SWNOVELS Chapter Inevitable: Epilogue
People who say all is fair in love and war haven’t really loved or fought in a war. I like to think the saying should be all is fair in business and money. Even then, when someone says, “Don’t take it personally. It’s just business,” you sure as shit take it personally.
Love and war are different though. There are lines on a battlefield that aren’t crossed. Women and children shouldn’t be hurt, those unarmed shouldn’t be harmed, mustard gas can’t be used. Sure, those rules have been broken before but history never shined a positive light on those incidents. Those were the incidents that weren’t fair, that had rules broken, and that broke down the saying.
The relationship I had with Whitfield should have followed the saying. I’d figured it would.
All’s fair in love. And. War.
And damn, weren’t we at war with each other half the time.
But I loved loving her and loved warring with her just as much every day of my life.
I’d come to terms with knowing the moment I met her, I’ve loved her in some capacity.
I loved her smell, her hair, her sassiness, the way she challenged me, the way she lit up when I challenged her. I fucking loved that girl.
So, my twisted way of showing it was messed up. Selfishly, I had wanted to take down and beat the monster who’d ruined her childhood at his own game. I wanted to own him and know that he could never own or ruin another part of her life again.
I didn’t go visit him to give him the satisfaction of telling me off. It was another step taken to crush his spirit and let him know I had ruined everything he’d ever built. Instead, I received a report on how he’d taken the news.
To say I was satisfied with the report was an understatement.
And yet even knowing all this, knowing I’d accomplished what I set out to do, didn’t really matter.
Because all wasn’t fair in love and war.
There were rules.
There were standards and lines that shouldn’t be crossed.
I’d crossed all of them.
I knew the second the words left my mouth in that room, staring down into her green eyes, that I’d stepped over an edge I couldn’t climb out of. Her face shuddered with agony I knew I wouldn’t be able to take back. And for moments, I didn’t want to take it back. She’d made me so damn mad, I wanted her to feel the fucking betrayal I felt after finding out she’d gone without me.
I was supposed to be there for her. I was supposed to protect her from him. From anyone. And she hadn’t let me. She hadn’t trusted me enough to let me be that person. So, I’d crossed the line. I’d hit below the belt. I’d stabbed her in her back and watched the love she had for me bleed out.
When she hit me, I wanted her pain, I wanted to feel it and absorb it and keep feeling it because the damn woman evoked every emotion in me that I couldn’t control. I wanted her to feel the chaos too. When I spewed more bullshit about her being like her dad, I was looking for her—and the room—to erupt.
Maybe I wanted it all along, for us to combust and explode. I had accused her of creating bullshit so we couldn’t be together, but I was just as guilty.
Mostly though, I think I couldn’t see past the burden of my feelings for her. I loved her so fucking much, I’d barely been able to get on the stage at my launch, I’d barely been able to launch everything my team had worked so hard for because I’d been consumed with where she’d gone.
She controlled my heart in high school, my soul when I left her mother and father to die, my music when I left her, and my career when I wanted to get her back. I was a fucking slave to her, and she hadn’t even known it.
So, I tore us apart by crossing the line, by doing the one thing not fair in our dance of love and war. I compared her to the man she hated and made sure she understood that I knew them both well enough to say they were the same.
When Rome carried her away, and she finally broke down to cry, my resolve cracked. Her broken sobs wrenched through me like they were my own. Souls connected somehow had the uncanny ability to make you feel the other’s pain. That pain brought me to my knees, literally.
In the middle of my backstage party, to celebrate the biggest success in music history for a man my age, I tried to suck in enough air to breathe through the turmoil of losing her. Of feeling our souls ripped apart. Of something burning my other half away from me.
My brother stood next to me but it wasn’t out of concern.
He bent low to face me and I remember his low whisper. ‘You deserve all this fucking pain, man. All of it. Losing her will be your biggest mistake. So, you better get the fuck up and start working to get her back.’
I did exactly as he said.
Now, I’m staring at her in our bed on the anniversary of the fire and her mother’s death. Today will be hard for her. She still struggles with trusting anyone after finding out why her mother stayed with her father. She’ll think about it today, and I’ll try to carry that burden with her. It won’t be easy. I know she still has a wall up because I kept the trust fund from her.
It’s something we still fight about and probably will for a long time.
We aren’t perfect together but no one is.
And yet, as I look at her sleeping, I know I’m damn lucky because she’s perfect for me. Her dark hair is loose across the pillow, and she doesn’t have a piece of clothing on. She’s let go of all her insecurities around me and it’s a beautiful thing to witness.
She works hard and takes some of the biggest risks while investing for Stonewood Enterprises I’ve ever seen. She’s good at what she does and it helps her to invest for Margie and the kids. Not that she needs to. We’ll always take care of them, but she tells me that’s not the point.
We bickered for about a day on where she was going to live. I got my way. There was no way my girl was going to continue to come to work on the train every day.
Now, I’m finding I won’t get my way with decorating the place though. Her decorating has turned more colorful and vibrant than anyone who’s seen her wardrobe could have imagined. The woman loves colors so bright, I’m concerned we’ll outshine the rainbow. She claims she’s living for her mother, her grandmother, and herself. That all their dreams show through her colors and her long, dark hair.
I would have let her decorate all of Stonewood Enterprises with that answer.
Still, I am proud to say I put my foot down with our bedsheets. A man deserves to have just white sheets if he’s going to stare at pink bedroom walls all day. Today, those white sheets look even better with a bright red engagement ring box sitting on top of them.
Today will be hard for her, but I’m hoping this will make it a little bit better.