung out with the varsity football team, and I sat quietly with his sister at lunch. Olivia might be a social butterfly, but I didn't have it in me to talk to our other classmates the way she did. So while she sat and chatted away, I drew in my notebook.

Lucas wasn't exactly an outgoing guy himself. Sure, he had loads of friends and ran with the popular crowd, but he didn't talk much. He was more of an observer than a participator. And even though we had that in common, we were on totally opposite ends of the spectrum. He was the epitome of confidence, while I was afraid of my own damn shadow.

Sort of like now.

I didn't know how he did it, but the guy had a knack for sneaking up on me like a ninja. There were days I thought about tying a bell around his neck so he couldn't scare the crap out of me like this anymore.

"Sh... Gin, it's just me," he said soothingly with that familiar, sad look in his eye.

I inwardly cringed at that expression. It was like he knew I was damaged goods somehow, even though he still didn't know about my past. I sometimes wondered if that was why I was infatuated with him. He had this way of looking inside of me, as if he could see all my nightmares and scare them away. If he only knew in my dreams he did...

He was my knight in shining armor. Only, I wasn't a princess, not anymore. No, I was a raggedy peasant girl with two left feet who couldn't look him in the eye without blushing beat red.

Seriously embarrassing.

"W-what are you d-doing here, L-Lucas?" God, I was such a dork. I had this annoying tendency to stutter whenever someone startled me like this.

One side of his mouth hitched up in a crooked grin like he found me amusing. "I was headed toward the theater with Johnny and some of the other guys when I saw you sitting over here. I figured you hadn't noticed how late it was getting, so I thought I'd come sit with you until you were ready to go home. You shouldn't walk home in the dark, Gin."

Could my mortification get any worse? Would there ever be a day when he wouldn't see me as his little sister's best friend? Someone he had to take care of?

After leaning forward so I could look behind him to see his friends disappearing off in the distance, I looked back at him and mumbled, "You d-don't have to stay here with m-me, Lucas. I'll be okay."

He laughed and bumped his shoulder into mine. "It's all good, Gin. I like watching you draw, anyway." Holding the rose red marker back up to me, he continued, "I think this color would go well with the purple."

I was too surprised to say anything. He actually wanted to spend time with me? Not with his friends? My stomach started doing somersaults again, and I looked down at my mermaid to hide my face. My eyes caught on her hair, and it suddenly clicked that Lucas was right. The rose red would look awesome with the purple, blue, green, and teal in her hair. Without looking back at him, I grabbed the marker from his hand and muttered a thanks.

I couldn't allow myself to dwell on the fact that the boy I was in love with was sitting next to me so close his arm was brushing my own. Or the fact that he had ditched his friends to stay with me. After all, if I let myself think about it too much, I might get my hopes up, which was something I totally should not do.

If only my speeding heartbeat would figure that out...
Chapter

6

Lucas

Seventeen Years Old

She was driving me nuts.

It was bad enough I had to sit through that bullshit English class I would never use after high school, but it was even worse when I had to do it after seeing Ginny walk down the hall in a damn mini skirt. Did the girl have any idea what a skirt like that did to me and every other guy in this school? How many of these pissants would see her dressed like that and imagine getting their hands up her too short skirt?

There had been no time to corner her and let her know she needed to change. If I hadn't gotten to class on time, Ms. Edwards would have nagged me to death about being late. Therefore, there I sat, pissed as hell, wondering what Ginny had been thinking and unable to do anything about it.

There were days I knew she did shit like that to try to get my attention, but the girl had no clue she had _all_ of my attention, and I couldn't let her know it, either.

I had my reasons for keeping her away from me. At first, it was because we had grown up together, and it was just too weird. The older I got, the more I saw the hopeful stars in my mother's eyes anytime she saw Ginny blushing in my direction. Teenage boys had an internal alarm that warned them away from anything remotely permanent in the pussy department, and those stars in my mother's eyes had warned me that she was picturing future wedding vows and grandbabies.

The thought damn near gave me hives.

My younger self had known Ginny was special, but even then, I didn't want to be tied down in any capacity. My whole life, I had wanted to follow in my father's footsteps and go in the Army. I couldn't let any girl, let alone my little sister's best friend, side track me from that goal. I was going to make a career out of the military. Join the Green Berets and go on top secret missions around the world. To obtain all that, I had to stay focused, which meant not worrying about leaving a girlfriend back at home while I was training.

Because of that, I treated her like I would my sister and started tapping whoever looked good and would let me into her panties, even if a part of me knew down to the bottom of my soul that Ginny was meant to be mine.

Would I admit it to her? Hell no. Were my feelings toward her way deeper than any seventeen-year-old should have? Hell yes.

The Army wasn't my only plan, though. No.

As I sat, stewing in English class, barely paying attention to whatever the hell my teacher was talking about, I was planning for the future, for when I was ready to settle down.

As soon as my first six-year enlistment ended, and I signed on for my next one, I would take some time off and come home to see if there was still that something different between Ginny and me. It might seem selfish of me to wait so long before coming back for her, but there was more than one reason to do so.

We were way too young for one thing, and she was three years younger than me. So, even if I waited until I was twenty-one and she was eighteen, I feared, down the road, she would resent me for tying her down so young.

When I dreamed about Ginny, it was hot enough to wake me up with the hardest morning wood I had ever experienced. There was just something about her that made me want to do crazy things, like fantasize about tying an older Ginny to the bed and kissing every inch of her body. I knew it sounded nuts, but something about her made me feel things I didn't understand, which was another damn good reason I should keep my distance from the girl.

It was more than physical. Ginny had this vision. She saw everything in vivid color. Her creativity, her smile, everything about Ginny was bright, including her future. She was smart, quiet, shy, and loyal. Through all the girl drama my sister ever went through, Ginny was by her side. Ginny had depth most girls didn't. Hell, she was deeper and more intuitive than any teenager should be.

I hated the few times she would seem to get scared of her own shadow. I really hated to see the longing in her eyes around holidays like Father's Day. She never talked about her dad, and I'd never asked.

The more I watched her, spent time with her, spent time around her when she was with Olivia, the more I wanted her. All of this added up to more reasons I needed to stay away.

Last month, I had woken up to one of those vivid fantasies about her, frustrated, aching, and tired of the insanity. I'd taken myself in hand and was going to take care of the problem, hoping it would help erase the crazy thoughts about her. Too bad I'd gotten a little too enthusiastic and moaned her name while I was on the verge of orgasming.

My door had flown open, and my dad had stormed into my room as if he were storming a castle on a mission. When he had seen I was alone, he'd sputtered, turned ten shades of red, and then given me his back while he had gruffly ordered me to get some clothes on because we needed to talk.

Fucking mortified my dad had walked in on me jacking myself off and more than pissed that he would think I would do something we both knew was wrong, I'd quickly pulled my shorts on and sat back down on my bed, seething.

When my father had finally turned back around, he'd apologized for busting in and accusing me, but he'd had a very good reason to be worried about Ginny and me. He'd been around my age when he had first noticed my mom... who had been much younger, like Ginny. He'd also noticed that my little sister's best friend had a raging crush on me, which didn't help the situation. Therefore, he'd worried I might give in to temptation as he had wanted to do so badly when it was him and Mom.

Even though I had been embarrassed as hell, I had sort of felt better knowing I wasn't a pervert for wanting a younger girl. That shit had been bothering me to no end.

Seeing my chance to finally talk to someone, I'd asked him what I should do. What had he done when it came to Mom?

We had sat there, talking for a little over an hour as he'd told me the story about him meeting Mom in school when he had been a senior and she a freshman. He'd known right away it was more than wanting to just be physical with my mom, but he had also known her parents would never approve of her dating a much older boy. He'd hinted that he'd had a similar experience to an extent, but he did not divulge further, which I was glad for. I might have gotten sick to my stomach if he'd told me anything about him and my mom.

He'd known his only chance to get close to Mom then was to be her friend, so that was what he'd become. That had given him the opportunity to protect her from the other boys who'd tried to take advantage of what he already considered his girl.

They'd hung out together with friends after his football games and met her at the ice cream shop on weekends. Then, when he had shipped out to basic, he'd asked Mom to be pen pals. They had kept in touch through letters until he'd felt she was finally old enough to ask her parents' permission to date her.

What he'd done made sense. Keeping her close yet not too close was smart. I wasn't so sure I could be that close to Gin and not give in to my need to touch her, though. There was just something about the girl that made me want to be a possessive asshole. When I'd told my father that, he had given a sad sigh then encouraged me to not act on my urges until I was older.

Before he'd left my room, he had said something I would never forget. He had told me he'd seen the way I had been looking at Ginny lately when I thought no one else was paying attention. He had explained how I was on the verge of becoming a man, and it was time to learn one of the most important lessons a man should ever learn: "A good woman is a priceless treasure."

She was meant to be protected and loved, never abused, never treated like she was less than she really was. That meant doing the right thing by her, even if it was the hardest thing a man might ever do. That meant keeping my hands off the girl across the street until I was ready to give her my last name.

"Ginny is a pure heart, son, beautiful from the inside out. You don't want to break a pure hearted girl like that, because it would break her in ways you might never be able to fix. And, if you ever do that, you would only end up blackening your soul. If she's yours and you've broken her, then you'll be living without the very thing you need the most: your heart."

My father's words resonated in my head for days, forcing me to think about something I had once thought I never would—tying myself down to one woman. It had been sort of overwhelming for me. Yet, the more I thought about it, the more the idea of Ginny and me felt right—owning the angel across the street, calling her mine.

One day, when we were ready, I would do just that.

Own her.

Love her.

After all, a part of me was already in love with her.

It was only my inexperience, youth, and dreams of leaving that held me back from falling in love with her completely. It wasn't easy, but I shut out the emotional shit and refused to let it grow any further.

Now, as I came closer and closer to my eighteenth birthday, my mind was made up. At the end of my first enlistment, I would be twenty-four, and she would be twenty-one. Ginny would have had time to live a little before I came home, and we would both be old enough to know if it had just been hormones or something more.

At seventeen, I knew who I was to an extent. After the talk with my dad, it was not lost on me that I had serious urges that might get worse when it came to the angel who lived across the street. It was going to take everything I had to ignore those urges, and who knew how domineering I might be when I did finally claim her? Deep inside, I knew the controlling, selfish part of me would only grow.

The reason why was simple: part of me wanted to own every part of Ginny. However, in return, Ginny would own every part of me, as well. We were in no way ready for that.

I was only worried Ginny was going to drive me insane between now and when we were ready. Seeing her without actually touching her was becoming torture.

It wasn't lost on me that Ginny only grew more beautiful every day. Still, she was shy, quiet, and painfully awkward. Thankfully, because of those qualities, the boys in school didn't pay much attention to her. Even though I was a senior, while she was just a freshman, I kept an eye out for her, making sure no one messed with her. And, by no one, I meant those of the dick carrying variety.

I had convinced myself before that I was doing it because she was my little sister's best friend and practically part of the family. Now, I wondered if something inside of me had always known Ginny was my girl.

In my attempt to keep my hands off her, I was still fucking my way through my high school and the one in the next county over. Was it wrong? Probably. I did feel guilty every time I touched another girl. However, I did my best to keep everything I did quiet so it wouldn't get back to Ginny and hurt her. Luckily, she didn't talk to many people and wasn't one to gossip. If she had heard a rumor about me and one of my hook-ups, I wasn't sure she would know whether to believe it or not.

Ginny had all hearts and flowers and forever in her eyes, and I was worried one of us would break before we were ready.

If I broke, it would be my willpower, and I might claim my girl sooner than I knew was good for either of us. If she broke, it would be her heart.

"Mr. Young?" my English teacher drawled. "Would you like to tell the class what you learned from the story of Odysseus?"

Somehow, I managed to stop myself from rolling my eyes at the uptight woman who loved to find any reason to throw me in detention. "Do I have to, Ms. Edwards?"

She crossed her arms over her chest and started tapping one of her high-heel-shod feet on the floor. An impervious eyebrow rose before she looked down her nose at me as she replied, "I wouldn't be surprised if you do not have an answer, Lucas. That would require you to pay attention to what I'm teaching, which I highly doubt you are."

The old shrew never failed to tick me off.

"If you want to know what I think of Odysseus, fine. He was an unfaithful, egotistical schmuck. Did he defeat some enemies? Yeah, but he also lost a bunch of his men, too. His wife sat at home for twenty years, waiting for his dumbass to come home, when she should have shacked up with a new guy. At least Odysseus got to bang a nymph and a sorceress."

My classmates laughed around me, while my teacher's face turned red in anger. Ms. Edwards opened her mouth to say something, but the bell rang, and I took the chance to get out of there before the hag gave me detention again. As I walked out of class, a soft hand grabbed my bicep and tugged a little.

Looking to my side, I found Rachel, a junior cheerleader I had already gotten a taste of.

"Hey, Rachel, what's up?" I kept walking toward the cafeteria, unwilling to waste time by stopping to talk to a girl I'd already had.

"Lucas," she practically purred, "my parents are going to be gone this weekend. I was wondering if you'd like to come over."

Her question stopped me in my tracks. Sure, lunch was important, but the chance to get between Rachel's thighs again was an awesome incentive to wait to eat.

Turning my back to the lockers, I leaned back and took a moment to glance up and down the hall to make sure Gin wasn't around before I looked Rachel over from head to toe. Damn, she had a nice rack.

"If I come over, what are we gonna to do?"

Rachel stepped closer to me and brushed her breasts against my chest as she stood on her tiptoes and whispered into my ear, "Whatever you want."

I brought one of my hands around to land on her back then slid it down until it was resting on her ass. "And if all I want is to fuck you and leave?"

"Sounds like a good time to me," she purred.

I flexed my fingers so that I was now squeezing the cheek of her ass instead of cupping it, and Rachel gasped against my ear.

"Then I'll be over on Saturday. Now back up. I want to go eat lunch."

Rachel stepped back then followed me down the hall. Apparently, my Saturday booty call was going to cost me a lunch companion today. Whatever. She knew I didn't date or do serious. If she wanted to follow me around, then she could waste her time.

After going through the lunch line with Rachel right on my heels, I sat down at the table filled with my football teammates. I had hoped Rachel would sit down with her cheerleader crew, but she pasted herself to my side, and I had to push her away a little to actually eat my lunch.

One of the guys asked me about this weekend's upcoming game, and while we debated the other team's offensive strength, I felt Rachel reach over and caress my chest.

I snapped my brows down in annoyance and looked over at her. She knew better. I didn't do that clingy shit. I might not be saving myself for marriage, but that didn't mean I wanted to cuddle with broads, and I definitely didn't flaunt my shit for Ginny and everyone else to see. Tap it and go was my motto.

I grabbed her wrist to stop her wandering hand and snapped, "What the hell are you doing?"

She bit her bottom lip coyly. "I just can't help myself around you, Lucas. Forgive me?"

I wasn't stupid. Rachel was up to something, and it didn't take long to figure out what, either, when I saw her try to sneak a look over to her left.

Turning my head in that direction, I saw Ginny sitting at the table in front of me, next to my sister. Her burger was hanging forgotten in her hand, her dejected eyes glued to Rachel and me.

Fuck.

Rachel was playing at her catty bullshit games, and Ginny was her victim. As much as I had tried to shield Ginny from the snobs of the school, Rachel and her squad had somehow figured out how Ginny felt about me. It didn't matter that I took great effort to keep my own feelings at bay. Ginny was always around. Add it all up and it did not bode well for my girl, because the little bitches like Rachel made her life a living hell. They took my rejection of a relationship with Ginny as proof that it was free season on her.

I was going to have to squash that shit right then, before it went any further. Rachel and her band of bitches were like leeches; once they latched on, they wouldn't fall off until they bled their victim dry. I would allow myself to be used as ammunition against Ginny.

Throwing Rachel's hand off me, I grabbed her lunch tray and slid it down the table until it fell noisily to the floor. Looking back at Rachel's shocked face, I snarled, "Looks like you're done with lunch. I suggest you go."

Rachel sputtered, "What's your deal?"

Raising my voice so at least half of the noisy cafeteria could hear me, I said, "That's my little sister and her best friend, and nobody, including you and your little crew, is going to fuck with them. Now get the hell away from me."

Turning to give her my back and my dismissal, I looked at the guy next to me. "Can you believe the chicks here, always starting some bullshit? Makes me think I should start hanging around the local college to pick off some freshmen there. I hear college girls are wilder in bed, anyway. Last time I let Rachel suck my cock, she was so sloppy I got bored." Admitting it wasn't my favorite thing to do, but this broad needed to be put in her place. I hated knowing Ginny was listening, but in the end, I couldn't come up with something better.

Rachel squealed in anger behind me then stomped off, presumably to sit with her friends.

I turned my head enough to look at Ginny and Olivia, only to wish I hadn't. My sister was glaring daggers at me while Ginny peeled the label on her soda bottle and avoided eye contact with everyone.

Before I pulled my gaze away from her, I spotted a lone tear traveling down one of her pretty cheeks and cringed.

Now more than ever, I realized I was doing the right thing by following my dreams to go into the Army. I would go on a journey like Odysseus; only, I wouldn't wait twenty years to come home to get Ginny.

Teenagers should have all the answers, right? Well, I didn't. The fact that I so desperately wished I knew what was right killed me, but it seemed like everything I did was wrong. Hurting her was hurting me, but she didn't know that.

As I watched her grab her backpack and leave the cafeteria, I worried Gin would hate me by then, which frustrated me. Actually, it pissed me off.

Was this the first time I had inadvertently hurt Ginny's feelings? No. Nevertheless, that didn't make it any easier to watch her walk out those doors. And there I sat, having to act nonchalant about hurting the one girl who mattered.

The guys around me joked about how the girls were tripping all over themselves to get a piece of me. I didn't laugh with them, though, because I was watching my little sister race out of the cafeteria after her best friend.

The way that tear had slowly slid down Ginny's face would haunt my dreams tonight. If only I could give her the big picture now... But I couldn't. She had her life to build, and I had mine. Then we could be together. We were young, too young, for all the things I wanted for the both of us.

I felt like I had torn myself in two from the inside out, battling my need for Ginny against what I had to do until I could have her. I would be lucky if I didn't go certifiably insane before I finally got the chance to hold my girl and tell her how damn sorry I was for everything I had put her through.

No matter what, I would endure whatever hell I had to go through until I could make Gin mine for one solid reason alone: I would never be able to live with myself if I destroyed the person who meant everything to me.

Ginny

Fourteen Years Old

I was going to hide in the school's media room for the rest of the day. Scratch that. I would hide in there for the rest of the year.

"Gin!"

The sound of my best friend's voice did not stop or even slow down my quick strides to get as far away from that freaking cafeteria as I could. Heck, at this rate, I could probably walk out of the school and get to my house in no time. Screw the media room; hiding in my room sounded like a fabulous plan.

" _Gin!_ Wait up!"

I still refused to stop for Olivia, though I could hear her footfalls getting closer. I wouldn't even turn my head to look back at her. Keeping my head down so I was watching the floor kept anyone from seeing the stupid tears slipping down my face.

How pathetic I must look to everyone. It seemed like the entire school had figured out my feelings for Lucas. With my drawings and reserved nature, they already thought I lived with my head in the clouds. Rachel sure seemed happy enough to rub it in my face that she could get her hands on him, while I couldn't.

I felt like such a freaking idiot for wanting someone who so obviously did not want me back. I couldn't help myself, though, because this wasn't some trivial, little crush like Olivia thought. Although I was only a teenager, what I felt for Lucas was a certainty. What I felt for him was more than an increase of my heart beating in anticipation, more than the feeling of butterflies in my stomach when he smiled at me. It was more than the dreams I had where he kissed me breathless and told me he would wait until I was ready to do more.

The reason I knew it was more than all of that was simple: anytime I was in his presence, I felt like I was home—safe, protected, wanted, and loved. I barely remembered life before Lucas Young.

My mom and I had left everything behind. I remembered having a huge house with a long driveway behind a stone fence. My mother would read me bedtime stories, and in my little girl mind, our house had been my castle. Then things had changed. Daddy had changed, and Mom packed me up. We never looked back.

Until Lucas and his family had come over with cookies that very first day, I hadn't been sure I would know how to handle all the changes. The ease in which they had fit into our lives had given me comfort. From there, Lucas became the knight in all my childhood fairy tales. Someway, somehow, he always seemed to be there when I needed someone the most. Rescuing me from locked closet doors and mean girls in school cafeterias. Giving me a hug to comfort me when I had been shaking from head to toe or cracking a joke when he thought I needed a laugh.

Maybe he didn't love me in the capacity I wanted him to yet, but I kept holding out hope that he would one day open his eyes and see me for who I was—his. Sometimes, it was the little things that fueled my hope. Like the fact that Lucas had just defended me against Rachel when it was obvious he could have anything he wanted from her. Or like the day he'd ditched his friends to sit with me under that tree while I drew then walked me home to make sure I was safe. Surely, he wouldn't do or say things like that if he didn't care about me, right?

Days like today made me wonder if I was the biggest idiot in the world for holding on to that hope.

God, I was a huge ball of mixed up emotions when it came to the boy across the street. Why my stupid heart had to be set on Lucas Young, I had no idea. Nevertheless, the heart wanted what it wanted, and that was the boy who didn't want me back.

I'd once thought he was my knight in shining armor. While I might not believe in all the fairy tale stuff I had before, I did know one thing: Lucas was lucky he wasn't a knight in shining armor, because if he were, I would take his lance and shove it up his butt for humiliating me like this!

If I allowed myself to hope, then I could say he didn't mean to embarrass me but rather defend me. It was all too much. God, if I didn't love him so much, I would absolutely murder him right now.

Sure, he had totally humiliated Rachel way more back there, but now the whole cafeteria knew I had a crush on him. After that little scene, the gossip queens would run their mouths, and by the end of the day, the whole school would know what I'd done my best to hide since I started high school. Now all of the mean girls would say out loud what I feared in my heart—that Lucas would never see me as anything other than his little sister's best friend.

Pulling my gaze from the hallway floor, I glanced up to see I was only ten feet from the main office. If I could just get in there and call my mom, then I was home free from this nightmarish day.

I barely got another three steps before I was grabbed by the arm and dragged, practically kicking and screaming, by Olivia into the girl's bathroom.

"Oh, no you don't! You are _not_ going to call your momma to come pick you up so you can hide in your room for the next week."

Dragging my heels, I tried to stop Olivia from pulling me, and we ended up in an awkward tug of war with my arm acting as the honorary rope.

This was what I did when I got uncomfortable. Momma had always made it so I could call her to come get me. Whenever I felt like people were making fun of me or the anxiety of life seemed to creep up, I found my escape to call her. Without hesitation, my mother was hands down my enabler.

"I'm. Going. Home!" I gritted out through my clenched teeth as I leaned backward, trying to pull my arm out of her grasp.

"No. You're. Not!" she snarled back.

Olivia gave a mighty jerk on my wrist, and unfortunately, I lost my balance and ended up stumbling through the bathroom door. She spun me away so I could not race back out through the only entrance. Then she stuck her head out the doorway, looked in both directions as if checking if anyone had seen us struggling, and then promptly shut the door and locked both of us in.

Turning back to me, Olivia stomped her foot. "You can't run from your problems in life, Ginny! You should have flipped both Rachel _and_ my brother off. How many times have I told you that bitches like that cheerleader from hell will walk all over you if you don't stand up for yourself? And let me tell you, sister, she's not just going to walk all over you with her brand of torture. Nope, she's going to drag your name through mud, throw you under the proverbial bus, and then do the cha-cha in her whorish designer heels as a victory dance to your complete and utter humiliation!"

"Thought about this a lot, have you?"

Olivia leaned in until we were almost nose to nose. "I don't need to think about it, Ginny. When have you ever stuck up for yourself to prove to them you aren't an easy target? Hmm? Maybe in second grade when Rachel stole your doll from you, and you wouldn't tell her fourth grade teacher? Or how about in fifth grade when she dumped the blue paint all over your art project so it was ruined? Better yet, how about five minutes ago when she rubbed it in your face in front of half of our school that she's been in my brother's pants just because she knows that's where you want to be?"

I opened my mouth to defend myself, to say something, anything, but as usual, nothing came out. My shoulders slumped a little bit as the truth pulverized me. I was a wimp, a weenie, that proverbial sidewalk the jerks in this high school walked all over because they knew I wouldn't defend myself. And I was damn tired of it!

It was bad enough I got picked on for being quiet, a nerd, or whatever perceived infraction they could find wrong with me. Then all those high-handed snobs decided to pick on me since they figured out my feelings for Lucas.

Olivia took one look at my trembling lips and watery eyes, and I watched as the anger melted right off her face to be replaced by sympathy. She reached over to the sink, grabbed a paper towel, and then wiped the tears from my face.

With a soft but firm voice, she continued, "You're one of the sweetest people I've met in my whole life, Ginny, and on days like today, that's a serious disadvantage. Don't mistake being a nice person for being a pushover, girl, or you're going to be trampled to death in life. Grow a backbone and show that bitch Rachel that, when she messes with you, she has messed with the wrong person."

After I gave Olivia a nod, she handed the paper towel to me and took a step back.

"All right, girl, I'm going to give you a minute to fix your face, and then we can hit the vending machines to grab something to eat. I'll be right outside the bathroom door if you need me." With that, my best friend left me alone.

Turning my head, I took a look at myself in the mirror. I didn't wear much makeup, because my mom always told me I was a "natural beauty" and didn't need it, but I did wear a little. The tear streaks over my cheeks had ruined my foundation, but thankfully, I wore waterproof mascara, so I didn't look like a scary raccoon girl.

Walking over to one of the sinks, I wet the paper towel, added a little soap, and then washed off what was left of my foundation.

While I washed my face, Olivia's words resonated in my mind. She was right; I had not defended myself from the likes of Rachel, ever. Because of that, there I was, hiding out in the bathroom like some sort of reject.

I had done a lot of hiding in my life, more than anyone else. Heck, my mom and I were both still hiding from our past. It was the only way to keep us safe from the person who might kill us after we had run from him.

Did I really want to hide out more, especially from the likes of Rachel? Was I really going to let her control my life like that? I was already being controlled by a man I could barely remember yet had enough nightmares about to never forget how dangerous he was.

Rachel was nowhere near as scary as I remembered that man being. She was merely a spoiled girl who fed off other people's misery. Was I really going to give her the chance to make me miserable for the rest of our high school years, or was I going to finally put my foot down and stick up for myself?

With a final swipe of the paper towel over my face, I stared at my own eyes in the mirror and made my decision. There were some problems you ran from because you were not strong enough to defeat them, and then there were other problems that you squashed.

I was going to squash Rachel like a bug.

Throwing my paper towel in the trash, I marched out of the bathroom and past Olivia, who immediately started to follow me.

"You've got this look on your face I've never seen before. Please tell me you're about to go punch that bitch in the face."

I shook my head. "No punching."

My best friend sighed. "You always take away my fun. It would've been nice to see someone knock that girl out and mess up her pretty, little face."

Looking up at the clock in the hallway, I saw that lunch would end in three minutes. I had to hurry if I was going to do what I wanted to do, which was my own way of messing the pretty, little Rachel up.

"Hurry up, Olivia. We've got to catch her before she leaves the cafeteria, or my plan won't work."

Jogging down the hall, we raced to the cafeteria door. My heart started beating like a jackhammer in my chest, and I had to wipe my sweaty hands on my jean skirt before I grabbed the cafeteria door handle to pull it open. I was sort of scared shitless of what I was about to do, but if I didn't stick up for myself now, I never would. I refused to let someone like Rachel ruin my life when I had bigger skeletons in my closet to be afraid of.

The loud cafeteria fell under a strange hush when I entered. The kids who saw me pointed me out to the other kids who hadn't noticed. Before I made it ten steps into the large room, I seemed to have everyone's attention, including a smirking Rachel who turned to her friends and loudly said, "Aww... Look, girls, she's done crying already. You think she finally realized Lucas would never want a freak like her?"

Ignoring her verbal jab, I eyed her immaculate and, more than likely, expensive outfit: white, off the shoulder, silk shirt; a pair of black leggings; and designer heels. Rachel might not care about school, but everyone knew she loved her clothes.

Walking straight to her table where she was sitting on the end with a new lunch tray, I saw it was filled with spaghetti and a can of diet soda.

Awesome. That meant I had ammunition for my attack.

Without saying a word, I stopped, grabbed her food tray and her open can of soda in each of my hands, and before Rachel had time to so much as move a muscle, I flung the spaghetti off her tray and onto the front of her shirt.

She stood up in an enraged gasp, and that was when I turned her can of soda upside down over her head, pouring the drink all over her perfectly done hair.

"Now you look sloppy enough to go along with that blow job Lucas mentioned. If you're going to act like a whore, you should probably clean up your looks and your skills."

After a few seconds of silent surprise, the entire cafeteria erupted in laughter. I could vaguely hear an adult shouting my name through the racket, but I was too busy smiling at Rachel, who was shrieking and sputtering nonsense as she stomped from the cafeteria, to care.

It wasn't until I heard Lucas's angry shout that I took my eyes off Rachel's retreating form and turned my head to see him standing up, dripping wet, and a water bottle in Olivia's hand as he yelled at his sister, "What the hell, Olivia?"

She shrugged. "I just didn't want Ginny to go to detention alone." She turned her head to look at me and winked.

As I covered my mouth with my hand to stifle my laughter, Lucas took one look between the two of us and snarled, "I'm telling Mom about this, you little shit."

Sometimes, revenge wasn't a dish; it was a cold drink poured over the head.
Chapter

7

Lucas

Nineteen Years Old

After I turned eighteen and graduated high school, I left for the Army. Following my dream and partying with the men I served with left little time to think about the shy, pretty, awkward, underage girl I had left back home except when I got those few solitary moments before I crashed. Then it seemed I had all the time in the world, and my only thoughts would be of her.

Late at night, when I lay in my barrack's room, unable to sleep, my mind would drift to Ginny. Sometimes, I would lie there and re-read all of the letters she had sent me. The one I found myself going to the most was, in turn, the least serious. It also made my mind drift to Ginny all dressed up in the picture she sent me later.

Lucas,

I hope this letter finds you seeing the world or at least the Army's version of it. Today, your mom made cookies for the marching band bake sale. Olivia and I snuck an extra one each and ate it for you. Noah made drum major, so he's made sure each of us helped raise money for new uniforms.

Your dad is so proud of you that he's decided he will mow the grass this summer instead of your brothers. Your mom came outside with a glass of lemonade, and for a brief moment, I thought he might run into the Whitmore's bushes. I guess the men in the Young family are easily distracted.

I applied for the summer art program. Mom says, if I don't get in, she will still load me up with supplies. It's not new water colors I want, though; it's the chance to try new techniques. What do parents understand, anyway?

Olivia is ready to go shopping for homecoming dresses. It's still months away. You know her, though. She doesn't want to wait until the last minute and not have the best selection. I'll be sure to send pictures.

All my love,

Ginny

I worried the time apart would mean Ginny would move on from her obsession with me. We weren't ready; I knew that. Still, the what if's kept taunting me. I had a plan. However, I constantly feared that, because I had not told her I already considered her mine, she would move on to some other schmuck.

The thought of a fumbling idiot touching her nearly drove me to insanity whenever my doubts arose. It was hypocritical of me for sure, since I was now fucking my way through the base, much like I had done in high school. The more I found release, the more pent up frustrations would build inside me that it wasn't Ginny.

Of course, at nineteen, nothing about my conflicted emotions had changed. All of my fantasies starred one blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl on the cusp of becoming a woman, one who was still not ready for me.

On Christmas Eve, I headed home for my first visit since joining the Army. Part of me started to wonder if maybe I should tell her how I felt, but the issue of her still being underage quickly killed that idea. I had more at stake now with being legal and having a career. Even if I told her she would be mine without touching her, I didn't need anyone to make assumptions. Plus, I was trying to give her time to be Ginny. My gut screamed at me that she wasn't ready for the white picket fence I had once overheard her telling my sister she wanted so badly.

The present I had bought for her practically burned a hole in my pocket as I tried to picture what the look on her face would be when I gave it to her. I might have to leave the girl who was made for me behind, but I would make sure to leave a piece of me with her.

My attempts to distract myself from those thoughts didn't work well, though. In fact, I was so lost in my head about what I wanted to do versus what I needed to do that the cab driver had to tell me three times that my ride was over, which made me feel like a fucking idiot since we were sitting in my parents' driveway.

By the time I got to the front door, I was damn near fretting like a little, old lady. Even the warm hugs of my family members, the familiar sights of all of my mom's Christmas decorations, and the smell of home cooked food didn't help. I felt wired to the max, yet I did my best to hide it. The last thing I needed was for any of them to catch on to the fact that I wasn't myself and ask me why.

I wouldn't be able to give them the truth, which would sound something like, __ "Because I'm in love with an underage girl, and it makes me feel like a pervert since I want nothing more than to take her to my bed and fuck her out of my system with her ankles up by my ears while I make the headboard slam against the wall. And eventually, I'll get around to telling her I've been in love with her since I was sixteen."

I wouldn't need my family to beat me bloody for saying something like that; I would kick my own ass for it.

After getting through dinner and catching up with what all of my siblings had been up to, I headed to my old room to try to catch some shut eye. That didn't work out too well for me, and I ended up spending most of the night staring at my ceiling. Then I spent half of Christmas Day sneaking glances at the front door, waiting for Ginny to show up. She and her mom always came over to spend part of the day with us.

On pins and needles, my stomach was half in knots that my worst fears had come to pass. What if she hadn't shown up yet because she was at some schmuck's house, spending the day with him? That dour thought led to me daydreaming about going over to said schmuck's house and ripping him limb from limb before throwing Ginny over my shoulder, caveman style.

When our doorbell finally rang, I somehow managed to keep myself from jumping up and running to the door. It took every ounce of willpower I had, but I managed to keep myself seated on the living room couch while my brother answered the door. That didn't mean I wasn't holding my breath while waiting for her entrance.

Then, when she finally appeared in the entrance of the living room, smiling nervously, it took everything in me not to drop my jaw open in shock.

Ginny had on so much makeup she looked like she was auditioning for the job of a hooker! I might have blown it off as a girl who liked her cosmetics a little too much and was trying to come into her own; except, Olivia busted her by asking why she had makeup on at all.

She quickly cut her eyes in my direction, and a bright red blush spread from her cheeks to her neck. My mother instantly admonished Olivia for what she had said, and my sister apologized then tried to play the whole thing off as she gave her friend a hug, during which my girl tried to momentarily hide her face behind the shoulder of her taller best friend, presumably so I couldn't see her.

Rather than feeling bad for Ginny, though, a smile spread over my face, and when Ginny saw that smile, she blushed a little more in apparent mortification. I sort of felt bad for making her feel worse, but I couldn't wipe the smile off my face for one simple reason: my girl still wanted me.

I didn't have a thing in the world to worry about.

Ginny

Sixteen Years Old

Could a hole open up in the floor and swallow me now, please?

I was so embarrassed I just wanted to run out the door and go home. If it weren't for the fact that this was my first chance to see Lucas since he had left to go into the Army, I would. However, there was no telling when he would be able to come home for a visit again, and as a result, I had to take advantage of the day.

That didn't mean I wasn't ready to kick my best friend's butt for throwing me under the bus, which must have been broadcasted plainly on my face, because she winced at the glare I gave her as she handed me a makeup removing cleansing cloth.

"I am so sorry, girl."

"You should be!" I snapped back as I snatched the cloth out of her hand.

Olivia threw her hands up in the air. "Come on, already! I get it; I screwed up. But can you really blame me? You walk through my front door, looking like the makeup counter from the department store threw up all over you, and you didn't think anyone would notice?"

Shrugging my shoulders, I looked away from her and into her vanity mirror, instead. Using the cloth, I wiped over one of my eyelids, only to see the special makeup remover cloth had only taken off some of the green eye shadow. Sighing in frustration, I started to scrub my face in earnest.

"What in the world were you thinking to use green, Ginny?" Olivia asked, sounding somewhat horrified.

I shot her another glare. "It's Christmas! I was thinking I was being festive, you fun killer!"

She shook her head and popped a fist on her hip.

Looking up to the ceiling, I silently prayed someone would save me from her over-the-top, Italian attitude.

"No. Just no." She wagged her finger at me through the mirror. "Festive is wearing an ugly Christmas sweater or one of those idiotic antler headbands. Festive is _not_ caking on bright green eye shadow and red lipstick so it looks like you were slapped in the face by kindergartners who were finger painting."

She ignored my gasp of outrage and bent down until her chin sat on my shoulder and our faces were side by side in the reflection of the mirror. "Listen to me, Gin, and listen well. If my brother can't wake up and see you for _you_ , all the makeup in the world isn't going to help. You shouldn't have to change who you are for any guy, even if you love him."

My anger melted away at her advice. Sometimes, Olivia acted harsh, but she was the most genuine person I had ever met. While I felt silly for trying to be something I wasn't in an attempt to impress Lucas, I had to admit my best friend happened to be right.

All of this makeup was not me. Being a simple girl, I didn't like anything caked on my face. I found myself more comfortable in my bare skin, so to speak. I'd only put on makeup in the hopes that, if I made myself look a bit older after Lucas hadn't seen me in so long, maybe he would finally notice me as a young woman and not the little girl who used to skin her knees chasing after him.

"You're right," I finally whispered.

Standing back up, Olivia shot me an overconfident smile. "I know I am."

Rolling my eyes at her, I quipped, "If your ego gets much bigger, I'm afraid you won't fit that big head of yours through the door."

Olivia shot me a sassy smile. "Don't hate me because I'm fabulous." Snatching the cloth with green streaks on it from me, she turned my chair around until I was facing her. "Now, sit there and shut up for a while. Let me show you the valuable lesson that sometimes _less is more_."

Two more makeup remover cloths and twenty minutes later, I stared at myself again in her vanity mirror. I didn't have an ounce of foundation on my face, but Olivia had put just a bit of a soft, shimmery pink blush on my cheeks. She had also coated my long, naturally blonde, curled lashes with brown mascara and dabbed a sheer, pink lip gloss on my lips.

It was understated, soft, almost whimsically natural.

It was me.

Raising my eyes to watch my best friend run her fingers through the curls I had spent over an hour putting into my hair, I grudgingly admitted to myself that she was right again. Lucas had to love me for who I was, not who I could make myself into for him. I was just so afraid he was never going to love me the way I already loved him—completely.

Two hours later, as I hugged Mrs. Young good-bye, I thanked her for the art set they had bought me for Christmas while my doubts about Lucas ever loving me weighed heavier on my shoulders than ever before.

He had barely spoken to me the entire time, and the few times I had managed to make eye contact with him had only resulted in him cracking a joke that had something to do with my age.

The first moment I had captured his attention, he had roamed his eyes up and down in what I had been hoping was appraisal, but I must have been wrong.

His eyes had found mine, and he'd said, "Ginny, did you join drama or something?"

I had already been mortified, and Lucas Young had only made it worse. No, I hadn't joined drama; I'd just wanted to catch the eye of the boy who had grown into a man whom I couldn't seem to get out of my heart and off my mind.

Not long after Olivia had fixed my hair and makeup, the boys had all brought up Ginny and me being able to drive. If I hadn't already been ready to crawl into a hole and never come out, Lucas's reply would have made me want to do just that.

He'd piped up with, "Finally old enough to apply for your learners permit, Gin? Don't run over any mailboxes."

I'd never thought there would be a time I didn't want Lucas's attention until tonight. It was just another time I wished the floor would have opened up and swallowed me whole.

Maybe Olivia was right yet again. Maybe I was crazy to love a boy who didn't love me back.

Anxious to get home and take off the dress shoes that were pinching my toes, I followed my mom out the front door. I had just stepped off the Young's front porch steps when the sound of their door opening and closing came from behind me.

"Ginny." His deep voice rolled over and through me until I swore that even the tips of my toes tingled in response to the sound.

Would there ever be a time when every part of me didn't answer to the simple action of him calling my name? Just the sound of his voice was enough to wash away the doubt I'd had seconds before and send my heart into overtime with new hope. It was amazing how a boy I had never even kissed owned every piece of me. Moreover, although it probably made me incredibly stupid, I wouldn't change a thing.

One day, if I waited long enough, Lucas Young would realize I was offering him everything I was, and in return, I was hoping he would give me the same. He would realize that I might have been the shy, quiet, passive girl he had grown up with, but I was going to become a woman who would be strong enough to stand by his side while he pursued his career in the Army. A woman who would hold the fort down while he was gone, take care of him when he was home, be more than just a girlfriend. I would be his partner, the person who would always be waiting with my arms open to welcome him home. One day, Lucas would see that I was going to be the woman for him.

Looking back at my house, I watched my mom as she walked inside and turned on the lights in our living room so they shined through our windows.

I turned back to Lucas and clasped my hands in front of me to hide the nervous tremble in them. "Yes, Lucas?"

The corner of his mouth tipped up in a smile while some sort of emotion lit up his eyes, but I couldn't read him. I would take that nameless emotion any day, though, over the teasing he had been giving me all night. He was an enigma to me, and I wasn't sure if I would ever understand all of the fine nuances to his personality.

"I promise not to hit any mailboxes between my house and yours as I _walk_ home." I tried to give him my best smile after all the ribbing tonight.

His brows drew together, and for a moment, I wondered if that was regret I saw in his features.

"With all of the excitement in the house, I didn't get a chance to give you the Christmas present I got for you," he murmured as he slowly started down the stairs toward me.

My stomach felt like it did a somersault, and my hands instantly started to sweat so much I worried about wet spots forming through my knit gloves as I clutched the art kit in my hands a little more tightly. There hadn't been that much going on in his house tonight, so was he just using that as an excuse to get me alone? A desperate part of me hoped that was the case.

"You bought a present... for me?" I whispered in awe. Should I have said that a little cooler? A little more confident? Yeah. Regardless, all of my thought capabilities had disappeared, and it was taking everything I had not to faint from a combination of glee and surprise.

The other side of his beautiful, firm lips ticked up, forming a full smile, and in that moment, I could stare at that smile until the day I died.

"Hold your hand out, Gin."

Slowly, afraid if I moved too quickly, I would scare him off like he was some timid animal, I moved one hand out so it was in front of me, between the two of us, palm up. Lucas reached into his pocket and pulled out a rectangle jewelry box that looked much like the ones he had given his mom and sister. Olivia had squealed when she had opened her present to see a gold hummingbird necklace, and Mrs. Young had shed a few tears when she had seen her gold sand dollar necklace. Never in a million years had I thought Lucas would have gotten me one, too.

The trembling in my hand became a bit more pronounced, and he had to wrap my fingers around the box so I wouldn't drop it. I stared at the box, unable to move. A part of me was terrified this was a dream, and I would wake up and discover the moment gone.

"Aren't you going to open it?"

Lucas's question sounded as if he were amused by me, so I looked up at him through my lashes. The sight that met my eyes only made my heart pound harder in my chest. The blank mask he had been wearing all night was completely gone, and in its place was a look I had wished, dreamed, and hoped for—affection.

Not a sisterly sort of affection that he had claimed to have for me before, but something infinitely better. Whether he knew it or not, the look he gave me right then was possessive.

"Gin?" he spoke my name slowly, warily, and I realized I still stood there like a statue.

Thrusting the trembling hand with the jewelry box in it back toward him, I stammered, "Will you open it for me, please?"

My other hand was still tightly grasping the somewhat heavy art kit, and with snow on the ground, I didn't have anywhere to put it to free up both hands.

Lucas looked at my hand holding my present, nodded, and then reached out to take the box. My hand wasn't the only thing trembling now as I watched him stroke the top of the rectangular box in contemplation with one of his fingers. My entire body was shivering, and I doubted it was from the cold.

A million things were rushing through my mind, yet I couldn't concentrate on anything except that box. Something told me this moment was pivotal when it came to Lucas and me, as if whatever was in that box was going to let me know the answer to the question that plagued me when it came to the boy I loved.

Would Lucas ever love me back?

Everything felt like it was in slow motion as he pulled the lid off, and then my world narrowed down to the sight of gold as I gasped. It was a heart-shaped locket with a 'G' engraved on it and what also looked like a tiny keyhole.

Lucas hooked one of his fingers through the gold chain and held the dangling necklace in front of me. "Do you like it?"

I couldn't pull my eyes away from the gold heart. _There_ , the hope inside me whispered. _There is the proof that, whether he realizes it or not, Lucas cares for me._ _Why else would he give you a heart when he gave his mother and sister a hummingbird and a sand dollar?_

"It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen, Lucas. I'm going to put it on as soon as I get home."

"I can put it on you now if you want me to."

My head snapped up in surprise. I hadn't expected that from him.

"Please?" I whispered.

Some emotion I didn't understand flashed through his eyes, sending a new round of shivers through me, the good kind.

"Turn around."

I did as he told me, waiting not so patiently as I stared across the street at my house. He moved closer until he stood right behind me, his body heat warming me. Even though it was mid-winter in New York, I felt a flush cover my cheeks.

A light stroke of fingers against my neck pulled my long hair to one side, and Lucas's deep voice sounded softly in my ear as he told me to use my free hand to hold it out of his way. I swear I could feel his breath on the back of my neck as he draped the necklace around my throat slowly then fastened the clasp.

Had his fingers lingered on the back of my neck? Probably not, but if they had, I might have begged for him to touch me more.

The metal of the heart was a cold shock when it first touched my skin, but the weight of it against my chest comforted me in a way I couldn't explain.

I wanted this moment to last forever, but reality crashed in with the sound of my mother's voice calling out from our house, telling me not to stay outside too long; she didn't want me to get cold. However, with Lucas so close to me, I felt anything but cold.

When I let my hair go, it slid back into place over my shoulders and down my back. I could have sworn I heard the sound of Lucas taking a deep breath, as if he were inhaling my scent. However, with the way I felt, almost light-headed with euphoria, I knew better than to make more of this moment than the dream come true it had already been. Nevertheless, my heart always won over my head where Lucas Young was concerned.

_You could make this moment better_ , my hope whispered. There I found myself yet again holding on to hope.

Turning slowly around, I decided to end tonight the way I had dreamed for so many years. Before my nerves got the best of me, I reached up on my tiptoes, braced my free hand on his chest, and softly planted a kiss on his cheek. I felt his body jolt in surprise before going rock solid under my hand, and I quickly pulled away.

"Thank you, Lucas. It's the best present I've ever been given." Without giving him a chance to respond, I walked away.

I didn't need Lucas to say anything. The heart-shaped locket lying against my skin said it all.
Chapter

8

Lucas

Twenty-One Years Old

After giving a heart-shaped locket that held a small secret its wearer still didn't know about to this day, I went back to my life with the Army and succeeded in passing Special Forces training to become a Green Beret. Because of joining my new team, training, and subsequent missions, I had been unable to make it back home for two years after that Christmas.

Now that I finally did make it home, it was for my twenty-first birthday party, and the house was packed with my two younger brothers, my little sister, and of course, the girl who haunted all of my thoughts and dreams—Ginny.

It was sad to admit as a grown-ass man, but I was doing my best to delay seeing her today. First, I'd made sure to stay up late last night and sleep half the day away. When my mom had forced me to get up after noon because the guests for my party were already showing up, I'd decided a nice, long shower couldn't hurt. I needed one, anyway, to clean off all the sweating I'd done through the night due to my flashbacks.

Nothing fucked with a man's head more than war. The only thing that helped me sleep was when I thought about Gin. Then my overactive imagination would spin fantasies of all the things I wanted to do to her but never would.

As I soaped up my washcloth, I grudgingly admitted to myself that my need for her had only grown since the last time I had seen her.

The reality that I was quickly coming to the end of my rope in regards to Gin was terrifying for me. The Lucas she had known had been destroyed in a desert halfway across the world.

Although I might have achieved my dream of becoming a Green Beret, I had never taken the time to think of what obtaining that goal would cost me. Some might say it was going to cost me everything one day.

After watching a man in my unit take a bullet to the neck and die from bleeding out thousands of miles away from his wife and kids, I'd had a reality check. I was living a life of kill or be killed anytime I went on a mission, and while I wouldn't change a single kill shot I had made in the name of defending my country, unit, or myself, I had changed my mind about other things, like Ginny.

She was, without a doubt, the girl meant for me. The problem was, I was no longer the guy she used to know. I had changed. I had experienced horrifying things I could never repeat to her, watched my friend's blood soak desert sand. I was darker, harder on the inside than I'd ever been. And while there would always be a part of me that could be gentle for the girl across the street, I was no longer the sort of man she needed in her life. Just like one of her favorite fairy tales, she was the beauty, and I was the beast. Only, I wasn't so sure anyone could handle my beast. Hell, there were days I couldn't handle myself.

Now, as I slowly scrubbed myself down to get ready for the party, I feared seeing the blonde-haired girl from across the street as much as I longed to. She was both my greatest strength and my greatest weakness. Thoughts and dreams of Gin had kept me sane while I was on the front line, battling terrorists. Knowing I couldn't have her now because I wasn't the sort of man she deserved was enough to gut me raw, leave me feeling hollow. The reality had often caused me to prefer feeling numb than feel anything at all.

I was pulled from my thoughts when I heard my mom shout Ginny's name from somewhere in the house, causing me to turn my head and find her watching me through the cracked door. The little shit had been watching me while I was in the shower!

She scurried away before I could say anything, but that didn't keep me from getting both hard as a rock and annoyed that she had been spying on me.

After doing some algebra in my head while I willed my dick to deflate, I dried off and got dressed. I had every intention of tracking her down and chewing her out for spying on me when _it_ happened.

_It_ being the moment my life changed, the moment I realized I was going to live in perpetual hell forever.

That was because, when I laid eyes on Ginny standing in the backyard with our family and friends, I forgot how to breathe, forgot how to form complete sentences. Even my heart forgot what it was supposed to do for a few seconds, skipping a beat.

During my time away, she had grown from that skinny, petite, pretty girl into a curvy knockout. She had finally blossomed into the woman I'd spent years waiting for. She was a young woman who was on the verge of being ready for a white picket fence and forever, two things I could no longer give her.

While I was standing there like a stupefied idiot, my mom pointed in my direction from across our backyard, and Gin followed the movement to see me staring at her. A rosy blush spread over her creamy pale skin, and then she ducked her head timidly to stare at the ground.

It took everything I had not to gawk at her. That innocent quality about her had the caveman in me coming to life. I wanted to throw her over my shoulder, cart her off to a nice hotel room, and debauch her in so many ways she could never think of another man. I wanted to put a ring on her finger and make her promise to be mine. I wanted to take that innocence of hers and fucking own it.

I couldn't do it, though.

I mentally kicked my own ass and forced a blank look onto my face. It didn't matter how gorgeous she had become; she was off limits now more than ever.

In the two years I had been gone, I had seen things that would haunt me for the rest of my life. I had walked by burning buildings with dead bodies littered in the streets of Afghanistan; watched good men in my unit fall down and not get back up; written letters to those men's wives or girlfriends, giving my condolences. Those experiences had taught me a valuable lesson: I had nothing except more of that ahead of me, and men like me shouldn't settle down.

It wasn't fair to the women and children left behind when we got our ass blown up or our head shot off by the enemy. Therefore, I ignored the strange looks from my brothers by the pool at my strangled silence. I ignored whatever my dad had said to me from where he was cooking food on the grill. I ignored all of them so I could walk back into the house, away from everyone—especially Ginny—to go to the kitchen for a breather. I needed space between the two of us before I gave into my primitive urges, dooming a good woman to a possible life of heartache.

Going to the refrigerator, I opened it, bent over, and was swiping a beer when I felt someone behind me.

"Lucas," I heard her soft voice call.

Steeling myself against all sweetness that was Ginny, I turned, wearing that blank look on my face, only to have her lips cover my own in a sneak attack. It was the first attack I had never seen coming and probably the one most detrimental to my sanity.

Her tongue swiped the seam of my lips, crumbling my resistance in an instant. I wrapped my free hand around her neck and plundered her mouth. I had never tasted anything or anyone like her. Like cinnamon and sugar, she was a small hint of spice with a whole lot of sweet.

I was milliseconds from letting my inner savage beast free to have her when she grabbed my arm as she moaned into my mouth. Her little nails pricked my skin through my shirt, and the small pain brought me back to my senses.

Pushing her away to break the contact, I noticed her free hand held a rather large, flat, rectangle wrapped box in shiny blue paper with a white bow. Her cheeks flushed, and her voice was damn near a Marilyn Monroe sultry purr when she murmured, "Happy Birthday, Lucas."

The hope in her eyes brought it all back to me—why I couldn't have this, us. God, what I wouldn't give to have that bit of sweet and spice in my life for the rest of my days. She deserved better than that, though. She deserved a man with a safe job that had him coming home every day after his nine-to-five shift, someone pure and whole who could give her the white picket fence and kids.

And that person wasn't me.

The man I was couldn't stand the thought of sullying someone as pure as Ginny with the death and harsh reality that now surrounded me. More than likely, my ass would die in some war zone, and then that hope would die. I couldn't be selfish by doing that to her.

Therefore, I did what I had to do: I acted like an asshole.

"First, you spy on me while I'm in the shower and now this? Damn, how desperate are you to have someone pop your cherry? You should warn people before you stick your tongue down their throats, Gin. That was like kissing my fucking sister. Jesus, I need to go rinse my mouth out now."

Her eyes watered up, and the first tear fell as I pushed past her, roughly shoving her aside as I made my way toward my bathroom. Before I closed the door, I heard my mom shout her name in a concerned voice as the door to our house slammed.

Regret and anger crashed through me. I wanted to punch the wall, destroy something as much as I had just destroyed both Ginny and me with my lies. I couldn't. If I started putting holes in the walls, my family would know something was up, and I didn't need them butting into my life.

Walking over to the sink, I turned on the cold water and splashed my face. It didn't do a damn thing to help me, and that only pissed me off more.

Overwhelmed with anger at myself, I punched the only thing I could in the bathroom without breaking it—the sink.

My knuckles slammed into the unforgiving porcelain several times before I noticed the red I was leaving behind. I had split my knuckles open. Fucking fantastic.

Growling in frustration at myself, I reached out to open the medicine cabinet doors and grab the rubbing alcohol and bandages but stopped when I caught my reflection and cringed. Was the hateful look that I had on my face now what I had shown Ginny when I'd spewed all those nasty words? If that were what I had looked like, there was no way to tell her I didn't hate her; I hated myself.

I wasn't going to be able to look myself in the mirror for a fucking month after this.

Ignoring the mirror completely, I gathered the supplies I needed from the medicine cabinet then cleaned and bandaged my knuckles. Not feeling up to being around my family anymore, I stalked to my bedroom and slammed the door shut, locking it.

I ignored my mother's concerned voice when she knocked on my door thirty minutes later.

I ignored my father's stern voice when he called out to me through my door an hour after that.

I even somehow ignored my sister's raging shouts as she banged on the door so hard and for so long that I thought she might knock it down two hours later.

What I couldn't ignore was the need to get rip-roaring drunk later that night, long after I had listened to everybody go to bed.

As a result, I quietly unlocked my door and went down to the kitchen to get a glass of ice and grab my dad's bottle of whiskey.

When I went back to my room, it was to find the present Ginny had held in her hands with a note taped to the top of it. I glanced up and down the hall, looking for whoever might have delivered it to my room, but I didn't hear or see anything except the dark silence of the night.

Closing and locking my door again, I slowly walked toward the box on my bed as if it were a bomb about to go off at any minute. In a way, it was a bomb, one I just knew was going to destroy my heart. Nevertheless, I had to see what was in it since it was laid before me like some sort of self-inflicted punishment I more than deserved.

Pulling the note off the top, I could see my sister's angry scrawl yet couldn't read the words until I reached over and turned on my bedside lamp. Once the light was on and I started reading, I sort of wished I had let myself stay in the dark.

You don't deserve her, asshole. - Olivia

They said the truth hurt, and that note was proof whoever had coined that phrase was right.

Just as my sister's note said, I absolutely did not deserve Ginny. That was why the reality of my situation and what I had done to her today hurt worse than any form of torture I could ever endure.

Right then, I felt like I could cut out my own heart with a rusty blade. What could possibly hurt more than that?

Seconds later, I wished I had never asked myself that question as I sat with Ginny's birthday present to me in my hands.

In a black wooden frame with a gray mat, one of the most beautiful things I had ever laid eyes on besides my Ginny was displayed: an eight-by-ten, full-color drawing so detailed and vibrant it would be seared into my mind forever.

In profile, Gin and I stood on the sidewalk in front of each of our houses, staring at each other from across the street. She had captured the way our street, the trees, and neighborhood would look from that angle flawlessly.

She had drawn me in the jeans and gray Army T-shirt I had worn the last time I had been home. She had drawn herself in a pair of torn jeans, a white T-shirt, and her favorite black converse tennis shoes that she had worn forever. Looking at this, I could see the deliberateness of each line, the purpose of each piece of the pseudo portrait.

It was a representation of so many things to us: home, our lives growing up, the way the two of us seemed meant to be, and yet there we stood on the sidelines, apart. It was the perfect little piece of paper to represent my perpetual hell in agonizing detail.

If the picture itself weren't enough to bring me to my knees, then the note in the corner was.

A piece of home for you to take wherever you go.

I'll be waiting.

Love, Ginny

Classic Gin: gorgeous, loving, and thoughtful, giving me something to remind me of home because she knew how much it would mean to me.

My fingers traced the lines that made up her form on the page, and I felt something in me wither and die.

My angel in white with worn chucks. Sweet innocence ready to be plucked by a man's hands. Only, those hands would never be mine.

Ginny

Eighteen Years Old

My hand was frozen from holding the pint of chocolate ice cream I had almost demolished. There was a time when I had sworn ice cream could cure anything, but today had proven that wrong. Nothing could cure today. Absolutely nothing.

After all of these years, with just a few words from the boy I had loved almost my entire life, I knew all hope was gone.

Lucas Young would never care for me the way I cared for him.

Perhaps I would always be his little sister's best friend or, as he had yelled at me today, like a sister. Either way, I would never be the thing I wanted most: his.

I put down my ice cream and grabbed the heart-shaped locket around my neck. I should take it off, put it up in my jewelry box, and never look at it again. Even as my mind screamed at me to do more than that—I should tear the damn thing off and throw it in the trash—I couldn't seem to make my hands move.

How pathetic was I?

There I sat in the middle of the night, the lights off and staring at the darkened window of Lucas's room across the street, my heart ripped in two from his cruel words, yet I couldn't take off his necklace. How much battering and bruising could a heart take before it finally broke irreparably?

Apparently, my stupid heart wanted to find out.

Crawling off the floor and into my bed, I curled into a ball.

When I had been a little girl, I had curled into a ball to protect myself from an alcoholic father who would lose his temper and take his frustrations out on me and my mother physically. Now I was curling into a ball to try to protect what was left of my emotions.

The funny thing was that I swore the verbal beating I had taken from Lucas was ten times worse than any physical pain my father had ever caused. Who knew words could hurt so much?

I closed my eyes, and Lucas's angry face came into focus. As my mind played back the incident for what felt like the hundredth time, I picked up on two things I hadn't noticed before.

First, Lucas had kissed me back. Not timidly, either, but with a ferocity that had surprised and almost scared me. If kissing me were so awful, why had he kissed me back like that?

Secondly, there had been something wrong with his eyes as he had raged at me. Something more than anger had been there. A hint of sadness? Bleakness, even? It was hard to say for sure, but I suddenly realized something had happened to the boy I loved while he had been gone these past two years.

He wasn't the same person he had been when he had given me the locket. Something inside of Lucas Young had died, and I wasn't sure I could bring it back to life. Therefore, I was going to do the only thing I could do—: give Lucas space.

People said, if you loved something, set it free, and what you loved would return to you. I didn't know if Lucas would ever return to me as the man he was before, but I loved him enough to set him free.

Still, I was going to keep the only piece of him I could possibly keep now: the heart-shaped locket. Then, one day, perhaps when I was stronger, I would take off his necklace and store it away in a box in the back of my closet where it would inevitably be lost. Until then, I would have to find a way to move on, although a piece of my shattered heart tried to tell me it wasn't possible.

I eventually fell asleep with my hand still wrapped around my heart-shaped locket, sad that was the only piece of Lucas Young's heart I would ever truly hold.
Chapter

9

Lucas

Twenty-Three Years Old

Due to another deployment, the next time I saw Ginny was a year and a half later. In that time, I hadn't received one card, letter, or email from my little sister's best friend. Mission accomplished, right?

Perhaps a little too well. I couldn't take not hearing from Gin at all. It might be selfish on my part to want to keep in contact with her, but I couldn't handle not knowing how she was doing.

I'd spent half my time in Afghanistan distracted, wondering about what she was doing. What she was drawing. If she had finally given up on me like I had done my best to force her to do. Imaging her with another guy was a double-edged sword. But that was what I had wanted for her, right?

The problem was, the mere idea made me want to puke my guts out, punch holes in shit, blow something up. It was irrational, and I totally didn't give a fuck. I'd spent too much of my life taking care of the blonde-haired angel across the street to give her up completely. Maybe I couldn't have her in the capacity that I wanted her, but I still needed her in my life in any way I could get her.

She had been dropped off at the family dinner by her boyfriend. My secret worst fear. I had no one to blame but myself, though, right? Then I had to watch as that shithead put his hands all over her while kissing her good-bye.

It had burned like a motherfucker to watch her with him, but that was my burden to bear. She was safe, seemed happy, and that was all I had ever wanted.

What bothered me that night was that she wouldn't look me directly in the eye. She had looked over my shoulder, at my chest, but she refused to look at my face. That burned, too. I had done that to her.

I might not be able to have her in my bed for the rest of my life, but I couldn't stand the thought of not having her in my life. I had to fix this shit.

As a result, I cornered her in the living room when she went to go grab her forgotten cell phone off the end table while everybody else was in the kitchen.

"Gin."

Her body froze. It was painfully obvious she would rather talk to a rattlesnake than be alone with me, making me feel like more of an ass than I already did.

After turning toward me, she stared at a spot over my shoulder and replied, "Yes, Lucas?"

Nope. I refused to talk to her if she wouldn't look at me.

Reaching out a hand, I gripped her chin with my fingers and pulled her face until I caught her gaze. "That's better. I want you lookin' nowhere but me while I say this. I get why you're gun shy around me. I was an ass last time I was here. I shouldn't have spouted off the way I did. You caught me off guard, and I reacted badly. Call me a dick. Call me a shithead. Call me whatever you want, honey. Just get it out of your system and forgive me."

" _Forgive you_?" she snapped. "Why should I forgive you when I haven't heard an actual apology yet?"

Seeing this new, sassy side of her made me hard, but I couldn't concentrate on that, so I apologized, instead.

"I'm sorry, Gin."

She only looked at me skeptically.

"Seriously, honey, I mean it. I was a dick that night, and I'm sorry. My head was in a fucked up place after my first deployment, and I shouldn't have taken it out on you. Forgive me now?"

Although the uncertainty faded from her eyes, I watched as a bit of curiosity replaced it. She tilted her head to the side, and I had the distinct impression she was trying to figure me out, maybe see into my head.

Who knew what she was thinking? I had given up on trying to figure out women a long time ago. All I could do was stand there and wait to see if the girl I had known for what felt like forever would give me a second chance to be in her life in some capacity.

I wasn't ready to let her go entirely. Honestly, I might not ever be able to let her completely go.

She studied my face for what felt like forever before she said slowly, "Forgiven."

A smile stretched across my face as I pulled her to me, used my arm around her shoulders to guide her, and led us back toward the kitchen.

"So, tell me what you've been up to, Gin."

"I have a boyfriend, and I'm in college. Which one do you want to hear about?"

Jesus. I would rather talk about her period than that boyfriend of hers with octopus hands.

"Let's talk college, honey."

In my line of work, I never knew if the next mission was the one I wouldn't come home from, so I was going to take this moment with the girl I loved but couldn't have and make it last as long as I possibly could.

Ginny

Twenty Years Old

As Lucas and I sat at his mother's kitchen table, catching up, I thought over what had been said a little over an hour before and almost laughed. Funny how, when Lucas asked me for forgiveness, it sounded more like a command than an actual question.

You would think someone seeking such a thing would make sure they were not demanding it, but not Lucas Young. The proverbial question mark on the end of his sentence was for my benefit alone and probably not a courtesy I would get from him often in the future. If he wanted something, he would obtain it by any means necessary.

For instance, when he had told me and Olivia at his last high school football game that he would score four touchdowns, he'd made it happen. Or, like how he had planned for years to go in the Army to be in Special Forces and was drafted right out of basic. Lucas Young was relentless when he wanted something. Therefore, I should probably consider myself lucky he hadn't dictated my forgiveness.

But instead of feeling lucky, all I felt was sad that he still didn't want me. You could think you were over someone, and then, with just a glimpse of their face after not seeing them for a year and a half, you realized you would probably never be over them. That truth sucked in a big way. It also made me want to run back home and cry my eyes out. I wasn't going to let myself do it, though. No, I was going to sit here and visit with him as if I didn't give a flying Fig Newton about what he thought. Even if it was the furthest thing from the truth.

So, I sat there, chatting with the boy I used to think was my knight in shining armor, rescuing me from locked closets, and studied him.

He looked older, and not just because he was. There were lines around his eyes and mouth that told me he'd laughed... and cried. His skin was overly tan from his deployments, and even though he was doing his best to seem carefree with me, his eyes were hard, dark, and maybe even... lost?

During the past year, I'd convinced myself that there was nothing Lucas could say or do that would allow me to forgive him for what he'd done to me. Now as I studied him, my resolution wavered. There was something about his demeanor that said he needed a hug. He needed a strong shoulder to lay his head on and lose himself in his thoughts. And pathetically, there was part of me that very much wanted to be the person who gave him the comfort he needed, which was why I was crazy as hell for sitting here and talking with him at all. I should be running in the opposite direction of him and staying far, far away.

Nevertheless, my heart had almost burst out of my chest at the chance for things to be normal between us again. Or, at least I had hoped things were back to normal until he asked his next question.

"Why aren't you wearing the necklace I gave you?"

I felt the color drain from my face and looked away. How could I answer that? _After you broke my heart, I couldn't stand to look at it every day, let alone wear it anymore._ Yeah, because every girl wanted to admit that.

The silence between us became awkward, and when neither one broke it, I peeked up through my lashes at him. His face was set in a grim look, his lips flattened with either anger or frustration; I couldn't tell which.

I looked down at the blue stain on the side of one of my hands in frustration, a smear of color left behind after drawing with my markers earlier. I rubbed at the spot with my thumb anxiously, using it as a focal point so I wouldn't have to participate in the confrontation.

Who the hell was he to get upset because I wasn't wearing his necklace? He was the one who had made it perfectly clear that we would never be more than family friends. Just because someone forgave someone else for hurting them, it didn't mean they always forgot what had been done to them. I doubted I would ever forget that sort of agony, which made me realize Lucas and I had a stain between us now, but that damn mark wouldn't be as easy to remove as the marker on my hand.

I was starting to wonder whether, forgiveness or no forgiveness, the blemish on what kind of relationship we did have was now permanent, sort of like a scar.

"Gin," his rough voice called almost sadly.

I slowly brought my head back up to look at him again, and he reached across the kitchen table and took both of my hands in his, wrapping them in his warmth. There was emotion working behind his eyes, but I couldn't name it. Regret maybe? Sorrow for still seeing the repercussions of his actions? Whatever it was, he didn't give me long to wonder about it before he spoke again.

"You didn't have to take off the necklace, Gin. I get you did it because I gave it to you, so in a way, you thought of it as mine"—Lucas shook his head—"but if you think that, you're wrong. It's yours. It's always been yours from the moment I gave it to you. Nothing I do or say can ever take that away from you. So, when you go home tonight, put it back on, because it will always belong to you."

With the end of that fervent but strange declaration, Lucas stood up, walked around to my side of the table, and gave me a kiss on the cheek. Then he walked away, leaving me sitting there with this odd feeling that something important had just happened, and I had missed it.

He had only been talking about the necklace... right?
Chapter

10

Lucas

Twenty-Five Years Old

It was Ginny's twenty-second birthday, and my family had begged me to come home for the weekend to celebrate it with them. Her mom had saved up the money to rent us cabins at a wilderness resort not far from our small New York town. I had once again been gone for over a year, but this time, I was coming home with the knowledge I was about to ship out for a third time.

Deploying didn't bother me. This was my job, my calling in life. What I didn't enjoy were all the tears from my loved ones before I left.

I didn't need them worrying about me. I needed them _living_ , going about their day and living their lives to the fullest. They were the reason I was willing to fight and die for this country—to protect them, to give them the freedom to go from day to day, knowing they were safe. I wasn't looking forward to my mother and sister's waterworks... or Ginny's.

Her tears were the worst, if only because I knew they came from some place deeper than worrying about a family member. They came from the place inside of her that she had stashed all of those little girl's hopes and dreams she used to have for me—for us.

Seeing Ginny cry over me was the equivalent of a knife to the heart. It killed me every time. Maybe it was a good thing that, with each deployment, a little more of my humanity died. Perhaps, in a couple of years, Gin's tears wouldn't affect me at all.

Against my better judgment, I caved in to my mother and sister's demands. It wasn't that I didn't want to see Gin—I always wanted to see her—but to have what you wanted more than anything in the world within your reach then walk away from it was torture. Not to mention, my emotions were all over the place when it came to seeing her.

My head prayed she still had the same boyfriend with the octopus hands, and they were settled down and happy. It would hurt to see her happy with someone else, but the logical part of me still knew it was for the best. My heart, on the other hand, hoped octopus boy had jumped in front of a moving train and died a tragic death. No man would ever love Gin the way I did.

The truth was that I still couldn't have her.

Anytime I got orders, there was a good chance I wouldn't come home. It was what I had signed up for, so I didn't complain. However, this sort of life wasn't fair to the women who waited at home for their man to walk through the door, and I refused to put the love of my life in that role.

With all of that in mind, for better or worse, I hopped onto a commercial flight and went home to spend time with the very woman my heart beat for on her birthday.

After I arrived at the resort, we all had a good time, taking in the various activities offered: horseback riding, canoeing, swimming in the lake. This meant I got to see Ginny in a bikini for half the weekend, which resulted in the worst case of blue balls known in the history of man.

On Sunday, we had a big cookout with my dad manning the grill, allowing the rest of us to drink, which I did a little too much of. What was the quote? _Be careful what you wish for_? Well, on the way into this little shindig, I had prayed for alcohol to get me through. After sitting down at the picnic table and being ambushed by Ginny sitting next to me, I knew alcohol was definitely going to be needed.

Our mothers had just gotten up from the table to go inside a cabin to get the potato salad, macaroni and cheese, and other dinner fixings when I suddenly felt a subtle breath on the shell of my ear.

"I need to see you tonight, Lucas." Ginny's soft voice sent a tingle down my body.

Turning my head to look her in the eye, I said the only thing that came to mind. "Why?"

A pretty blush spread over her cheeks, and she bit her bottom lip. "I want to... talk with you tonight. So after dinner is over, I'm going to come by your cabin. Okay?"

The question was hopeful, and there was a mischievous gleam to her eyes. Dear Lord, that look could do what nothing in my military career had been able to do so far—bring me to my knees.

Instinctively, I knew she didn't want to talk. No, the look in her eyes said she wanted to do things a hell of a lot more intimate than talking.

My dick went rock hard at the thought of my hands on Ginny's naked skin.

It was absolute torture.

I didn't know why she had suddenly decided to make a play for me again, but my decision hadn't changed in our time apart. My life was still too dangerous to bring in someone as soft and gentle as Gin. I couldn't take the chance that, if something happened to me, it would break her.

Getting out of this situation was going to take some deceptive maneuvering. The woman I still secretly loved with every cell in my body would probably hate me again by tomorrow morning, but if that was what I had to do to spare her the heartbreak of being a future military widow, then I would do whatever the hell I had to do.

Pasting a smile on my face, I replied quietly. "Sure, Gin, come on by the cabin after dinner and we can talk."

Her face lit up brighter than a fucking Christmas tree, and I knew that it might be the last smile she ever gave me. Then she darted in, gave me a quick peck on the lips, and jumped up from the table to walk away. Looking back, she mouthed the word, " _later_ " then disappeared into the same cabin our mother's had gone into.

Looking back at my dad at the grill, I caught his disapproving look.

Shit. By tomorrow, I would be in the dog house with both Ginny and my father. Whatever. A man had to do what a man had to do to protect the ones he loved, even if it meant breaking their hearts.

I got up from the table and headed over to the cooler full of beer. I was going to need about a dozen of these to help me get through today. How was I supposed to know that, in the end, the alcohol was what would end up being my downfall?

The day passed in a blur of food and joking between siblings. My brothers would occasionally ask about my deployments, and I would give them the vaguest answer I could then change the subject. Ginny sat by Olivia the entire day, but I often caught her glancing my way out of the corner of her eye.

I did my best to play along, cracking jokes and making conversation with the family as if I weren't internally hating myself every goddamn second that passed. We even had cake. A two-layer, homemade one with strawberries and blueberries that made an American flag on top. I bet the cake was delicious, but everything tasted like sawdust to me at the thought of what I was going to do later. Or not do.

After night fell, Olivia and Ginny excused themselves and stated they were going to bed. Everyone wished Ginny a final happy birthday, and she left, giving me the sort of smile I'd only seen her give me in my dreams.

I started pounding back the beers after she disappeared. One after the other.

Eventually, the parents went to bed, and the only people left were me and my brothers. I kept them engaged in conversation until well after midnight, allowing what I thought was enough time to pass for Ginny to get the point that I wasn't going to meet her at my cabin.

When I was so drunk I started to wonder if I would be able to walk back to my cabin, I finally told my brothers good night and left.

It was a good thing I left when I did, too, because it took my drunk ass probably half an hour to shuffle my feet the short distance to my cabin. Stumbling inside, I barely managed to get my clothes off, accidentally pulling my boxers off with my jeans before tripping over my own damn feet and thankfully landing on the bed. I passed out immediately, only to dream about soft hands petting my chest and abs. And there were soft, silky, smooth legs tangled with my own. I wasn't the only one lying on the bed now.

"Wha da fuck?" I slurred, finding that sort of funny. Who knew you could be drunk in a dream?

I felt a finger cover my mouth and heard a soft voice whisper, "Sh... It's okay, Lucas."

Damn. I knew that voice. It haunted me in my dreams. It had gotten me through cold nights in the mountains and deserts overseas. Maybe this was another one of those dreams where I could have my Ginny and not worry about ruining everything. That was what it had to be—a dream—because my angel would never be waiting in bed for me. I had given up on ever having her in my bed years ago.

Plus, innocent girls like her didn't do things like this, which was all the proof I needed that I was sinking into one of my many fantasies of her. A sweet torture, these fantasies I had.

"Why yous haunt me, Gin? I swear I sees yous everywhere I go."

The legs next to mine moved, and she maneuvered herself until dream Ginny straddled my waist.

"You're drunk, Lucas. I shouldn't do this or tell you what I'm going to while you're like this, but if I wait another minute, I'll lose my courage, and I don't want you to leave again without knowing."

"Woman!" I shouted, confused, "Wha are yous talkin' 'bout?"

She lowered her face until it hovered above mine. God, even when Gin was in my head, she was as pretty as the real thing.

Her tongue came out to lick her bottom lip nervously, and I groaned at the sight. It made me think about what else she could be licking, and I felt myself harden.

Wasn't that totally fucked up? A man could feel like his cock was so hard it could hammer nails even in his dreams? It didn't seem right.

"I love you, Lucas."

Her voice again was soft, but those words of hers rang loud and clear through me. I didn't care if I was passed out drunk, and this was just a figment of my imagination. Right now, she was giving me everything I had wanted for what felt like my entire life, and I was going to enjoy every moment of it before I woke up and was alone again.

Grabbing her head, I slammed my lips against hers. She ground herself down on me, and that was when I realized dream Ginny was naked. Hell, yeah.

I wandered her body with my hands while she scratched her nails down my chest. Then she brought her body back until she was straddling below my waist.

I probably should have paid attention to what she was doing, but my eyes had caught on to the sight of my necklace wrapped around her neck, lying against the creamy skin of her chest. It looked so right, seeing her bare in nothing except that gold chain and heart-shaped locket, exactly as I had always imagined.

I didn't think emotions could be this intense in a dream, and that probably should have tipped me off that something was horribly wrong. Of course, then my angel did something else I had always imagined yet never thought I would get to enjoy.

She wrapped both of her hands around my cock, stroking my length and causing me to lose what was left of my mind. Nothing else mattered when I was submersed in her touch, this pleasure.

I bucked, but she pushed me down with her weight. If this were real, and I was sober, my tiny, little angel wouldn't have had a hope in hell of holding me down. Anything was possible in my dreams, though.

It felt like she was rolling something down the length of me. A condom, maybe? It would make sense that dream Ginny would be as smart as my real Ginny. Although, my dream Ginny had never used a condom before in my fantasies. Strange.

That thought niggled at me, and the back of my neck tingled with some kind of warning, but then all of my doubts were lost as she started to slide herself onto my throbbing cock.

"I don't want this dream," I stumbled over my thoughts in a raspy whisper. "I don't want to stop. Ginny," I dragged out her name as I fought the urge to tell her all my secrets.

It was slow moving, and we struggled a little because she was so tight. I wanted to love her good, make it the best she would ever have, dreams or no dreams, but my patience was shot, and the fuckin' room was starting to spin. There was no damn way I was going to pass out into oblivion before I finished this fantasy.

Flipping her over onto her back, I accidentally slid out of her, losing what little progress we had made. That was okay, though, since I was sure as shit about to fix that.

Using my hand to guide myself into her, I felt her wetness on my fingertips, only spurring me on to hurry. She was obviously ready. I sure as fuck was ready. There was no need to wait. Any sort of waiting meant I could wake up, and this would all be gone. I never wanted it to be gone, so I had to hurry up. That way, I could hold on to the memory of it forever.

I slammed home, shouting out at the grip she had on me. Dream Ginny shouted, too. For a moment, though, it sounded more like a cry.

"Fuuuuck, you feel better than anything I've ever had."

"Lucas," her voice hitched.

"Sh... honey. I'm gonna move, 'kay?"

"O-ok-kay."

Then I started sliding in and out of her.

"So fucking good. So sweet. Ginny," I rambled on. "I don't ever want to stop. So tight, my sweet Ginny. Mine," I growled. "Every dream with you gets better and better. You keep the nightmares away." I thrust into her over and over.

This right here, even if it was a fuckin' drunken figment of my imagination, was everything I had wanted from before I was even smart enough to realize it. The sweet angel who had grown up across the street from me was spread out below me, around me. I could touch and taste the sweetness of her innocence, and her moans sounded better than any music I had ever heard.

Running my lips over her skin, I moved until I met the single tear track on the side of her face. I pressed my lips to the damp skin there then made a trail of kisses back to her plump lips. Her tongue felt velvet soft against my own, and she tasted like the rich, sugary birthday cake I had eaten earlier.

As I slowly moved in and out of her, the sensation of her surrounding my hard length was enough to make me wish I could die just like this—surrounded by her touch and warmth, loving her.

When she moved her hands up to grab my shoulders, her nails pricking my skin in their fierce, little grip, it almost sent me over, which just wouldn't do.

I was wrapped up in heaven right now with the angel of my dreams moaning against my lips as I made love to her. This couldn't end. I needed to make it last as long as I possibly could because, when I woke up, I would be inundated by the hell that was my life without her. It was time to show dream Ginny what I longed to show my real live Ginny...

_I owned her_.

Mind, body, and soul.

And this fantasy wouldn't end until I was damn ready for it to.

Grabbing her hands, I forced them to the bed on either side of her head, lacing my fingers with hers, locked together as one exactly as we should be.

"Lucas!" she sobbed. "I—" Her voice cracked. "I don't know what to do."

Leaning down so our lips were touching, skimming as we breathed each other's air, I gave her the simple truth.

"I'll lead; you follow. I'll command; you'll obey. Gimme all of you, sweetheart, and I'm gonna take it, but I'm also gonna give you back so much you won't miss what I take. Understood?"

She bit her bottom lip uncertainly yet nodded. It was all the permission I needed, but I wanted more.

"Gimme the words. I wanna hear you say it."

With a timid look, she asked slowly, "Say what?"

"Say you're mine."

"I've always been yours." No hesitation. No doubt.

It was so close to how I knew the real Ginny would answer that I almost stopped what I was doing. I refused to let this dream go, though, so I pulled out until my tip was at her entrance then surged forward inside of her, reveling in the way I felt complete for the first time in my life.

"Damn right you have been, baby. Now I'm gonna show you how you were made for me."

And that was what I did for what felt like forever yet not long enough. I could touch her and love her every day of my life, and it would never be long enough.

One hand held both of hers captured to the bed while I used my free hand, my lips, my teeth, and my cock to brand every inch of my angel.

I whispered things I never dared to tell her in the light of day: how I had planned for so long to make her mine, how I had known since she was thirteen that she was mine, and I had waited so fucking long to hold her like this. I even whispered all of my darker urges: how I would claim her in ways she had never dreamed, consuming all of her until there was no doubt in her mind whom she belonged to.

However, it wasn't one-sided. I might take everything from Ginny since I needed her with every fiber of my being, but I would also offer myself back to her, giving her everything I had wanted to give her for years—my passion, even my love.

Dream Ginny tried to thrust her hips and move with me, but the movements were awkward, as if she were unsure of what she was doing, which was something else she had never done in my dreams. In my dreams, I had molded her into the little sex kitten I knew she could be. It didn't matter, though. I knew how to handle my girl.

I let go of her hands and held her hips down, thrusting harder with my cock, making sure to hit her g-spot with every glide in.

When she started moaning my name, it nearly sent me over. However, I wouldn't let myself go, not until I made my girl come.

I used my hand to play with her nipples as I sped up my thrusts. She went wild underneath me, hoarsely calling my name, asking for more, begging for harder. I gave her what she begged for because I was damn near begging for the same things, too.

When her orgasm finally crashed over her, she clamped down on me so hard I swear I saw fuckin' stars.

Dream Ginny and I finished just like I had always dreamed—together—and then I passed the fuck out.

The next morning, the remnants of my dream from the night before quickly became a goddamn nightmare in the light of day.

I woke up to banging on my cabin door, a body draped over mine, and confused as hell. The banging wouldn't stop, and my head didn't appreciate it. I was trying to figure out where I had gone to pick up the broad on top of me.

Fuck, she even looked a little like my angel, with creamy skin and blonde hair.

If I had been dreaming about Ginny while I was doing this chick, I sure as hell hoped I hadn't called out my angel's name. That was a good way for a man to get his nuts cut off. Of course, I probably should have been more worried about not remembering where I had met the woman instead of if I had moaned the wrong name. Whoever she was, she needed to go because I had to murder the person who wouldn't stop banging on my damn door.

I opened my mouth to wake the chick up, and then said broad turned her face toward mine. That was when the shit hit the fan.

The broad was Ginny.

"What the fuck?" I whispered roughly.

Her blue eyes blinked open, and when she saw me looking at her, she smiled... until I opened my mouth again.

"What the fuck, Gin!" I fumed as I pushed her roughly off me.

She recoiled as if I had slapped her, grabbing the sheet to cover her naked body, which made me realize I was naked, too.

Another round of banging sounded on my door. Then I heard my sister shout something.

Looking at the door then back to Gin naked in my bed, I flipped out.

"This cannot be happening. What the fuck is going on here, Ginny?" I yelled at her.

She flinched again, and it only pissed me off more. I would never hurt her, so she had no reason to flinch like that.

Jumping out of the bed, I grabbed my jeans and pulled them on while trying to ignore the awkward silence in the room. Then I looked back at the gorgeous, naked woman in my bed, and everything inside of me felt conflicted. In this moment, I realized somewhat resentfully that all of my dreams of waking up next to my angel had finally come true.

All of my nightmares, too.

During the night, I might have touched, kissed, and loved my Gin just as I had fantasized about doing a million times before. Still, the bleak truth was, if I had, then I shouldn't have. The dangerous life I led was still a place where my vibrant, beautiful Ginny didn't belong.

God, I hoped I hadn't done anything stupid like fuck her.

Running my hands through my hair in frustration, I tried to lower my voice to soothe her. "What are you doing in my bed, Gin?"

"You don't remember?" she questioned me softly.

My head throbbed with my sister continuously banging away at that fucking door. I was ready to wring her neck.

"I remember getting drunk at the cookout, and then I guess I passed out. What else is there to remember? Did you help me get back here?"

I watched as something in her eyes died. She wilted, sadly whispering, "You don't remember."

Frustrated with what was turning out to be the morning from hell, I snapped at her, "I was drunk. Drunk people tend to forget shit. Now you need to get up, get some goddamn clothes on, and then get out of here after I get rid of my sister so no one knows you slept in my cabin last night."

Not giving her a chance to respond, I walked out of the bedroom, shut the door behind me so no one would see Gin, and went to the front door. Whipping it open like an angry bear, I snapped at my pain in the ass sister, "What!"

She propped a hand on her hip and gave me the evil eye. "Wake up on the wrong side of the bed, jerk-face? And who are you yelling at in there?" Olivia craned her head around, trying to see around my body and into the cabin.

Shit. What the fuck was I going to do, tell my sister her best friend was naked in my bedroom and I didn't know why? Hell no.

"I'm not yelling at anyone. I stubbed my toe when I jumped out of the bed because you wouldn't stop banging on the damn door and shrieking like a harpy. Now what the hell do you want?"

"Have you seen Ginny?" she asked. "She wasn't in her cabin this morning."

"No," I responded.

"Damn. Okay. I'm gonna leave your grumpy ass alone to get some coffee." Olivia huffed in exasperation then pivoted on her heel, stepping away from my door. I almost breathed a sigh of relief yet held it in when she whipped her head back around to look at me. "Ma says we have to check out by ten, so get a move on."

I watched my sister as she flounced off then closed my door and leaned against it with my forehead pressed against the wood.

A noise behind me told me Ginny had entered the main area of the cabin, and I turned just in time to see her barreling at me. Or, at least, I thought it was me until she angrily tried to push me out of the way of the door. Jesus, what had crawled up her ass this morning?

When I didn't move out of her way, she started slapping her hands against my arms and chest.

Grabbing her flailing hands, I barked, "What's your problem, woman?"

Tears filled her eyes as she screamed at the top of her lungs, "I never want to see you again, Lucas Young!"

I was taken aback by her outburst, which finally allowed her to shove me out of the way so she could storm out the door and take off running. If I yelled her name, my sister or someone else might hear and get the wrong idea about why she was running from my cabin. Therefore, I let her go with the intention of tracking her down later and apologizing for freaking out on her.

Closing the door, I was walking back to the bedroom with my mind set on taking a shower, getting dressed, and tracking down Gin to apologize when a flash of red had me stopping in my tracks. I had seen a lot of blood in my life, but this time, it sent a chill through me from head to toe. Not because there was a lot of it in the sense that meant somebody was bleeding out and dying. No, this was much, much worse.

It was a small smear of blood, something that should seem irrelevant. Except, this small smear was on the white sheets of my bed.

I had a bad feeling I knew where that blood had come from. Damn, but I had seriously fucked it all up royally this time. The memories of last night's dream, fuzzy as they were, slowly creeped in.

I was an ass. I had taken my girl's virginity then thrown her out like she was a dirty secret.

By the time I hauled ass to Gin's cabin to do whatever I could to salvage this nightmare, she was already long gone.

What the fuck have I done?

Ginny

What did I do?

The question ran through my head on repeat as I drove away from the hell I had just endured.

The best night of my entire life, the very thing I had dreamed of for years, had just been reduced to a memory that would haunt me for the rest of my life.

Never had I imagined it could go this badly. Never, ever. Some yelling? Maybe. Anger? Knowing Lucas, probably at least a little. I had, in essence, ambushed him when he was truly what my mom and Mrs. Young would call a man's man. Lucas was just like his father in so many ways and liked to be in control of all things at all times.

Honestly, the reaction I had received had been the stuff of nightmares.

I had known he was drunk, but I hadn't realized he was so far gone he wouldn't remember anything. I had been drunk in my own way on his kisses.

The moment he had slammed his lips down on mine, I had been lost in a haze of pleasure, lost to everything except the touch and taste of him. The man had a way of intoxicating me with nothing other than his mouth.

I had felt like an addict in desperate need of an intervention—shaking, raw, and desperate from the inside out.

All of those words he had whispered to me in the dark, had he meant any of them?

_"Oh, God, baby, I've been waiting for you, for this moment, forever. Hold on tight, sweetheart; never let me go."_ At those words, I could only hold on more tightly both in my heart and physically in the moment.

There had been more than honeyed words coming from his lips, though. He had said things to me that would keep me blushing for a month.

And just like that, I felt the ghost of his lips against my ear as he whispered, _"Damn, you feel good. Perfect for me. I bet your mouth and ass will be just as perfect, too, sweetheart. I can't wait to feel them on my cock_."

Just like that, my body had been on fire and building through the discomfort to something fairy tales were made of.

Even now, with my heart broken beyond repair, I couldn't stop the flush that spread over my face at the memory of those words.

I didn't know how long the actual act of us having sex had lasted, but it had been long enough for Lucas to take my virginity... and so much more.

Last night, I hadn't cared that he had taken everything I was. He had given me all the words I had always wanted to hear.

_"I want my ring wrapped around your finger the way my necklace is wrapped around your pretty throat."_ God help me, I'd wanted that, too.

After saying that, he had gently wrapped one of his hands around my throat with a savage look of determination on his face, his fingers squeezing just enough to send my heart into a frantic beat in my chest. He hadn't hurt me, and I knew he never would, not like that. However, there was no doubt his hand wrapped around my vulnerable throat had been a physical message, and his next words had been the verbal embodiment of it _._

"I'd show the whole world that I own you. Love you so thoroughly in every way I could that no one would ever doubt you were mine."

And he had given me even more words I had never dreamed of hearing.

"You feel me inside of you? I'm filling you up, baby. Your tight, little pussy is the sweetest thing I've ever felt, and I'm going to fuck it so good you'll never forget who it belongs to."

The problem was that he had taken back everything he had given me, leaving me with nothing. He had filled me up both physically and emotionally and then left me hollow.

Then a horrendous thought hit me like a sucker punch to the gut, knocking the air out of me.

Oh, God.

Oh, hell.

Oh, God!

What if Lucas had thought I was someone else? What if he had thought he was saying all those sweet nothings to another woman? What if all of the words that had made me feel so whole, so utterly complete were never meant for me at all?

I couldn't remember if he had even said my name at any point last night. I had been so wrapped up in finally getting what I wanted that it had never occurred to me Lucas might not think it was me.

The pain in my chest magnified until I felt like I couldn't breathe. My vision got blurry, and the road in front of me became impossible to see. There was a part of me that couldn't care if I got into an accident and it ended me, but I didn't want anyone else to get hurt because of my recklessness, so I pulled my car over to the safety of the side of the road.

When my lungs started to burn enough that the sting bled through the pain around my heart, I realized it was because I wasn't breathing. Opening my mouth, a jagged gasp escaped as I tried to inhale. My throat felt like it was closing up, making it harder to pull in the much needed oxygen. Somehow, however, I managed to get at least a little of what my body needed.

When I exhaled, the first agonizing sob escaped. The sound slipping out of me seemed tortured even to my own ears, and that only caused the next bawl emerging from me to sound worse. It didn't take long until I was a wailing, wounded mess with a face covered in tears and snot.

None of it mattered.

Not one bit.

What was left of my hope and my heart had just been demolished into nothingness by the man who had been my everything for as long as I could remember.

Nothing mattered anymore except getting away, hiding my heart and burying the jagged metaphorical pieces in a place where they could never be touched by anyone again. Sitting on the side of this road and bawling my eyes out wasn't going to get me safely away from the horror of the memories I was trying to leave behind, either. As a result, I wiped my face off with the sleeve of my thin, cotton jacket and took a deep breath.

Something inside of me ceased to exist. I felt numb. Dead.

I had thought he had left me hollow. No. This was worse. To be hollow, you had to have a space that wanted to be filled. I no longer had even that.

My hopes, my dreams, my love, my fucking emotions all ceased to exist.

If this morning had been all one could expect from being faithful and believing in something as elusive as love, I would rather be dead inside. After all, someone who didn't feel couldn't have their heartbroken, could they?

I would learn to live half a life and forsake the dreams of a white dress, a picket fence, and a happily ever after. I would give up on the foolish dreams of waking up next to the man of my dreams, forget the idea that I would get to lie my head next to his every night. I would trash the silly delusions of growing old together and being surrounded by a family we had created out of our love.

After all, there was no love. There was absolutely nothing now. And what friendship we'd had was wiped away between Lucas's stupidity this morning and my own last night.

With all of my delusional hopes and dreams of love stripped away, all there was left was me—a blank slate that felt incredibly hollow.

Regardless, a blank slate was a clean slate. That meant I could rebuild myself, and this time, I was going to make my heart impenetrable. I would build a fortress around myself that would make Fort Knox look like a fucking joke. No one would ever hurt me the way I had stupidly let myself get hurt again.

Fairy tales and dreams were for suckers who believed in them, and I had been a sucker for far too long.

I knew better now.

Now I had to pick up the pieces that were left in the wake of Lucas blowing everything inside of me to smithereens. I had to put them back together. Then, when I was done rebuilding myself, I was never going to be vulnerable to a man again.

No wonder my mom was such a robot at times. Her world had been blown apart by a man, too, yet I had obtusely thought nothing like that would happen to me. Our circumstances might be drastically different, but the end results had been the same—two broken-hearted women who had to learn the hard way that you shouldn't expose the soft spot inside of you.

Nope. You should lock it up and throw away the key.

Well, that was what I was going to do. I didn't need a knight in armor. No way. I was going to wear my own flippin' armor from now on, and nobody, not even Lucas, was ever going to get near my weak heart again.

I didn't need anybody except my momma.

And my art.

And maybe Olivia, even if I couldn't talk to her about what had happened today.

I would just go home, shore up my defenses, start building my metaphorical but totally kick-ass Fort Ginny-way-cooler-than-Knox fortress, and pretend to have a stomach bug for a few days to keep Olivia away. I would use that time to figure out my next move.

There was one thing I didn't need time to figure out, though.

I never wanted to see Lucas Young again.

A sting against my palm made me realize I had unconsciously reached up to grasp the heart-shaped locket still hanging around my throat.

I guessed it might take my subconscious a while to figure out that Lucas was no longer in the picture. At least my poor, battered heart didn't need to be taught that lesson again. Once in a lifetime was enough. I just had to remind my subconscious of the lesson we had learned until it stopped yearning for the boy who used to live across the street.

Men sucked.

And Lucas Young was the suckiest of them all.
Chapter

11

Lucas

Six Months Later...

Fuck you, you fuckin' fuck!

The bold, black letters practically screamed at me from the crisp, white background of the front of the postcard. I was sure that was the point of the card's design, along with the drawn-out middle finger right next to the written message.

Flipping it over, I saw dainty, scrawled red ink that read, _The postcard says it all. Stop trying to contact me._

Ginny was lucky she was almost three thousand miles across the country from me, or I would bend her over my lap and spank her ass until she couldn't sit for a few days. I had never been more pissed than I was now at being stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington when she was back in New York.

_Fuck me_?

She already had in more ways than one. That was why I was trying so damn hard to get her to talk to me.

Apparently, my angel had turned into a bit of a devil and was determined to drive me insane. Every time I reached out to her, I was given the proverbial middle finger. This time, she had given me the middle finger literally in black and white.

The last six months had been hell. I had been trying to get a hold of Ginny in one way or another since finding the smear of blood on my cabin sheets. Every phone call went unanswered. Text messages were always ignored except for the one time she did reply with, _Take a long walk off a short pier and lose my number._

For a whole two days, I got my hopes up that maybe she would finally talk to me after that message. Then I found myself blocked from calling and texting her altogether.

Since she wouldn't talk to me over the phone or through text messages, I tried emails. The first few I sent her were mainly apologies for my reaction. Then I screwed up and got frustrated one night, typing out a lengthy email about how she needed to pull her head out of her ass and talk to me. Just because we had made a mistake, it didn't mean we had to stop talking to each other completely, right?

Evidently, that had been the wrong thing to say.

Ginny's response was that the only mistake she had ever made was loving me. Then she'd blocked me from emailing her, too.

Nothing made a man realize he had really and truly fucked up than seeing his woman give up on him for good. It was at that point that I started to panic, and wasn't that crazy in itself? I was a goddamn Green Beret, trained to be cool, calm, and collected, even if I was neck deep in terrorists, and I was panicking over one woman. She wasn't just any woman, though; she was _my_ woman. The trouble was that she didn't know she was my woman because she wouldn't talk to me, not that I blamed her.

After what I had done, I wouldn't want to talk to me, either. Regardless, I needed Ginny to talk to me. I needed to apologize. I wasn't some poetic schmuck who could sit down and pour my heart out with pen and paper. I would only fuck that up if I tried.

No, I needed something else, something tangible I could mail to my angel that would let her know I still knew her and that I really was sorry.

I started to give up hope of figuring out whatever that perfect something was until I happened to see it sitting in a little tourist shop on a street down by the water of Puget Sound.

On a stand next to one of the shop's windows, a flash of color caught my eye. Curious, I strolled over to the window and examined it.

Postcards.

But they were more than postcards. They were the answer to my dilemma since they were the sort of thing Ginny would love: fantasy art of dragons, knights, fairies, and castles. They immediately brought up the many memories I had of my angel sitting with a pad of paper and markers in her hand, drawing away as if the rest of the world didn't exist around her.

To me, those pictures were nonsense. To her, they were representations of her dreams and wild imagination.

I went into the shop and bought every variation of those crazy-ass, little postcards—all twenty of them. For the last four months, I had been mailing her one postcard a week with two words written on the back: _I'm sorry._

Maybe if I apologized to her enough, she would give in and finally talk to me.

I could write more things I wanted to say, like, _I love you_ and _If you don't start fucking talking to me, then I'm going to tie you down to the bed and turn your ass cherry red,_ but I thought those should be said at least over the phone, if not in person. That was why I stuck to my apologies.

Sixteen postcards later, this was the response I got back.

Fuck you, you fuckin' fuck!

Frustration and anger boiled up inside of me until I exploded. The next thing I knew, my fist was throbbing in pain and buried in the sheetrock of the wall by my front door.

Pulling my hand out of the wall, I ignored the mess I had made, ignored my bleeding and busted knuckles, and walked over to where my cell phone sat on my kitchen table.

After a couple of rings, my sister answered with an exhausted, "Lucas?"

I didn't give her the niceties of a greeting, just asked what I needed to know. "Why won't she talk to me?"

"I don't know, big brother. Why don't _you_ tell _me_ why she won't talk to you?"

What did I say to that? If Ginny hadn't told her what had happened, I sure as hell wasn't. As far as I was concerned, that was between me and my girl.

Since I couldn't tell Olivia what had happened in the cabin, I moved on to the other thing buggin' the shit out of me.

"Do you know what she sent me?"

"No, what?" Olivia asked on an exasperated sigh. I knew my little sister was tired of being put between Gin and me, but she was the only connection I had left to the woman I loved.

"A postcard. You know what the damn thing says? ' _Fuck you, you fuckin' fuck!' "_

Stunned silence was all I got from the other end.

"You got nothing to say to that, Olivia? Since when does our mild-mannered Gin send postcards out that tell people to fuck off?"

"Since some jackass obviously did something to hurt her!" Olivia snapped back. "If you would just tell me what happened, maybe I could help the both of you, but neither one of you will talk about it."

Now it was my turn to be silent.

Could Olivia help me smooth things over between Gin and me? Probably. It wasn't her fuck up to fix, though. That was all on me.

When Olivia realized I didn't intend to say anything, she sighed again, sounding a little weary. "Look, big brother, I'm gonna say something that you're not going to like, but I want you to think about it before you open that big mouth of yours. Ready for it? Here it goes. Give her some space."

I was shaking my head. It didn't matter that I knew Olivia couldn't see me physically telling her no. I was doing it, anyway, because every fiber in my being couldn't stand the idea of leaving my angel alone. Not talk to her? Not apologize a million more times if that was what she needed? Not hear her sweet voice tell me that we were finally okay?

I couldn't do it.

Then again, I didn't have a choice, did I?

The more I thought about it, the more I realized I had to walk away from my angel and give her the space she needed in the hopes that one day she would forgive me.

I was twenty-six years old, and I had already learned to survive through bullets flying at me, bombs going off around me, and the enemy trying to make sure I wouldn't take another breath. But I didn't know if I could survive this.

Ginny was vital to my beating heart and the integrity of my soul, even if she didn't know it. Could someone live without their heart and soul? I wasn't sure, but it looked like I was about to find out. At least for now.

Hopefully, I wouldn't have to live without her for long.

During the weeks that followed the morning after Ginny stormed out of my cabin, I realized I had taken her virginity, and an epiphany the size of a metaphorical sledgehammer had practically pulverized me. My angel had waited all of this time to give me one of the most precious gifts a woman could give. That was something you didn't take for granted.

It wasn't some outdated sense of honor that made me feel as though I owed Ginny a ring in exchange for her innocence. It was more like a primal male who was unable to deny his mate. I had been inside my girl, possibly unprotected since my dumbass had been drunk as a skunk, and now that I knew I'd _had_ her in the carnal sense, she was _mine_ in all ways.

I wasn't willing to be noble and try to let her live her life with a man who was kind-hearted, clean, and capable of acting more like a gentleman than a possessive asshole.

Nope. All of her chances to escape the dark, dominating beast with blood-stained hands were long gone, and now I was a predator waiting for the moment to pounce on his prey. As much as I hated it, now was not that time. I had given my girl some deep, serious wounds the last time I had seen her, and now I had to give her the chance to lick those scars and heal.

"Lucas? Did you hear me?"

"Yeah." The word felt like sandpaper against my throat as it came out and probably sounded just as gruff. I cleared my throat then let loose a hollow laugh. "Yeah, I hear you. I'll give her some distance. How about half a world away since I'm deploying in a few days? Not that Ginny knows that, though, since she won't fucking talk to me."

This new reminder of my mistakes burned like a motherfucker. I might have had good intentions in my past decisions, but I had ultimately made some extremely poor judgements. Now, as the military liked to say, I needed to "embrace the suck" and face the consequences of my bad decisions head on. That also meant it was time for me to make some better decisions, and unfortunately, since Gin wasn't speaking to me, I was going to need my sister to help me do that.

"I need you to do three things for me if I'm going to back off."

"Okay," Olivia replied cautiously.

"First, I need you to give her my contact info after I get over there. I want to make sure that, if she changes her mind and wants to talk to me, she can. Second, check in with me every now and then to let me know she's okay. The third thing..." I hesitated as the words got caught in my throat. I didn't want to play telephone, passing messages through my sister to the woman I loved, but it was all I had for now. Clearing my throat, I finally croaked out, "Tell her I'm sorry, and I'll be waiting when she's ready to talk. Over the phone, through a letter, or face-to-face when I get back—it doesn't matter; I'll wait for her."

Although my sister gave me a pity-sounding reply, I didn't really pay attention to whatever it was she said and hung up the phone.

Sticking my hand in my jeans pocket, I pulled out the one thing I carried with me at all times besides the dog tags I wore around my neck: a small, gold key that unlocked the heart necklace I had given Gin when she was sixteen. No one knew about the key's existence except for myself, and that was just the way I wanted it. For so long, the key had symbolized the secret plans I'd had to make Ginny mine when the time was right. The problem was, the right time had never come.

After writing one too many _I'm sorry your boyfriend/husband/son died_ letters and constantly seeing too much blood on hands that I considered too soiled to touch anyone as pure as my girl, the key had come to mean something different. It was a reminder of what I was fighting for: a world where my angel could live safely and happily. Boy, had I ever fucked that mission up.

Once again, the key's meaning changed for me as I held it in my hand and ran my finger over the smooth metal. This key was going to be my proof to the girl I loved that she would always be mine as much as I was hers. It was going to be the evidence I presented next time I saw her that, in my own sappy, clichéd way, I had given her my heart years ago, and that she was the key to my everything. Now I was just left to wonder how long I would have to wait before I got to talk to my angel again.

If only I had known how long it would end up being, I might have decided not to wait.

Walking to my bedroom, I let my body fall onto my mattress without taking my eyes off the gold symbol in my hand. Over the last few months, I had been having vivid dreams of my angel. It had taken me a while to realize they were not the fantasies I'd had before, but the memories of the night at the cabin. Reliving those moments was both a nightmare and a blessing.

They were a nightmare because every time I remembered something, I gained a little more insight into just how badly I had fucked this up between us and a blessing because having those swirling, drunken memories of us was better than having nothing at all.

"Why yous haunt me, Gin? I swear I sees yous everywhere I go."

That was the God's honest truth. I did see Gin everywhere I went now. I saw a bit of Gin anytime I saw a couple happy, holding hands, and obviously in love. I saw her in a piece of artwork in a shop on the pier. I even pictured her in the market one day as I watched a blonde-haired woman shopping with her small daughter. Looking at that little girl had been like having a full-blown flashback of the first day I had seen Ginny all those years ago.

"I love you, Lucas."

Her sweetly whispered words haunted me more than any nightmare from the war ever could.

That night, I now remembered telling her as we made love that my fantasies about her kept my nightmares away. What would she say if I told her losing her was my new nightmare? The worst one I'd had yet?

"Gimme all of you, sweetheart, and I'm gonna take it, but I'm also gonna give you back so much you won't miss what I take."

I hoped with every fiber of my being that she would give me the chance to prove I was finally able to and willing to give her everything she could take and so much more.

Ginny

"Gin? You hear what I said, girl?"

My best friend was talking, and I could hear her just fine, but that didn't mean I wanted to listen to a word she was saying since the message was pretty unbelievable. Lucas Young was sorry, and he would be there, waiting for me, when I was ready to talk?

He had a better chance of seeing a flying unicorn than talking to me anytime soon.

That morning six months ago hadn't just killed all of the dreams I used to have for Lucas, but my love for him, as well. It was the harshest slap in the face I had ever had, and I didn't need another blow to know he was right; I had made a mistake by loving him.

It was time to move on.

At least, that was what my head kept telling my bruised and beaten heart.

It was saying it even louder since the man I loved, who had broken my heart for the last time, was heading off to a war zone again, and I was just now finding out because I had refused to speak to him. It made me doubt my decisions.

Should I call him? Say good-bye? Tell him to be safe?

It was tempting... to just give in a little bit and at least tell him I hoped he stayed safe while he was over there. However, Lucas Young was the type of man who, if you gave him an inch, would take a mile. If I called him to even wish him well, he would talk me into speaking to him about other things, like how I had stupidly seduced him and given him my virginity while he was drunk as a skunk. And I wanted to relive that night about as much as I wanted to bang my head against a brick wall. That meant I had to stay strong and not give in to the urge to call him and say good-bye.

Lucas Young was a warrior in every sense of the word. He would go play his real life war games, kick some enemy ass, and be the solider he had always wanted to be when he was a little boy. Then, when he came home, he would probably stop at the first bar he could find to brag to some woman about all the scars he had earned while playing GI Joe.

Well, that was what I was going to keep using to remind myself why I couldn't call him. Though, it might take a while longer before my heart finally got the message. Until it did, I planned to stay far, far away from the man who had broken it so irreparably I wasn't sure it would ever function again.

"Gin?" My best friend's voice brought me out of my own head.

"Yeah, Olivia, message received." I hesitated for a second before deciding it couldn't hurt to ask my best friend one little thing. "Do you know where he's headed to this time?"

"Afghanistan again. At least nine months this time, if not an entire year. We won't know exactly where he'll be until he gets there and sends us his contact info. Do you want me to give you that information when I get it from him?"

My head was shaking vehemently, though Olivia couldn't see me over the phone. "No, no, no. Don't need it, don't want it."

"You sure about that?" Olivia asked quietly.

"Absolutely," I told her in a voice that sounded a hell of a lot more confident than I felt.

Olivia's own voice sounded full of trepidation when she asked, "You ready to talk about it?"

_Never_ was the first word that came to mind. Knowing my best friend, though, that wasn't possible. So, what could I say to her that would get her off my back about this?

I couldn't tell her that I had lost my virginity to her brother and that he had been so drunk he couldn't remember the next day. I couldn't tell her it had been the best night of my life, followed up by the morning that killed all of my hopes and dreams. And I couldn't tell her that I might never be ready or willing to forgive Lucas for crushing me. If I did, then she would pester me until the end of time to know why.

That left exactly one thing I could tell her.

"Remember when we were younger and you used to tell me that I would grow out of my crush on Lucas?"

She answered slowly. "Yeah."

"Let's just say I finally grew out of my crush and leave it at that, okay?"

Displeased with the answer, Olivia asked in an unsatisfied tone, "That's the story you're sticking with?"

"Until the day I die," I replied.

Olivia snorted. "All right, girl. If you ever change your mind, you know you can talk to me."

"I can also have all of my teeth pulled by the dentist. No offense, but I'd rather have that done than ever have the Lucas conversation with you."

"Ouch. Point taken. I'll drop the subject." She laughed. "So, what are you doing this weekend? I thought we could see a movie."

"Actually, I'm taking my mom into the city to do some clothes shopping. Rain check?"

"Sure, chickadee. Talk to you later?"

"Absolutely," I answered honestly. I might not want to talk about what had happened, but Olivia was my best friend. We would stick by each other until the end of time.

I had just put my phone down on my kitchen table when I felt a delicate hand on my shoulder. I didn't need to look back to know who it was. She was vital enough to me that I would know the touch or smell of her anywhere. My mom.

As soon as I did look back at her, she took her hand off my shoulder and ran it over my hair in a comforting touch. "It's been six months since your birthday, darling. Whatever it is, I'm here if you need an ear to listen."

Her eyes were kind and seemed understanding. I was pretty sure she had pieced together a bit of what had happened, but she had given me the space to work through it on my own while letting me know she was there.

Although I didn't want to tell her everything, it was time to tell her something at least.

I motioned for her to sit down at the table then grabbed her hands in my own. "Can I ask you something, Mom?"

"Anything, darling," she replied warmly.

Hesitantly, I asked the question that had plagued my mind on and off for years, but more so since my birthday. "Do you miss Dad?"

Her entire body flinched at my question, and I immediately felt like crap for asking.

"It's okay," I said quickly. "You don't have to answer that."

She shook her head and squeezed my hand. "No. No, I'll answer. I always knew you wondered about your father and would probably ask about him someday, but the question still caught me by surprise." My mother took a deep breath, as if trying to fortify herself somehow. "Would you be terribly surprised if I told you yes?"

Actually, yes. I was shocked down to my toes, really. I was ready for her to say she was glad he was out of our lives and hoped to never see him again. What I wasn't ready for was that answer.

A sad smile spread across my mom's face as she watched my reaction. "Yes, I guess you are surprised. You have to understand, Ginny, that your father wasn't always the man you remember him to be. Well, what little you can remember. You were so young when we left." Mom paused, took a deep breath, and then said something that shocked me. "You know, you and Lucas have something in common with your father and me."

My eyebrows shot up my forehead, and all I could get out was a bewildered, "Oh?"

She patted my hand affectionately before gripping her hands tightly on the table in front of her. Nodding, she continued, "We grew up across the street from each other. I've known him my whole life."

Astonished, I slumped back into my chair. My mom and I hadn't talked about my dad much since we had left him all those years ago, so there was a lot I didn't know about him, and I probably shouldn't be as surprised as I was. Still, I was speechless.

"You see, your father and I both come from well-to-do families, what many would call 'old money.' Our parents ran in the same social circles. Our mothers took tea regularly, and our fathers golfed together once a week. Your father and I saw each other quite often. I was rather taken with him from an early age, and he was much the same with me. Our parents realized what was blossoming between us and encouraged it. They felt it was a good match and would produce a profitable union.

"I didn't care about what being with your father might do for me money-wise. Why should I? My family had plenty of it. The only thing that mattered to me was the way the boy across the street held the door open for me and led me through the waltz as if we danced on air."

As she paused to watch me, I thought I probably looked like a fish the way my mouth kept opening and closing, but nothing came out for quite a while.

Eventually, I squeaked, "That's not exactly the dad I remember."

Her shoulders lifted and fell in a helpless shrug. "People change, darling. The young man I fell in love with opened my doors, pulled out my chairs, had impeccable manners, and escorted me to my debutante ball. He was the perfect gentleman in every way. More importantly, he was good to me."

My mind raced with jumbled thoughts. I didn't remember much about my father, but everything I did remember didn't add up to the man she was describing. The man I had nightmares about was a monster. The man she described was Prince Charming. It was like she was trying to tell me two plus two equaled five, and she also had oceanfront property in Arizona to sell me.

To this day, what I could remember of my father woke me up in a cold sweat. He had never laid a hand on me, but I remembered horrible bruises on my mother's face once. And I would never forget the way he would shove me into my pitch-black room from time to time with a fierce command to be completely silent as he locked the door so I couldn't get out. How in the world could that man be the same one who had waltzed with my mother and made her fall in love with him?

My mother's soft voice cut through my confusion. "I can see the disbelief written across your face, and I understand why you would have trouble accepting what I am telling you. The thing is, darling, you have to understand that sometimes life gives people lemons, and they don't simply add sugar and make it lemonade. When given more lemons than they can handle, they add vodka, drowning out the sweetness of what life could be. Instead, they prefer to get lost in the intoxicating power of the alternative, losing themselves and becoming someone else they feel they need to be. That's what happened to your father."

Now this conversation had turned ridiculous. She was comparing the angry man who had put bruises on his wife and locked his daughter in the dark to a freakin' drink? And speaking of lemons, a few bites of the lemon sorbet I had in my freezer was totally needed right now if we were going to talk about my psychopathic father.

Getting up from my chair, I went into the kitchen, heading straight for the freezer. As I put the lemon sorbet on the counter, two bowls appeared next to it, courtesy of my mom. I looked over at her, and she smiled at me indulgently.

"I must really be stressing you out if you're diving into the ice cream, darling."

Biting my bottom lip, I shrugged back. "I wouldn't say you're stressing me out, Mom. I would say you're confusing the holy hell out of me." I started dishing up the creamy, yellow goodness into our bowls.

I held up a spoon filled with lemon sorbet, pointed in her direction. "How about a toast?"

Mom laughed and held up her own full spoon. "What are we toasting?"

"To the men who used to live across the street, may we never see them again." My sorbet was starting to melt a little, so I ate it before any of it could drip off my spoon. One should never waste something as life affirming as ice cream. In my opinion, it was more important than regular food and water.

"That's it? I thought surely you would have something more creative thought up for a toast, Ginny." Mom stuck her sorbet in her mouth before it fell off her own spoon.

Shrugging one shoulder, I said, "I could say something like 'may the fleas of a thousand camels invade their crotches,' but I was trying to keep it classy."

My mother sputtered, choking on the sorbet she had been in the process of swallowing.

Feeling bad, I patted her back while she coughed up any sorbet that might have gone down the wrong way.

When she was done coughing, Mom wheezed, "You just gave me the most horrid mental image of Lucas scratching his crotch due to fleas."

My mom's words only put the mental image in my own head, which caused me to laugh. And as I laughed with my mom, the depressing, heavy thoughts from the past six months disappeared... a bit.

My mom was right about one thing. Life would give you lemons, and you either made lemonade or poured a gallon of alcohol in your lemonade and got piss drunk to forget it all. Right now, Lucas had given me a shitload of lemons, and it was my job to turn the sour of those lemons into something sweet. Lemon sorbet seemed mighty fine to me.

Plus, the woman laughing beside me wasn't about to let me go through my heartache alone. My mom was my rock who loved and protected me through everything in my life. Besides, if she could get over my dad, I could get over Lucas. Therefore, I was going to lean on my mom while the tough got going and be grateful to have such a strong, wonderful parent in my life. If I didn't have my mom, I would be lost.

At the end of it all, we would be the two women who had survived the boys across the street breaking our hearts. As long as we had each other, I was okay with that.
Chapter

12

Ginny

That Weekend...

"Hey, we're on Fifth Avenue; do you want to stop sightseeing and go in one of the department stores, Mom?"

My mother gave me that look any grown person had probably seen from their parents a thousand times in their life, the look that said: _I love you, and I'm trying to indulge you here, but you're pushing your luck_. And I was—pushing my luck, that was—because we couldn't afford the bigger department stores. Plus, they weren't my thing. Regardless, I had been saving up money for six months from my tips at the coffee shop to buy my mom a designer purse she had seen on television and practically drooled over. I knew she was going to protest by saying it cost too much, but she deserved it.

My mother made sure I had everything I needed and gave me what I wanted when she could. She never did anything for herself. There were times she had worked two jobs in order to pay all our bills. The memories of her coming home dog-tired left a bitter taste in my mouth, especially now, after her revelations to me this past week about coming from a wealthy family.

All this time, the two of us had been scraping by in life when, if circumstances had been a little different, my poor mother could have been living in luxury.

Don't get me wrong. It wasn't about us having the material things or not. I didn't need designer handbags or swanky clothes. What I did want more than anything was for my gentle-spirited mother to not have to work herself to death due to her trying to make sure the mortgage was paid on time.

It just pissed me off to no end that she had worked herself to the bone to take care of me, all because my father was a monumental dickhead, which was why I was more determined than ever to buy her that purse she had 'oohed' and 'awed' over months ago. It was the least I could do for the woman who had loved me unconditionally enough to leave her comfortable, affluent lifestyle behind in order to give me a new life in a safe environment, away from my own flesh and blood who had turned himself into some sort of moral-lacking monster in the name of pride and greed.

Mom grabbed my arm above my elbow and steered me from the sidewalk and into the opening of an alley between a coffee shop and an upscale diner so we were out of the busy pedestrian foot traffic normally found in New York City.

The hustle and bustle of the people pushing past us and the loud, honking horns of traffic all disappeared as my mother studied my face intently.

Curiosity overcame her features, and she softly asked, "What's this about, Ginny?"

I nonchalantly shrugged. "We never go into the high-end stores. I thought it might be nice for us to go window shopping for once."

Her curiosity morphed into doubt. "Does this sudden fascination with expensive stores have anything to do with what I told you about our family?"

At least I could answer that honestly since I had saved up for that purse long before ever knowing my mother used to be rich.

Shaking my head, I said, "Nope. Promise. Since you're not going to believe me, though, I'll tell you the truth. Remember that purple purse you liked so much? I saved my tips for it. I want to go buy it for you."

Her eyes got a little misty as a trembling smile formed on her lips. She brought her hand up and cupped one side of my face. "You didn't have to do that, darling."

I started to protest, but she wouldn't let me get a word in.

"Was that handbag gorgeous? Absolutely. I'm sure half the women in America want that purse, but I don't need it. You know why?"

Frustrated, I shrugged my shoulders.

Her lips stopped trembling, and her smile got bigger, warmer. "Because all I need is you, sweet girl."

How could I be mad at my mother after that comment? Was she ruining my surprise for her? Yes. Just like she ruined the time I saved up my meager allowance and tried to take her to an upscale restaurant when I was fifteen. Or the time I saved up again and tried to buy her some real leather, knee-high dress boots that she promptly took back and traded for two pairs of reasonable tennis shoes for both of us. So, in a way, I wasn't surprised she was doing this. I was, however, frustrated that she wouldn't let me do for her what she had always managed to do for me somehow—give me what I wanted. I was sure, if someone added up all the art supplies she had ever bought me, I could buy at least five of those purses.

Letting my frustration get the best of me, I argued back, "Just let me do something nice for you, Mom. One time, I'm asking for this one time; let me splurge a little and buy you something you don't need."

Mom dropped her hand from my cheek down to the top of my shoulder where she gave it a gentle squeeze. She bit her lip in indecision before asking, "Why do you want to buy me the purse so much, sweetheart? You have to realize that it's very expensive. You could buy those special markers you were telling me about for your comic panels, instead. Certainly, you need those before you submit your work for that internship you were hoping to get?"

Desperate to get her to understand my need to take care of her for once the way she had always taken care of me, I blurted out, "Because it's always about me, Mom! Always! For once, you deserve for it to be about you! I know the purse is ridiculously expensive and that you could find at least ten better ways we could use the money. Except, I'm asking you not to.

"I'm asking you to let me do this one small thing to show you that I appreciate everything you've ever done to take care of me. This is my way of saying thank you for every double shift you've ever worked to pay the bills, every man you turned down for a date because you said I was your number one priority, every luxury you gave up to give me a better life. Please, just for _once_ , let me take care of _you_."

The mistiness came back to her eyes, and now her whole chin was trembling as she tried to hold in the tears I could see threatening to escape. There was such a wealth of love and appreciation shining from her eyes that I almost started to cry, too. It was in this moment I realized my mother and I had come full circle.

We were two women who had loved two very different men, yet we both had ended up broken-hearted beyond repair, left to cling to each other with the love between a mother and daughter to sustain us. Only, I wasn't a little girl anymore, and I didn't have to depend on her to take care of me. Now it was my turn to take care of her a little bit, and I would do that any way I had to, even if it boiled down to simply buying her a damn purse.

It was there in the look on her face as she took in what I had said to her and battled her tears that I knew I had finally won. She was going to let me buy her the purple purse from a ludicrously expensive store.

Her mouth opened, and I was seconds away from jumping with joy at my victory when the unthinkable happened.

"How fortuitous for me that I see my long-lost wife and daughter walking around New York City while I'm here on business," a cold, low voice said from behind me.

The words almost didn't make sense to me since I had been staring at my mom's face, waiting for her voice, when the cultured baritone took its place. I understood all too clearly, though, when my mother was roughly pulled around me by a strong hand on her arm and into the body of a tall, slim man.

Once he had her positioned in front of him with her back to his front, he then wrapped one of his arms across her chest, just above her breasts, effectively holding her captive against him.

My mother's eyes were now wide and panicked as she stared at me. At least, I thought it was me until I heard shuffling.

Turning my head slowly to either side, out of the corner of my eyes, I saw two large, bulky men who were now pinning me in with their presence, cutting off any possible escape route I might have had.

When I looked back at the man who held my mother caged in his arms, my heart started to thump so hard I thought it might beat itself right out of the front of my chest.

It had been sixteen years since I had seen him, but I couldn't forget that face. That face had haunted me in my nightmares since Mom and I had left him.

His sandy blond hair was styled and combed to perfection. Blue eyes just a few shades darker than mine stared at me ruthlessly as precious seconds ticked away. In that moment, he seemed totally opposite from what my nightmares remembered.

There was no denying who this man was or what he was to me.

The monster was back.

Only, this wasn't a nightmare, and Lucas wasn't here to save me.

This wasn't the furious man who had raged and roared. No, this man had an air of quiet, deadly calm. And the funny thing was that I would suddenly rather deal with the bad temper from my nightmares because this man... Well, he scared the living shit out of me with merely a look.

As a child, even though I had a vivid imagination and lived half my life with my head in the clouds, I would have never dreamed it possible that the monster who had terrified me was capable of becoming anything scarier than he already was. Apparently, my imagination just hadn't been good enough. This man who stood in front of me with his expensive suit and polished leather shoes didn't just ooze a menacing aura... He radiated danger.

Sometime since we had escaped him, he had transformed himself from being a monster to the sort of being monsters were afraid of. I had no idea how that was even possible.

All of my instincts were screaming, _Run!_ Whereas, my mind was telling me the cold, hard truth. We were screwed, trapped, and there was no getting out of this.

He cocked one seriously impervious-looking eyebrow at me then subtly nodded his head to the street. "Follow my men into the car, Virginia. You don't want to know what will happen if you don't."

I internally shuddered at the order. I didn't need him to verbalize what he would do if I didn't listen. The little girl trapped inside me knew well enough that, if you didn't do what dear old Daddy wanted you to do, he got angry.

It was never good for anyone when the monster got angry.

I slowly made my way into the limousine waiting at the curb and climbed into the back after one of my father's henchmen opened the door for me. As I slid onto the leather bench seat, the car door on the other side opened, and one of his men got in, blocking any escape I might have had.

I stopped in the middle of the seat, waiting not so patiently, terrified out of my mind, as my mom climbed in and sat herself across from me on the other bench seat. My father sat down next to her, wrapping his arm back around her shoulders as if he didn't want to let her out of touching distance for an instant. Maybe he was afraid, if he did, both of us would up and disappear again.

The second henchman, who had held the limousine door open, slid in next to me, and my breath choked up in my chest. I was sandwiched between two men who looked like they ate professional wrestlers for breakfast and were no doubt armed with at least one gun. The word fucked came to mind, as in I was totally fucked in a bunch of not very good ways. Even that description seemed to pale in comparison to my current reality.

I was sitting across from the very man my mother had risked everything to leave in order to protect us both. It wasn't likely we would escape him again. Now the question was, what would he do with us?

My mother had painted him as a good boy gone bad through desperate circumstances. However, as I forced myself to stare into his cold, hard eyes, I didn't see an ounce of good left. Whoever this man was, he wasn't the man my mother had fallen in love with years ago. No, this man, who had his arm wrapped around my mother like he would super glue her to himself if he could, had a face that didn't just say, "don't fuck with me." That face said, "I'm your worst nightmare," and in my case, he was.

It took everything I had not to tremble in fear while staring at the face that somewhat mirrored my own, waiting for what he would do next.

With his free hand, he knocked on the glass partition separating us from the driver, and the car moved forward, merging into traffic. He didn't move his eyes from my own, and although I was scared shitless of him, some part deep inside wondered what he saw as he looked at the daughter he hadn't seen in sixteen years.

A beloved daughter returned to him? Or a nuisance he wanted to get rid of once and for all?

I was terrified of learning his answer would be the latter. Not just because every woman wanted their father to love them, even if they were a deranged, dangerous man, but because—in my case—my life might be on the line.

Hopefully, my mother was right in her belief that, deep down, she felt my father was still the good man she had fallen in love with. However, as I stared into those seemingly soulless eyes of his, I wondered just how deep down that part of him was buried, if it was there at all.

He finally pulled his gaze from mine to turn his head and look at my mother. Grabbing the hair at the back of her head gently, he then turned her so she was looking back at him. I couldn't be sure if it was the dim lighting through the tinted windows or just my wild imagination, but I could swear a look of tenderness passed over his face for a split second.

"I almost didn't recognize you with your hair styled so short, darling."

If he thought mom's short hair was drastic, I would hate to see how my father would have reacted to all the different hair colors she had tried over the years.

He ran his fingers through the short strands of mother's bob in an almost loving inspection. The sight reminded me of a movie I had watched about a man who had obsessively stalked a naive woman he ended up killing.

A shiver went down my spine at the thought. Now was not the time to lose my shit, so I pushed the morbid thoughts away in order to stay in the moment.

"It might be fashionable on other women, but you know I prefer your hair long."

Well, that comment certainly didn't help me forget about my creepy, stalker slash killer movie comparison! However, he was my father; thus, I would try to stay positive and hope for the best, despite the fact that I was positively scared shitless. Perhaps the years had changed him and he wasn't the scary monster I had thought he was when I had been a little girl.

"My beautiful girls are back with me where they belong."

An unexpected part of me softened at his quietly spoken declaration. Maybe Mom was right; my father was good somewhere deep in his bones.

"Now you'll tell me everything about where you've been all these years, or there will be consequences, and those consequences will be dire, my love. If I have to figure it out on my own, I'll go and wipe out every person who's helped you in any way, shape, or form, even if it includes burning the mailman alive in your old driveway."

Nope. It looked like my father really was a psychopath.
Chapter

13

Lucas

One Month Later...

"Mom, what's going on over there?"

I was stationed in the middle of hell, and my life was slowly unraveling on the other side of the world. To say I was hanging on by a thread would be the biggest understatement of my life.

My left hand held the phone so tightly I heard the plastic groan from the pressure over the sound of my mother's hysterical sobbing through the phone.

I had called my parents' house because I had received something in the mail today that had all but ripped my beating heart from my chest—a letter from Ginny.

My hopes had soared at the sight of that familiar handwriting on the outside of the envelope. I had written Gin several times before leaving for my deployment, unable to give her space. Something inside had told me it was imperative that I make my angel understand I was sorry for everything I had done. It was vital to get her to talk to me so I could finally give her the three words I should have told her years ago.

I love you.

All of my hope had been crushed after opening that envelope, though. Then, once I tried to find answers from my sister, my gut warned me that shit back home was a lot worse than I'd feared when I had gotten my mother, instead.

My mother's sniffles were breaking my heart almost as much as the words she was giving me.

"Mrs. DuBois died last month in some freak car accident," she rambled.

Just hearing those words was enough to tell me how distraught my mother still was from losing one of her closest friends. "I know Gin's mom died, Ma. You told me that the day after it happened—last time I called. What I want to know is if they figured out why she had the accident."

"From what poor Ginny explained to us, her brakes went out, and she slammed into a huge tree after she lost control of the car. She was going downhill, and her car was going so fast that, when it slammed into the tree, it exploded. There was nothing left of her by the time the fire trucks got to the scene.

"I'm so worried about her, Lucas! She's not talking to anyone. She's losing weight. Our sweet Ginny needs us now more than ever!" By the end of her speech, my mother was crying so hard she could barely speak.

I heard my sister taking the phone away from her as my father coaxed his overwhelmed wife away to calm down.

I completely understood how my dad felt right then. There wasn't anything I wouldn't give to be able to comfort the woman I loved, and I couldn't. I would soon learn my troubles didn't end there, though.

"Lucas?" Olivia's watery voice asked.

Logically, I knew my sister had suffered right along with my mother, even Ginny, over Mrs. DuBois's death. Unfortunately, I wasn't feeling very logical at the moment.

I was torn between anger at myself for being half a world away from everyone who needed me and fear that I was somehow on the verge of losing more than I had ever thought I would.

"Why the fuck didn't you tell me what's going on with her?" I snapped at Olivia, knowing I shouldn't take out my frustration and worry on my sister, but the overwhelming feeling of helplessness had taken over.

Men like me didn't do helplessness. If something was wrong, we fixed it.

I couldn't fix this. Not for Ginny. And that meant I had failed my girl again.

Maybe it was irrational thinking, but it was all that was swirling around in my head. My girl had lost her mother, and I hadn't even been there to hold her hand to comfort her.

"It's not like I can call you, Lucas!" Olivia snapped back. "Mom and I both wrote letters, trying to let you know what's going on, but they must not have gotten there yet. I couldn't send you a Red Cross message, because Mrs. DuBois wasn't a direct family member, and neither is Ginny. I did everything I could."

Olivia wasn't the only one who had written letters. I had written one to Gin every day since I had received the news Mrs. DuBois had died, begging her to pick up the phone when I called, doing my best to put into meager words just how sorry I was that she had lost her mother. I knew it took time to process mail from deployed soldiers, but I also knew she had received at least my first few letters already and had chosen to ignore my phone calls, anyway. Not exactly the reaction I was hoping for. No, the epitome of all my damn nightmares was what I received from Gin today.

I tried to run my hand through my hair but couldn't; Ginny's letter was still clutched in that hand. As a result, I stood there with my fist clutching her devastating words, resting on the top of my head.

Everyone in the room around me knew bad shit was going down for me, and they were either leaving the room or moving farther away to give me space, not that it mattered.

If I had thought I was standing in hell before, I knew better now. Hell wasn't a desert with an enemy trying to blow you up with roadside bombs. Hell was being half a world away from the woman you loved while she went through the worst moment of her life, and she didn't want a goddamn thing to do with you.

All the proof I needed that Gin wanted absolutely nothing to do with me was written in black, daintily scrawled ink on the paper I was clutching in my fist as if my life depended on never letting it go.

That one piece of paper contained the embodiment of my worst fears. It told me in no uncertain terms that she had finally given up on me and decided to move on from her foolish dreams of being in love with me, something I would have gone out of my way to dissuade her of if it weren't for her parting line.

If you have ever cared for me in any capacity, Lucas, if the years between us have meant anything at all, I ask that you respect my request for no further contact. Don't write me any more letters and don't call me anymore. I need some time to process everything that's happened. If you can't do that, then I'll be forced to sever all of my ties with your entire family, even Olivia. Please, don't make me do that.

The knowledge that I had hurt my angel so badly she was willing to give up the only pseudo-family outside of her mother that she had ever known was a brutal blow to my conscious.

Could I take that chance of pushing her away from any semblance of family she had left?

A desperate part of me wanted to run home, drop to my knees, apologize for every shitty thing I had ever done to her, and then tell her I was so fucking sorry I wasn't there for her when she needed me. I couldn't do that, though, since the Army would waste no time labeling me a deserter before throwing my ass in the brig.

I could say all that in a letter, but what if, in her grief and devastation, that letter finally pushed her over whatever fragile sanity she was holding on to, and she really did turn her back on my family who loved her so much, just to get away from me?

I couldn't take that chance. I couldn't let my angel be completely alone in the world.

Since she wouldn't turn to me, I had to agree to her request so she would at least have my family to turn to. It was the least I could do for fucking things up so badly between us.

When you loved someone, you were supposed to make them happy and build them up with your love. In my ridiculous attempts to push away the woman I knew was meant for me alone, due to my insecurities and doubts, I had shredded the amazing gift of love I had been given.

The bad news didn't end there, however. What Olivia said next between her hysterical sobs was enough to send chills down my spine.

"She's leaving, Lucas. She's leaving, and I don't know how to stop her!"

"What the fuck do you mean she's leaving?" I growled, my voice cracking, which caught the attention of a few of the guys in the room with me, but I couldn't bring myself to answer their concerned looks.

"She came over two days ago to tell Mom and me that she accepted a job in Chicago. Why would Ginny leave us after she lost her mom like that?"

Because I had probably finally pushed her away, not that I was going to admit my mistakes to my little sister. I didn't think I could get the words out of my mouth if I wanted to. Not just because I was too proud to admit I had screwed it all up, but mainly because my heart hurt so much right now that I was half convinced I was having a heart attack.

I had done this—well, me and fate. I'd pushed and pushed and pushed her away until I had broken her, and then fate had come in and taken her mother away, too.

There was absolutely no one to blame but myself, and even though it went against every fiber of my being, I was going to give my angel exactly what she wanted from me now.

Absolutely nothing.

I wasn't going to call her, and I wasn't going to write her a letter or mail her another postcard.

It was the least I could do for the woman I loved.

Even if it destroyed me.

Blowing out a weary breath, I broke the silence between my sister and me. "Listen up, Olivia, and listen good. I know you're worried and upset about her leaving, but you're going to keep your opinions to yourself and help your best friend through this. That means you're going to go over to her house, help her pack up her shit, and then tell her you'll always be there if she needs you. And you're going to do all of that without giving her any shit, you got me?"

"How can you say that, Lucas? Why would you want me to help her leave us when she needs to stay here where we can take care of her?"

"Because it's not about us, Olivia. It's about her, and she obviously needs this right now, so you're going to have her back like a best friend should. If we're lucky, after she's been in Chicago a while, she'll decide to come back home."

"I can't believe you're telling me this! How in the hell could you give up on her like this? I thought you cared about her!"

What small hold I had on my temper snapped.

"I love Gin, so I'm giving her what she asked me for in the letter she sent me—time. I'm hoping that, if I give her what she wants, she'll get over the pain I caused and talk to me when I get home. Now, get over yourself and help your best friend with what she wants to do. This isn't about you, and it isn't about me. It's about what Ginny needs, and apparently, right now she needs to get away from it all. Weren't you the one who told me not too long ago that she needed space?"

Olivia was quiet for a moment before she whispered, "You love her?"

Huffing in resignation, I finally answered, "Yeah... I do. Too bad I screwed it up so badly she doesn't want anything else to do with me. Since I haven't been able to tell her that yet, that means you keep your big mouth shut about it. I've made mistakes—big ones—and I have to find a way to show her."

There was a loaded silence, and then Olivia quietly said, "Okay, Lucas."

I let out a small sigh of relief that I was at least able to help my girl in some small way by reining my crazy-ass sister in to help Ginny instead of giving her grief. It wasn't much, but it was all I could do at the moment.

Tired and very defeated from the reality of my situation with my angel, I gave my sister one last order before getting off the phone. "Let me know when she leaves and give me her new address when you get it from her."

"Okay, Lucas. Take care of yourself over there."

"Don't worry about me, Olivia. I'll be okay as long as I know Gin is."

Little did I know that neither Ginny nor I would be "okay" for a very long time.

Ginny

One Week Later...

"Did the maid help you unpack your belongings, Virginia?"

Rolling my eyes at my father's haughty tone, I answered him without turning away from the floor-to-ceiling window, "Her name is Barbara, not 'maid,' and yes, Barbara helped me unpack my clothes."

I knew being a smartass and emphasizing the maid's name was probably a bad idea, but I was wound so tightly lately I found myself snapping off at the mouth before my brain had a chance to think about what I was saying. Even as we closed off our life in New York, my father had Mom and my every move and conversation monitored. I had never felt like I was so under a microscope until Richard Wellington found his way back into our lives.

A tense few seconds passed before movement reflected off the glass as my dear old daddy stopped to stand just behind me. He put his large, well-manicured hands on top of my shoulders, giving them a small, firm squeeze. It was not really painful, but it definitely got my attention.

He then spoke in a quiet, scary voice. "A lady does not roll her eyes at her elders, especially her parents. Nor does she speak to her parents in such a way. It shows some very bad manners." He clutched me so the grip turned slightly painful, and I did my best to hold my wince. "Next time you roll your eyes or speak to me that way, there will be consequences, Virginia, understood?"

What little bravado I had been holding onto fled with the first sign of pain in my shoulders. It took everything I had to keep my voice from wavering when I answered, "Yes, sir".

He released his grip, and then he leaned down to kiss the side of my head. "Good girl. Now, go and join your mother in her suite for a cup of tea. I have some work to see to."

I flinched at his command, knowing the order to see my mother was more than just a way for him to get me out of his hair. It was a reminder of what he was capable of—death.

Threatening it.

If those threats were to be believed, he was also capable of causing it.

Apparently, he was a pro at faking a death, too.

Within forty-eight hours of plucking Mom and me off the street, he had turned her car into a flaming mess, wrapped around one of the biggest trees I had ever seen. I still didn't want to think about the body found in her car or how he had gotten the coroner to "match" her dental records.

To the rest of the world, Mrs. DuBois was no more. In less than two days, the man had proved quite sufficiently that he was capable of doing almost anything. Therefore, it would probably be a good idea not to piss him off.

He turned on his heel, walked back to the oversized cherry desk in his office, and picked up a piece of paper, scanning its contents.

Just like that, I had been dismissed.

Steeling my spine, I walked out of my father's office at a measured pace, ignoring the bodyguard who gave me a nasty smirk on my way out. Everywhere I turned, I was surrounded by my father's wealth, power, and the men who were both his protectors and my jailors.

My life had changed forever a little over five weeks ago when the past my mom and I had been running from finally caught up to us, and the present was a hell of a lot scarier than the past had ever been. At least, according to my mother, it was.

Before my father had carted her off to Chicago, leaving me behind with no less than six of his men watching me, Mom had pulled me aside to detail the gravity of our situation.

We were caught. My father might love us, but he was clearly unstable, and if she had to guess, he had only grown more so while we had been gone. She urged me to go along with his plans until she could figure out how to get us out of this mess.

Consequently, I had stayed behind in New York, mourned her "passing," and packed up our house, telling my best friend I'd taken a job in Chicago. All the while, I had been hoping my mom had some grand plan for escape by the time I rejoined her.

Those hopes were dashed my first night under my father's roof. In the time we had been separated, my mother had learned a few new things about my father.

First, she had easily gathered he didn't merely own the penthouse she had been staying in; he owned the entire building. The security looked to be top notch, and during the little bit my father had let her travel of the building, she had seen he had multiple men on every floor, in addition to the men guarding her.

Secondly, Mom had employed one of the most valuable lessons my grandmother had taught her growing up in the upper crust of society: If you kept your mouth shut and your ears open, you could learn a lot. She had been listening to the men talk when they didn't think she could hear them. Mother had heard quite a few interesting things, such as the fact that my father's men often referred to him as the kingpin of Chicago, and nobody crossed the king without consequences.

Apparently, he had his fingers in so many pies here he owned a good portion of the city. He had legal businesses to funnel the money from his illegal businesses and enough politicians and policemen on his payroll that there wasn't a soul in Chicago who could come after him.

Mom still wasn't sure what he was into illegally yet, but she was pretty sure he was involved in drugs.

How ironic was it that, growing up, I'd had my head in the clouds, dreaming about dragons, white knights, and fairy tales, while my father had built himself a kingdom and crowned himself? Overnight, fantasy had become semi-reality, and I had become the princess of a seedy underworld I had never wanted to know.

What would Lucas say about my fairy tales now if he knew the truth?

Waiting for me next to the elevator that would take me one floor up to our new "home" was another of my father's men who trailed me constantly.

Dear old Daddy didn't trust my mother and me not to run off again.

He was right not to.

If I thought I could sneak us out from under his thumb, I would do it so fast his head would spin. There was no way I could, though. My father had made it very clear to me what was at stake if one of us tried to leave him again—everything I held dear.

In less than forty-eight hours, the man had torn our lives apart to a microscopic level. He'd had his men take our driver's licenses and use them to pull up any and all information he could on us. From there, he had ordered them to sneak into the little house we had called home—our safe haven from him—and they had gone through it to figure out our lives, which was exactly what they had accomplished.

We didn't have much, and we didn't talk to many people, but we did have one thing my mom and I both held very dear—the Young family. They were our friends, and one of them once was the love of my life.

They hadn't pulled any information from my mother's room that could be used against her. Everything they needed was found in mine: pictures of Mom and me at cookouts in the Young's backyard and even more pictures of Olivia and me throughout the years. Then the most damning information of all was discovered—my feelings for Lucas—all of which my father's men had pulled from my diary.

My poor mother had protected and hidden us from my father for sixteen years, and in less than a day, my father had not only found us, but had figured out how to keep us in his gilded cage, too scared to try to take flight again.

All of it was my fault.

I was the one who had insisted we go into the city for a day trip. Could I have possibly known my dad would also be there on business? No. Regardless, if I had stayed at home and gone to the movies with Olivia, then none of this would have happened. And if I hadn't chronicled all of my thoughts and feelings, either through words in my diary or through the images I had drawn, then my father wouldn't be threatening to end the lives of the only people we cared for.

Who knew the images and scribblings of a teenager could be so lethal?

Since I had screwed it all up for us, I was going to do what I had to in order to fix it. That meant ignoring the giant behemoths who followed me around wherever I went, like the one currently walking behind me down the hall. It also meant not showing the behemoth named Dexter that I was terrified of him just because he was visibly armed with two handguns in a shoulder holster and a face that probably scared his own mother.

It was my responsibility to do what I had to in order to keep the ones I loved safe. That meant moving to Chicago for an alleged job just weeks after my mother's supposed memorial service and cutting contact with the Young family, even my best friend.

I had to watch every little step I made and follow every mandate my father laid down. All of our lives depended on it.

Everything about Ginny DuBois's life was gone, even Ginny DuBois herself.

The long lost Virginia Wellington had returned home.

It was a good thing my love for Lucas Young was gone, too.

Well, that was what I kept telling my broken heart.
Chapter

14

Ginny

Twenty-Seven Years Old...

Two Days Before Leaving For Miami

Sitting in the velvet wingback chair facing the wall of windows overlooking the city, I held a delicate crystal glass in my hand and swirled the liquid inside slowly as I pondered my trip to Miami. I was leaving soon, but I certainly was not traveling alone. Richard Wellington would never let me out and about unattended. No, if he couldn't keep his ever watchful eyes on me, then there would be bodyguards to make sure his precious "Virginia" didn't try to run away.

My father ought to know damn well I wouldn't run. Couldn't. That would mean leaving my mother behind in his clutches, and I would never do that, not in a million years. For a man who "loved" his family, he sure did have an atrocious way of showing it. Richard Wellington was the most obsessive man I had ever met, and his sole obsession was my mother.

No, that wasn't true. He had one other obsession in his life—power.

In the past five years, he had taught me that power meant money, and money meant you could have whatever you wanted or, in his case, anyone.

Anyone was my mother, the woman he treated like a queen... and a prisoner. There was no doubt in my mind that my father loved her, but it was a twisted, unhealthy love. On his part, at least. In her own way, my mother still loved my father, but it was more about loving who he used to be—the boy across the street. The boy she loved from childhood into manhood. The boy who had captured her heart and would never let it go, no matter how badly she tried to get it back.

She still had a hard time coping with the fact that the boy she had loved had turned into a man whose single-minded purpose had become to own the street, the city, and everything inside of it that he could possible buy, steal, or take with brute force.

When I had first moved to Chicago, I silently scoffed at what people had nicknamed my father—the kingpin of Chicago. One man couldn't possibly have that much power, could they?

It didn't take me very long to learn that, yes, one could.

The street gangs were afraid of him. They either gave him a wide berth or paid him dues to avoid getting kicked out of the city.

The mafia respected him. I didn't know exactly what their arrangement was, but I had figured out through eavesdropping on meetings that they had some sort of mutually beneficial business arrangement that my father had come up with. Because of that arrangement, the mafia let dear old Daddy have his corner of Chicago, free reign to run his many businesses—legal and illegal—and they never bothered him from their corner.

As for the police? The thought of them made me want to laugh. My father probably had at least half of them on his payroll.

In other words, there was absolutely no one who could help me permanently escape my father's clutches. Therefore, I had learned to live in the gilded cage he had put me in.

The only consolation I had over my predicament was that, evidently, Richard Wellington had been scared sober when my mother had left him and didn't drink anymore. This, my mother informed me, was a good thing, because he had only hit us when he'd been drinking. Now, he wouldn't touch a drop of alcohol, unwilling to take the chance of losing his precious family again.

Funny how Mom tried her best to convince me that we could make the best of our situation. She would continuously try to persuade me to stay quiet and play along by pointing out that he hadn't hurt either one of us so far.

To give my psycho father credit, I had believed him when he'd said he was sober now. I had not seen him drink nor smelled alcohol of any sort on him since moving here. That didn't mean I was ready to jump on my mother's bandwagon of denial. The reason for that was simple.

Six months after I had moved to Chicago, I'd had the absolute crap scared out of me. One evening, I had gone snooping around in my father's office when I had known he was out on business. I had been looking for any tangible information I could find on just how dangerous my father really was to prove to my mother we needed to run again. A man who kidnapped women off the street with his hired henchmen had to have some sort of dirt in his workspace, right?

A frantic search of his desk had turned up nothing. Desk drawers had been locked, his computer security encoded, and there hadn't been a file cabinet in sight. I had resorted to looking behind the artwork hanging on his walls for some sort of super spy hidden safe when a loud _thunk_ from the office's connecting hallway had made me abandon my search.

Running to his office closet, I had hidden in order to avoid being caught snooping.

Instead of the physical evidence I had been looking for, I received a visual lesson I would never forget.

From a crack in the doorway, I had watched as my father's men had dragged in a bound but struggling mid-thirties man with a gag in his mouth. They'd shoved him to his knees in front of my father's desk and physically held him there so he couldn't escape.

My father had then disappeared out of sight for a moment, but I'd heard the sound of a desk drawer opening then closing. When my father had come back into view, he'd had a pistol in his hand, one I hadn't even known he had in the office.

It had dawned on me that the gun must have been in one of the locked drawers. All of my revelations had seemed trivial seconds later, though, as I'd watched him say something to the kneeling man who had been openly sobbing, press the gun to his head, and then, with no hesitation at all, pull the trigger.

The crack of sound hadn't been as loud as I had thought a gunshot would be, but that wasn't the sound that would haunt me for the rest of my life. No, the sound that was going to more than likely give me new nightmares was the harsh thud of dead weight hitting the floor.

I imagined I had come close to death myself that night due to the strangled scream that left my throat and escaped past the hand I had already secured over my mouth. A higher power must have been watching out for me, because the best I could figure it out, between the heavy wooden door blocking me from view and the thump of the man's body falling to the floor, the noise had somehow been muffled.

Later, as I had lain in my bed, shaking in fear, it had occurred to me that my father could have known I was there in that closet the entire time and simply hadn't cared. Why would he? He had the upper hand, and he damn well knew it.

When I had finished my story and explained to my mother that Daddy didn't need a drop of alcohol in his system to put a bullet into another man's brain, she had slapped her hand over my mouth as if she could stop me from saying the words. It didn't work.

I had pried her hand from my lips and furiously whispered that, if he were willing to do that totally sober, then we couldn't guarantee our safety, either.

Mother had simply shaken her head violently in denial at what I had been trying to tell her. Her trembling hands had grabbed my own, and she'd squeezed tightly in warning. Looking around nervously, she then had softly told me I must have been mistaken.

Although my words had been spoken as faintly as my mother's, the implications rang as loudly as that gunshot between us. My mother's beautiful blue eyes had flared with terror, and it was then I had realized my mother wasn't in denial about my father and how dangerous he was. It was completely the opposite. She was doing what she believed she had to in order to keep us alive in a desperate situation.

My mother and I were stuck where we were, and she had figured that out long before I had. The man had warned us both with an ominous promise my first night in Chicago during dinner that he would hunt my mother and me down to the ends of the earth if we tried to leave him. I now knew he was crazy enough to do it.

There would be no escaping the Kingpin, Richard Wellington. Subsequently, I had spent the last five years learning how to be seen, but not heard, molding myself into the sort of "upper class young lady" my father thought I should be. I had shed my favorite comfortable jeans with holes in the knees, worn T-shirts with marker stains, and black chucks for designer dresses and high heels, turning myself into the sort of high maintenance woman I had never believed in before.

Five years ago, I had told myself that Ginny DuBois was gone. I could have never known then just how right that statement would be. Ginny DuBois and all of her dreams had died slowly, starting the morning after losing my virginity to Lucas and ending the night I had watched my father murder someone.

When I had snuck out of that room hours later, after I had known it was finally safe to do so and the monsters in my life were long gone, I had left that room reborn in a sense.

Ginny DuBois couldn't handle this life. She was too naïve and innocent to survive it. That meant I'd had to become someone who could not only survive in this new dangerous world, but thrive in it.

That someone was going to be Virginia Wellington. Thus, that was who I had become.

I no longer believed in fairy tales. I had learned the hard way through the horrors of my new life that monsters couldn't be defeated. I no longer dreamed of a man I adored, a white picket fence, or a loving marriage. I definitely no longer believed that ice cream could cure anything. Nor did I draw beautiful things like knights riding on white horses, racing off to rescue the princess in distress.

As Virginia Wellington, I had learned that money and power made the world spin. A couple of months ago, I had also learned I might not have a white picket fence, but I would have a husband my father had handpicked and found "suitable" to his needs. I was aware I would be having children, but that was because my future husband, Sanjay Kahn, expected me to produce "heirs" to cement the joining between his family and my own. It didn't take a genius to figure out there wasn't an ice cream on earth that could make my newest complication of a looming marriage better, but the vodka in my glass sure did help take the edge off.

Perhaps that put me on the path of becoming similar to what my father had been like when I was younger. An alcoholic at least, abusive at worst. Although, I couldn't imagine ever hurting someone I loved as he had. Then again, I bet my father had not planned on hurting those he loved, either.

Ironically, Mother had told me years ago, before my father had found us, that there were two types of people: those who added sugar to the lemons they were given in life and made lemonade and those who added alcohol to their lemons and drowned in their sorrows.

After I had watched my father murder a man, I had discovered sugar and ice cream were pointless, and vodka was my new best friend. I didn't give a damn if that made me another lush Wellington.

Staring sightlessly out of the windows at the bright daylight covering the city of Chicago beyond, I ignored the sound of light footsteps walking up behind me. There were only two people who could fit those footsteps. One was my mother, whom I didn't want to talk to, because she would insist we needed to discuss something about my upcoming nuptials.

I loved my mother beyond reason. She was still my favorite person in the entire world, even if I thought she was highly delusional and needed a reality check about this arranged marriage nonsense my father was forcing on me. I wanted to talk about marrying Sanjay about as much as I wanted to jump off the top of this building.

On second thought, the thought of the air whipping around me, my arms outstretched from my body as I freefell to the ground below was almost appealing. I guessed that sort of thought was normal for someone who had been dreaming of freedom for years, only to learn she was about to inherit a new yet different gilded cage to be kept in.

No matter. As the soft footsteps drew closer and my inebriated mind caught sight of the gray and black uniform, I realized it was the other woman who shared the living quarters with us—Barbara, our maid.

Ginny DuBois would have called Barbara a friend. Virginia Wellington knew better than to be friends with the hired help.

The woman was kind, though, and seemed to genuinely care and worry about me. Barbara also tended to disapprove of my drinking habits, like now for instance, as she wrinkled her nose at the glass.

"It's eleven in the morning, Ms. Wellington. A tad early for that sort of drink, isn't it?"

I snorted a laugh, fully aware that, if my father were around, he would scold me for the sound. "Yes, but I've heard this song that says it's five o'clock somewhere, so cheers."

I drained the remaining two fingers of vodka in my glass as Barbara shook her head at me. She would never do such a thing in front of my parents, but I had convinced her long ago I couldn't care less about acting uptight all the time. I might have to be Virginia Wellington now, but at least I had one person I didn't have to pretend in front of all the time.

To be honest, it was nice to have the other woman around. She was old enough to be my mother with plenty of wisdom to give advice when I asked for it, yet detached enough from my situation to be absolutely honest when I could convince her to talk to me. For that reason alone, she had helped me keep what little sanity I had left in this overwhelming world of my father's. Not to mention, she was resourceful, knowing who was who from working for my father since the moment he had bought this building.

Barbara was my saving grace while I underwent my self-transformation from free-spirited artist to polished socialite. Wardrobe, mannerisms, and warnings on whom to rub elbows with and whom to avoid—Barbara had helped me with it all. Add in the fact that she washed my clothes—if I had to wash silk, I would ruin it every time—and helped me get to bed when I was too blitzed to do it on my own, and it made her invaluable. The woman was a godsend.

However, she wasn't a fairy godmother, and she couldn't wave a magic wand and get me out of my predicament, which brought me back to my reasons for sitting by myself in my living room at eleven o'clock in the morning and plotting over vodka.

Barbara had given me a reason to go to my father and request the trip to Miami. _Wouldn't a new wardrobe be nice to meet Sanjay's parents in?_ The request would have seemed ridiculous to any sensible person, but that was my father for you. As far from sensible as you could get. So he had said yes as long as I followed his strict rules and followed the orders of the men he would send with me. Whatever. At this point in my life, I was willing to do almost anything for a small taste of freedom again.

My chance at temporary indulgence was so close I could already taste the fruity cocktail that would accompany it. I could even smell the salt from sea in the air around me, picture wiggling my toes in the sand, feel the rush of excitement as I figured out a way to slip my guard's protection long enough to indulge in a steamy quickie with a lover who would end my sensual solitude.

Maybe after having a new lover, I would no longer fantasize about the man with hazel eyes when I lay in bed alone. No longer dream about strong hands that stroked my naked body or kissed me in the most intimate ways. Maybe then I could forget the way he had filled me until I burst, only to leave me hollow the next morning.

God, I couldn't wait to get to Miami. The only thing better than being in paradise for a while was daydreaming of the possibility of being Ginny once more. Miami was possible... Ginny was not.
Chapter

15

Lucas

Thirty Years Old

Present Day

After Midnight was packed to the rafters with people. Ever vigilant even on my time off, I scanned the customers mingling with the girls working the floor while I sat at a table in the VIP section with my fellow teammate Chase Anderson.

After losing both Wyatt and Logan in the blast, the same explosion that had critically injured Riley's brother Declan who now was laid up in the hospital with temporary paralysis, it was probably going to be a long while before I let my guard down again. It had also hammered home my thoughts on not letting any of the guys to get as close as I had my Green Beret teammates.

I had known this job was just as dangerous as the military, and also just as I'd expected, I had once again lost teammates on a mission.

This wasn't a time for mourning lost team members, though. This was a time for celebration. Knowing both Wyatt and Logan, they wouldn't want us to wallow after their passing. No, my battle brothers would want me to get a lap dance or more from one of the girls strutting their ass around my table, asking me if I needed anything. Or, as one nice G-string clad woman had offered, "Absolutely anything my big ol' cock desired."

She was a stunning brunette with pin-up model curves and the cutest little tattoo on her ass, but she wasn't what my heart ached for. And apparently, my heart was attached to my dick these days, because he wasn't interested in her offer, either. Nor would there be any lap dances for me tonight. Therefore, I thanked the lovely lady for her offer yet politely turned it down and turned my attention back to the reason we were here.

We were waiting for the private party room in the back of the club to finish being decorated for the going away party of Kara, my other teammate Riley's woman.

Our mission here had involved more than the sex slave ring we were trying to bust. It had played out like one of those cheesy soap operas my mom liked to watch, only a bit more X-rated. The good news was my man Riley had reunited with the love of his life. The bad news was we had lost the only lead we'd had on who was behind the kidnapping and selling of women who had gone missing across the south. The ugly news was we had lost two of our men and had one injured in an explosion.

Riley hated leaving Declan in the hospital, especially now that Declan was finally awake, but the younger Sullivan had been adamant. He didn't want Riley to miss his soon-to-be again wife's party. Riley had tried to convince Declan they could bring the party to his hospital room, complete with strippers who might sponge bathe him, but Declan's face had morphed to grim determination as he had shaken his head no.

The refusal had shocked all of us. Good time Declan had said no to hot women and the promise of a sponge bath? Had he hit his head harder than we'd thought in the blast? I was sure Riley hadn't noticed it because of his ongoing concern for his brother's medical problems, although it wasn't lost on me that something was on Declan Sullivan's mind.

The thing was, I wasn't so certain it was worry over his back and walking again, as the doctors had warned him. He had some other kind of demon he was battling, a demon I quickly surmised might have red hair and be the best friend of Baker's woman.

Before Riley had gotten out of the door after Declan had kicked us out of his room, Declan had asked if anyone had called his phone since Riley had been holding onto Declan's cell while he was recuperating.

I watched as the concern Riley had worn for days disappeared, and pity replaced it when he replied, "No."

Declan had nodded and waved us away after that.

Taking a swig of my beer, my mind wandered to _her_. The sound of Riley laughing next to me made me grateful I wasn't the only one having woman problems. First Baker then Sullivan, and now it looked like the other Sullivan was jumping on board the crazy train to woman-ville. At least Baker and Riley's situations had each had a good ending.

Who the fuck would have thought the Ex Ops team would come down to Miami to catch the scum behind a sex slave ring and end up finding Sullivan's wife? However, the fact that he had Kara by his side now almost gave me hope.

I glanced over at Riley and stared at the smile he wore. It was odd to see him smile. As long as I'd known him, he had been a black cloud of emotions. Now, a completely different person sat in front of me, and I couldn't help being happy for him.

We might have had our differences, but we were still a team. That being said, I knew exactly what it was like to be driven fuckin' nuts by a woman.

Riley was a lucky son of a bitch, and I bet he knew it. Me? I wasn't so lucky.

There was no one other than myself to blame for my misery, though. I had kept the woman meant for me at arm's length for half our lives. Then, when she'd thrown herself at me in what I now knew was one last desperate attempt to express her feelings for me, I had shut her down harshly. No, harsh wasn't the word.

Brutally.

Coldly.

Angrily even.

Ginny had thought that anger had been directed at her and her many attempts to declare her love for me. If only she had known I was angry at myself, instead, because I had convinced myself I couldn't have the one woman I wanted more than my next breath.

In essence, she had tried to hand me her heart, and I had metaphorically thrown it to the ground and crushed it under my combat boot.

These days, all I could seem to hear was my father's advice from years ago playing on repeat in my mind. _"Ginny is a pure heart, son, beautiful from the inside out. You don't want to break a pure hearted girl like that, because it would break her in ways you might never be able to fix. And, if you ever do that, you would only end up blackening your soul. If she's yours and you've broken her, then you'll be living without the very thing you need the most—your heart."_

If only I could have known how right he truly was back then, perhaps then I could have spared both Ginny and myself the pain we were enduring now.

There was only one thing my father had gotten wrong. Ginny was more than my heart. Even though I hated to hurt her, there was no way the experience had blackened my soul... because the woman _was_ my soul. My very essence.

I missed her presence the way one would miss their leg if they had lost it. I was never steady on my feet anymore, stumbling through life without the balance I desperately needed. Ginny was that balance. My breath of fresh air. The heartbeat in my chest. She was the fucking sunshine in my life... and now I lived in perpetual darkness. I had damned myself by never telling her this.

Now, not only had I not heard from her in the last five years, but she'd all but disappeared from the face of the earth. Preliminary background checks I'd run had turned up absolutely nothing. As in, there was no Virginia DuBois who matched the angel who had lived across the street from me. I then reached out to some of my contacts in both law enforcement and private investigations and was met with more disappointment at every turn. No one could find her. It was as if she had never existed at all. Not in the city of Chicago, not in the state of Ohio, and not even in the whole damn U.S. of A.

The woman I loved had disappeared almost as if she had never existed in the first place. The only evidence she'd left behind were the broken, jagged, and jaded pieces of what I used to call a heart.

My angel, my Ginny was real, and I needed her back in my life. She was the light to my darkness. And who wanted to live in a world without light?

So, here I sat in a strip club, surrounded by beautiful women and plenty of other people, and I couldn't give two shits. I was happy for Sullivan, but his happiness made me remember what I'd lost. Sort of like rubbing salt into an open wound, it stung like a motherfucker. I wasn't sure how much longer I could sit here and stomach all of Riley's good fortune.

"Holy shit. If that chick wasn't utterly wasted, she'd be a bombshell," I heard Chase say from the other side of the table.

People watching was better than musing over what I didn't have, so I looked up in the direction Chase was staring at and promptly felt my stomach drop to the vicinity of my feet.

There, across the large VIP area, was what I had lost.

Now, she was found.

In a micro mini red dress, there she was, dancing sloppily to the music, her eyes glassy, indicating she was probably high and/or drunk, as some playboy in a fucking suit watched her with a displeased yet possessive gaze.

Maybe Miami was the lost and found for men who had epically fucked up their love lives.

A hand clapped down on my shoulder, and I looked over to see Riley looking at me in concern.

"You okay, man? Kara just said our party room in the back is ready, and you didn't even hear her."

Looking over his shoulder to where Kara stood, I apologized for not hearing her and then looked back at Sullivan.

"You all go ahead. I've got something I need to handle first."

Riley's eyebrows shot up. "You do?"

I nodded.

"You need backup?" Chase asked.

Shaking my head, I gave them the truth. "My past is flashin' her ass in a red dress across the room and strung out of her mind. I'm gonna go find out why, and then I'm gonna be her goddamn fortune teller and explain what her fucking future is."

"And that is...?" Kara asked, her eyes full of curiosity, although a smile was on her face.

"Me."

Getting up from our table, I ignored the laughter of the people I'd been sitting with and started to make my way across the crowded room. Eyes locked on my target, I didn't dare look anywhere else for fear she might disappear.

My heart was thundering away so hard in my chest it actually hurt. The last bit of rationale I had left my head found that pain ironic as the inner beast that had always belonged to this woman took over.

Loving Ginny had been a sweet agony I had endured for years now.

Here was my chance to claim my woman and show her I could give her everything she had ever wanted from me... and more.

By the time I was done carrying her out of this club and letting her know she was never going to disappear from my life again, she was going to realize she was mine. And I was going to give her the proof I had always been hers.

I had the key to her locket in my pocket.

It was time she learned she had always carried my heart.
Note From The Author

Thank you for reading _Sweet Agony_! You're the absolute best for giving little ol' me a chance. For every Indie Author you read, somewhere out there a fairy gets its wings! Okay, maybe not, but it still seems pretty magical.

For those of you thinking, "WAIT! She didn't resolve all of the issues!" You're absolutely right – I didn't. If you've read my books before, by now you should know that I usually don't. Some issues will be solved in the next book, _Sweet Recovery_. This was merely the beginning of Lucas and Ginny's story. To pick back up where they left off, make sure to grab the next two books: _Sweet Recovery_ and _Sweet Eternity._

I hope you enjoyed reading this book as much as I enjoyed writing it. If you did, please consider leaving a review at your favorite online retailers or review websites such as Goodreads. These are great ways to help spread the word about books to readers who have yet to discover them.

Happy reading!

Jessie Lane
About the Author

Jessie Lane is a best-selling author of Paranormal and Contemporary Romance, as well as, Upper YA Paranormal Romance/Fantasy. She lives in Kentucky with her two little Rock Chicks in-the-making and her over protective alpha husband that she's pretty sure is a latent grizzly bear shifter. She has a passionate love for reading and writing naughty romance, cliff hanging suspense, and out-of-this-world characters that demand your attention, or threaten to slap you around until you do pay attention to them.

For more information on Jessie Lane:

<http://jessielanebooks.com/>

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