Worth the Fight (Accidentally on Purpose)

Worth the Fight

(Accidentally on Purpose #3)

By L.D. Davis

© 2013 L.D. Davis

This book is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and situations are entirely a result of the author's over active imagination. Any resemblance to persons living or deceased is coincidental. No part of this novel may be reproduced without written permission from the author.

Cover created by

Distorted Edge Designs

www.facebook.com/distortededge

Edited by

Evelyn Erndt

Lorien Moy

Karleigh Lewis-Brewster

Contact
L.D. Davis
:

www.facebook.com/lddaviswrites

www.twitter.com/lddavis478

www.lddaviswrites.com

[email protected]

Also by
L.D. Davis
:

Accidentally on Purpose

Worthy of Redemption

(Accidentally on Purpose #2)

&

the novella

Pieces of Rhys

Worth the Fight

(Accidentally on Purpose #3)

“You would fight for me?”

“To the death.”

*

~Emmy Grayne & Luke Kessler~

Accidentally on Purpose

Prologue

Fool (noun)

1. a silly or stupid person; a person who lacks judgment or sense.

2. a professional jester, formerly kept by a person of royal or noble rank for amusement: the court fool.

3. a person who has been tricked or deceived into appearing or acting silly or stupid: to make a fool of someone.

4. an ardent enthusiast who cannot resist an opportunity to indulge an enthusiasm

5. a weak-minded or idiotic person.

I was every definition of the word. I was the man who lacked judgment or sense. I was being kept by a person, appa
rently for her amusement. I had been deceived into acting stupid – both by my keeper and myself. The enthusiasm I irresistibly indulged in was the said keeper. To have endured all of the above for several months, I was definitely an idiotic person.

I repeatedly gave her the benefit of doubt. She wasn’t b
eing herself. The woman I loved and had loved for some time would not normally put herself or me in such difficult circumstances. The woman I loved – the real one, not the imposter that has taken her place – was strong in mind and soul. She had an abundance of confidence and knew she deserved respect, happiness, and monogamy. She would have never gotten involved with her boss, especially her boss who had a steady girlfriend, and she certainly wouldn’t have lied to her doting boyfriend’s face day after day. The woman I loved wouldn’t do any of that. She wasn’t the most innocent person, but she was not cruel. This woman, this other woman who took her place was cruel and weak, and I was tired of her slowly breaking my heart.

When you know in your bones, right down to the cellular level, that you are supposed to be with someone, it is hard to simply walk away. When you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that someone is your soul mate, the one person in the universe you cannot be without, it is hard to just give her up, even if she is crushing you under her foot while whispering sweet things onto your tongue. Every time I considered pulling away and leaving her, I felt physical and emotional pain that nearly crippled me. So, I hung on. For months. But I’ll hang on no more. I’ll just have to suffer and find a way to deal with the pain. The longer I stay, the more she’ll hurt me.

I knew she was on her way over. She was excited to go to the beach and have a fun day, and pretend that the
other
one wasn’t waiting for her somewhere when the day came to an end. I hadn’t spoken to her in a couple of days, other than a few short text messages. I needed time to make the necessary phone calls and convince my family that had come to love her why they needed to let her go. I also needed every ounce of strength I could muster to do what
I
needed to do and what I didn’t need was for her to weaken me with her kisses, her touches, her smiles, and her incredible sex.

I heard the front door open and heard her start towards the bedroom. I shifted slightly where I was standing and heard her change direction. As soon as she saw me, her smiling, bea
utiful, so beautiful face began to change. She was the other half of my existence. Surely she could feel that there was something bad about to go down.

“Lena's not doing as well as we had hoped,” I said quie
tly. At least I didn’t have to lie. I didn’t have to be like her and lie. My sister was very sick. The thought nearly choked me and I had the resist the urge to walk across the room and into her arms for comfort.

“I'm sorry,” she said sincerely. She looked like she wan
ted to approach me, but she hesitated, and I was glad. If she touched me I might change my mind.

“I'm going to leave sooner than I planned.”

“How soon?” Her voice was unusually high and her eyes had widened. She bit down on her full lip.

“Next week,” I said stiffly. I had to ignore the normal things about her that would typically drive me crazy. Like her teeth sinking into her plump lip. “By the end of next week.”

Emmy took a step back as if my tone alone was frightening. Good. She should be frightened.

“I've decided I don't want you to come with me,” I said.

I watched her delicate throat as she struggled to swallow. She tried to smile, but she looked very uneasy.

“I understand,” she said. “You have a lot going on with your sister and family.”

“This isn't about my family, it's about you. I don't want you.” I said it as coldly as I could manage. It worked. Her smile faded. She took another step back.

“I thought if I gave you some time, you would make a decision,” I said. I tried to be firm, but my emotions were hard to keep down, and they were leaking into my words. “I thought you would stop stringing me along as a backup and really commit, but you haven't. You're still seeing Kyle.”

Her eyes closed and she swayed slightly as my words impacted her. I should have cared that she looked like she was going to fall, but coldness was trickling in with my anger and pain. I didn’t know it was possible to feel cold, hurt, angry, sad, and unbearable grief all at once. Until now.

She hung her head. Tears slipped down her cheeks. I wanted to slap them off of her face, but I don’t hit women. E
ver. I would rather die than to hit her, but the desire didn’t fade easily. She was already crying. She already knew she was caught and the charade was over, but I couldn’t stop telling her my thoughts.

“I'm not sure which part bothers me the most, the fact that you've been lying for months or the fact that you thought I was too simple minded to see what was going on. I can't count how many times you've lied about where you were or who you were with, or the times that you climbed into my bed still ree
king of him. How many times have I kissed you and your mind was with him? I've given you opportunity after opportunity to come clean, but you never did.”

She was still looking down at the floor. She didn’t even have the guts to look at me, to look at the man she fucking broke! She had plenty of guts to spread her legs for that asshole and to lie to my face, but she couldn’t look at me now?

I growled and stepped towards her. I spoke very softly, my tone laced with unspeakable threats.

“At least give me the courtesy of looking in my fucking face while I am talking.”

Slowly, she raised her head and met my eyes. I could almost feel her shame. Her eyes were filled with self-hate and regrets, but it was too late. I didn’t care if she hated herself. She deserved to hate herself. Hell she deserved my hate, too, but despite the conflicting emotions I had, I couldn’t make myself hate her.

“I looked like the biggest idiot at work, committing m
yself to the girl who was obviously fucking Kyle Sterling.”

Her mouth fell open in surprise. Was she really that dense? I almost snorted. She should have taken her head off of his dick long enough to look around.

“Everyone knows, Emmy,” I told her. “Despite your sneaking around, people still know. You both think everyone else is too inferior and dumb to figure it out.”

She shook her head in disbelief. This infuriated me. Fire raced through my veins. This was the biggest response I had gotten out of her and it was because everyone else knew she was a slut, not because I alone knew she was a slut.

“Don't you fucking shake your head,” I growled fiercely, pointing in her face. She backed away from me with fear in her eyes, but I didn’t care. I wanted her to be afraid of me. I pushed forward until I had her backed up against a wall.

“You're more upset that everyone else knows than you are about me knowing!”

She jerked when I yelled and hit her head on the wall. On any other day, I would have immediately felt bad and made sure she was okay, but this wasn’t any other day. I hoped that she hurt her head, though I knew it would never compare to my own hurt.

“No, that's not true,” she protested. She wiped at her tears and it only made me angrier.

“Like I can believe anything you say now!”

“I'm so sorry,” she sobbed.

“Maybe you are, but I don't forgive you. I can't even forgive myself for falling in love with you, knowing that you were Kyle's whore,” I said with abhorrence.

She looked at me with wide, teary eyes. She had never witnessed me behave like this before, ever. I never had a reason before her. She apparently brought out the worst in me. She looked away from me, towards the living room, like she was thinking of leaving. Did she really believe she could do the shit she did and just slither away? I saw only red. My anger and pain consumed me. I roared as my fist worked on its own a
ccord and slammed through the wall only a couple of inches from her head. She screamed and winced. She thought I was going to hit her. I backed off. I wasn’t going to hit her, but chances of me handling her entirely too roughly were very high.

“Luke, your hand!” She reached for my hand, but I moved away. I could barely feel the pain in my hand. The pain in my chest muted every physical pain. I heard the soft patter of blood dripping onto the floor.

“Let me at least help you take care of your hand,” she begged, cautiously reaching for me again.

I let her take my hand. I don’t know why. I was still b
eyond angry and I wasn’t even sure if I was really in control of my actions, but I allowed her to fix up my injured hand. I couldn’t take my eyes off of her. She was gorgeous, even crying and sad, but she was dangerous. She ruined me. I was completely ruined. There would never be anyone else for me but her, but she was already gone. She had been gone for a long time and I didn’t accept it.

Her fingers lightly touched my wrist. I fought not to touch her.

“I didn't know how to let go of either one of you,” she whispered.

“Fortunately for you, I made that decision for you,” I said coolly.

She burst into tears. She sobbed so hard that she looked like she would collapse. I hated her for crying. I loved her for crying. I fucking hated it.

She released my injured hand and began to turn away from me. As it turned out, I wasn’t in control of my actions, b
ecause why would I stop her? Why would I crush her body into mine and kiss her with every emotion I felt? Why would I do that? It hurt me to kiss her, because I knew I’d never kiss her again.

I forced myself to stop kissing her. I held her face in my hands and wiped away her tears with my thumbs. Her face blurred before me as my own tears overflowed and spilled hotly down my face.

“Listen to me,” I said, my voice breaking. “I don't ever want to see you after today. Don't call me, don't text me, don't email me. Whatever relationships you were building with my family, it's done. They've already cut you off at my request.”

God. This was it. This was the end. It was over. I was over. I was going to die without her. I would die with her.

“I love you, Emmy, but you fucking broke my heart. I know I am part to blame, I know, but...” I looked at her hard. I wanted her to know how much I meant what I was about to say. I wanted her to feel pain as I had felt it.

“I hope Kyle Sterling rips your heart out of your chest and makes you choke on it.”