A Fighting Chance (6 page)

I feel my heart starting to come alive and for a split second, I think just maybe, I can give him back my heart, when Savvy comes up to the both of us.

“Get your hands off her, you dim-witted imbecile,” she says and slaps his hand off of me and pulls me to her.

“Back off, Savvy,” Max barks giving her a look that given to any other human being would have melted them on the spot.

“No, I will not. You had your chance, you blew it. Regret’s a fucking bitch isn’t it, Slick?” she says, tugs on my arm and pulls me into the bar.

“Chloe, please, I made a mistake, I just want to talk to you. Please,” he pleads. The sound of hurt and loss in his voice pulls at my heart, but I can’t allow him or any man close to my heart, ever again. Not only is it too painful, but I honestly don’t think I have a heart left to give to him, or anyone.

Max

Not only did I make a huge mistake by breaking up with Chloe, I’ve waited too long to do something about it. I’m a fucking idiot! Why did I think that breaking up with her was the best thing for her? The best thing for her is being in my arms, not sitting in a bar while I sit down the street in my truck stalking her.

That’s it. I’m making it my mission to win her back. I’m going to fight for what’s mine. I’m going to prove to her that I am the man she needs. I love her and I’ll be damned if I’m letting her go. These past few days have been torture. I haven’t been able to work or sleep. I can only think of how bad I miss Chloe and want her back where she belongs. How do I do that though, is the question?

I’m not a hearts and flowers kind of guy. I have no idea how to win back her heart. Just then my cell rings, I check the display and see, ‘Savvy Calling’.

“I don’t have time, Savvy,” I bark.

“Slick, you need to come quick, there’s big trouble at the bar,” she whispers in a panic. I can hear men in the background arguing. I hear bottles breaking and the sounds of men fighting.

“Sit tight Savvy, I’m on my way.” I speed dial Levi to get a lock on Chloe. He tells me she’s at work. Thank God she’s not in the bar.

I get to the bar and see it engulfed in flames. I don’t see anyone standing outside either. I rush from my truck and into the burning bar. I pass three men laying on the floor and call out to Savvy. I find her passed out behind the bar. I carry her out, and place her on the gravel beside my truck. I head back into the bar to only find one man still on the ground. It’s the owner of the bar. I drag him out and place him next to Savvy. I call it in, and the police and fire department are on their way.

Savvy and the bar owner, Gary, are going to be fine. They suffered minor smoke inhalation and will be released from the hospital in a few hours. The bar, on the other hand, is a total loss. It completely burned to the ground. The bar was all Gary had. It’s all Savvy had too. The two men that were in the bar apparently came in and said that Gary needed to start paying them a percentage of the bar’s earnings, or they were going to run him out of town. Gary didn’t take kindly to their agreement, so the fight broke out. With all the alcohol that had been broken in the fight, all it took was one little match to send it burning to the ground in no time. I promised Gary and Savvy that I’d get to the bottom of it.

After doing some investigation, it turns out that the men hit up several bars in town demanding the same thing. But after Deuce’s burned to the ground, they high tailed it back to Texas. Now is not the time for me to take a case out of town. I need to get Chloe back. But, I also made a promise to Gary and Savvy. I have never once gone back on my word, and I’m not going to start now. As much as it kills me, I need to leave town.

I pack my bags and my Explorer. I don’t know how long I’ll be gone. I don’t know what this will do to Chloe either. I know what it’s doing to me. It’s breaking my heart to know what I did to her and that I can’t fix it. I need to make one more attempt to try and talk to her. If I could just get her to listen to me and tell her why I did what I had to do, and just how wrong I was.

I stop at the florist and walk around like an idiot. I feel so out of place in a store like this. I don’t know what the fuck to get her. The woman behind the counter asks, “Can I help you find something, sir?”

“I just need something that says, I’m sorry,” I tell her.

“Ah, I see, well I can put something together for you? How much did you want to spend?” she asks.

“I don’t know, just make it real nice, I have a lot to apologize for,” I tell her.

I guess she took that to heart, because when she told me the total, I about had a heart attack. Good thing I’m not a hearts and flowers kind of guy, they’re fucking expensive.

I call Levi and ask him where Chloe is. He tells me she’s been at home for about twenty minutes. I get in my truck and drive straight there. On the way there, I plan out just what I need to say to her. ‘Chloe, I love you. I’ve made a big mistake. I’m sorry that I hurt you. I thought that I was protecting you from my lifestyle, from my job, but I was wrong. The best place for you is in my arms. Can you please forgive me? I swear, I’ll live the rest of my life proving to you that I’m worthy of your love.’ Yeah, that should do it, sounds perfect.

I get to her condo, grab the flowers, and knock on her door. And I wait. And I wait. She doesn’t answer the door. I know she’s in there, Levi said she didn’t leave.

I place my head against the door and say, “Chloe, I don’t know if you can hear me. I need to leave town for a little while. I don’t know when I’ll be back. You know I wouldn’t leave unless I really needed to. I just want to talk to you. Please, I’m begging you. I’m standing here with my heart in my hand begging you to just please let me talk to you.”

I’ve never been so torn up in my life. It’s always been black or white, right or wrong. This grey shit fucking sucks. I hate leaving things like they are. I hate what she’s doing to herself. I hate what I’ve made her do to herself.

Chapter 5

Chloe

As I stand on the other side of the door with my forehead pressed against his on the other side, I didn’t think my heart could break any more than it already has. I don’t eat, I don’t sleep, and I don’t go to therapy. I can’t go to Deuce’s anymore. I have nothing left and I have nothing left to give. I don’t have a spirit; the man who kidnapped me stole that. I don’t have a soul; he took that too. Thou shall not kill, I killed a man. I don’t have a heart. Max ripped that out and threw it away like it never meant anything at all to him. I’m an empty shell, I have nothing left. I am nothing.

“Chloe, I don’t know if you can hear me. I need to leave town for a little while. I don’t know when I’ll be back. I just want to talk to you. Please, I’m begging you. I’m standing here with my heart in my hand begging you to just please let me talk to you,” he says. Oh, I hear you alright. Your heart may be in your hand, but at least you still have one, mine doesn’t exist anymore thanks to you.

“Chloe, please just open the door. I know you’re in there. Please don’t leave things like this. Just let me talk to you,” he says, then punches the door, startling me. I take two steps back and sink to the floor. I wish I could just take my own life and end the horrible existence that I call my life. I don’t have it in me to kill another person, even if it is myself.  I lay on the floor, begging for death to just come down and consume me. Wrap me in your shroud of darkness and take me to wherever it is you want to take me.

As I lay there on the floor staring endlessly at the ceiling, every thought of how my life could end plays out like a dream. Like a freeing, good dream, to release me from my hellish existence. I want it, I need it. I just want the hurt to stop; something, anything, a fatal car accident on the way to work, a mugging or a gunshot to the head. I don’t care what it is; I just need something, anything that will take me away from it all. I give it all permission to take my life. To please, just end it for me, I don’t want to live anymore. I defy it not to take me. Do you hear that? Whoever it is, the Grim Reaper, the Angel of Death, or Satan himself, I forbid you to do nothing. I challenge you to walk away. Do you hear me? You’re a coward. You don’t have the balls to take me away.

As I lay there continuing to stare at the dark ceiling, I start to laugh, because I know none of that’ll happen, why do I think that? Because, my life sucks and everything in it is shit, I don’t have the luck to have it end for me. I clamp my hand over my mouth when I hear Max start talking again.

“I have something out here for you. I’ll leave it on the porch. When I get back in town, you’re going to talk to me, whether you like it or not,” he says. I listen to his footsteps walk away. I hear his truck door close. I hear his engine start up, and then I hear him drive down the road and out of my life once again. I don’t know where he’s going, or when he’ll be back, but if I have it my way I won’t be here when he does.

I eventually get off the floor and open the front door to see a beautiful arrangement of flowers on the doorstep. They mean nothing to me. I pick them up and walk them straight to the dumpster. Max can say he’ll talk to me as much as he wants when he gets back, but he will never get another piece of me. Not only do I not have anything left to give him, but I’d never give him the chance to try and find any shred of what could possibly remain. He can buy me all the flowers in the world, but they will never fix the damage that’s been done.

It’s been weeks, and Max is still out of town, not that I care. Adrian and Shay’s wedding is this weekend, and it’s the last thing I want to go to. We had our final dress fittings and the seamstress took one look at me and gave me a dirty look. I still don’t sleep or eat much of anything. She’s going to have to do a rush job to take in the dress. I don’t care about that either. Work doesn’t even excite me anymore. It’s the only thing I have left that’s good in my life, so I do at least put my all in at work. I don’t know why I bother though, I’ve worked my ass off to get to where I am, but I’m still not where I should be or anywhere close to where Kyle is in his career. At one point we were equals, but I’ll always be ten steps behind him now.

The wedding day is here, and I’m dressed. I even let the makeup artist plaster on tons of cover up to take away the dark circles under my eyes. I let the hair stylist do what she wanted to my hair, I don’t care what it looks like. Everyone is fluttering around excited and pampering Shay. As I sit in the back of the room, I try desperately to think of a way I can just slip out unnoticed.

“I have something to say before we get to the something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue part. Chloe, I have thought long and hard about what to do about you. I am very concerned with how you have been behaving these past few months…” Amelia says looking at me.

“I told you all, I’m fine,” I tell her, and anyone else in the room who cares to listen.

“No, you’re not. But let me finish. I won’t claim to know what you went through being held those three years. I had a little taste of it when I was there with you. But you survived something that normal people only ever hear about in a news report or watch on a television show. We both survived. Don’t give that man the satisfaction of seeing you like this…”

“He’s dead, he gets no satisfaction. I saw to that, I killed him myself,” I remind her.

“I know he’s dead, sweetie. You have been through so much. You deserve to be happy. I know why Max broke up with you,” she says.

Everyone’s eyes are on me. I don’t even care anymore why Max broke up with me. It doesn’t matter anymore.

“You can keep it to yourself. I don’t care why, and I don’t want to know why he broke up with me. I don’t care about any of you,” I shout.

“That’s just the thing, we all care about you. I talked to your counselor and she said you stopped seeing her a few months ago…” Amelia starts to say.

“I don’t need her, I’m fine. And how dare you go behind my back and talk to her. She has no business even sharing that kind of information with you. Everyone just leave me alone,” I say.

“I’m not going to do that. None of us are. I have something for you,” she says and hands me a small gift bag. I don’t want to cause a scene on Shay’s wedding day, so I take the bag. I pull out the tissue paper, and my hand stills in the bag, I feel a lone hot tear slide down my cheek. It’s the first tear that I’ve been able to shed in months. Amelia kneels in front of me and places her hands on my knees. “You never let that man get the best of you. Never. I don’t know what your future holds with Max, but I can tell you that you can’t let this get a hold of you either. We’re all worried about you. I’m not saying that you need to get over Max. I’m not even telling you to stop loving him. If you are meant to be with Max, then it will happen. But, sweetie, if you’re not meant to be together, then you need to let go and move on. You have been through so much and you can’t let a breakup pull you down into this depression. That is what this is, too. Honey, I need you to promise me that you’ll start going back to counseling.”