SWNOVELS The Devil’s Reward: Chapter 49
I will never settle for being a consolation prize. I’m worth more.
I stare at him, confused. “This is Sam?” I ask carefully, my hands gripping the picture tightly. “You mean, the Sam that is your former teammate? The one you told me about? The woman you asked me if I knew? And where is Macy?”
He nods, his face solemn as he closes the door behind him and steps inside. I don’t approach him, and he doesn’t approach me. My mind is whirling with so many thoughts that I can’t keep up, not all of them good. “Syn has her playing with the dogs and Viper is there too, watching over her. She’s perfectly safe, especially with the dogs. They’re trained in protection. And I wasn’t sure I was ever going to show you that picture,” he admits, and my stomach sinks.
“Why?” I demand, anger building past the dread. “Because she looks like me? Or I look like her, I guess, from your point of view?”
He doesn’t flinch, but I can see the pain in his eyes. I just can’t bring myself to care. “I knew you would be freaked out and it wouldn’t make sense. Or make you think I wanted you because you looked so much alike. When I first saw you, it made me want to stay far away from you.”
“And that’s supposed to make me feel better? Did you have a relationship with her?”
“No.” But there’s something on his face, and my stomach clenches.
“But you wanted to,” I say slowly. “What? Did you sleep with her and she didn’t want to be something more?”
“I never slept with Sam. But I won’t lie to you. I wanted to. We had this crazy chemistry, but we never once gave in. I think we both knew that it wouldn’t go anywhere, so why screw up the working relationship and friendship we had.”
“That’s not everything,” I say tightly. “Don’t lie to me, Shadow. I can see it on your face. There’s something else about her that you’re not telling me, and I want to know what it is.”
He’s quiet for a moment, watching me. He steps closer, but I step back because I don’t want him anywhere near me. I pull my anger around me tight like a shield. He stops and runs a hand through his hair. “On our last mission, before it all went to hell, we had agreed to go out on a date. But it didn’t mean anything, Quinn,” he hurries to say as my heart falls. “I’m not trying to date you to replace her.”
“Sure sounds like it to me,” I reply harshly. “Can you honestly say to me that when you look at me you don’t think of her? That you don’t wonder what it could have been like with her instead of me?”
“I did at first,” he admits. It’s like he’s taking a sledgehammer to my heart. “And it did do my head in for a bit. I honestly wasn’t sure if I could handle ever seeing you again, because I had finally got to a point where I was happy and living the life I wanted, and then there you were. I thought for sure it was fate’s version of a cruel joke. Or Sam trying to be funny.”
I stare at him. “You thought I was a cruel joke?” I repeat slowly.
“No, I mean…” He stops and a growl comes from deep in his chest as frustration covers his face. “Quinn, you need to understand. I lost my entire team that day, including Sam, and I had to finish my mission. I wasn’t allowed to grieve them until I completed it, and until I took care of the men who killed them all. When I was discharged, I was messed up. So fucking messed up. And I felt the worst about Sam. I didn’t protect her. I didn’t see the person who shot her in time, and I had to learn to live with that.
“Then, when I got home, I had to bury each one of them. I carried their caskets to their damn graves. Sam was the last one. Her family was around here, and she was buried here. I vowed to her that I would never forget her. Just as I told the rest of them the same thing.”
“But you were in love with her,” I say harshly. “You wanted her as more than just a teammate, and you stayed in the town that she is buried in. How the hell can I compete with that? How am I supposed to wonder if every time you look at me you only see her? See what you could have had?”
“Because you are not Sam,” he says equally harshly. “You are not Sam, Quinn. Sam was adventurous to a fault, a smart ass that didn’t know when to keep her damn mouth shut and not get a rip from our commanding officers, and she was an adrenaline junkie. You are none of those things.” My entire body is cold and stiff with each comparison. All I’m hearing is how much less I am than her. Than this dream girl of his. The one he wanted before. Now he has to settle for someone who only looks like her. Bitterness mixes with the anger inside me, and I feel sick. “You are nothing like her, Quinn, but you are better than her, and that’s why I want you in my life,” he continues, like he thinks the words are going to fix everything.
“Why? Why settle for someone so much less?” I ask nastily. I lift the frame and point at the woman in the picture. The woman with my face but who is apparently nothing like me. “This is the woman you want, Shadow. You wanted her then, and you want her now. What? You think that by dating me you can save me? That you can fix the past? That you can appease your guilty conscience?”
His eyes darken and his jaw clenches. “This isn’t about that,” he says tightly.
“Sure seems like it to me. I will never settle for being someone’s second choice, Shadow,” I tell him coldly. “I’ve done it enough. I wasn’t even second choice for Bobby. He picked his job and his friends. I was only good for being home to keep his house clean. I’m boring, and I don’t have an adventurous bone in my body. You’re only going to be disappointed and I won’t do that to myself. And I won’t do that to Macy. If you’re looking to find a woman like Sam, I am not her. I will never be her.”
“I don’t want Sam,” Shadow yells, his voice bouncing around the room. It startles me because I’ve never heard him yell before. His anger is clear, and so is his pain, but I just lift my chin as he stares at me. “Do you think that I don’t know what I want after all this time, Quinn?” he demands furiously. “I would never have been happy with Sam. Sure, she was pretty and adventurous, and maybe if we had slept together you might be onto something, but you are wrong.
“When I saw you at the garage, it was like a damn punch in the gut. I thought for sure I was seeing a ghost. Then I saw you again, and again, and I knew there was a reason that you were in my path. I knew I needed to stop and pay attention. And I realized that you are the complete opposite of Sam, and you are everything I could want. You’re beautiful, you’re smart, you’re shy, and you’re the only one who has ever made me feel this way. Like I’m finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel that I’ve been trapped in.
“The past has been holding me back. Sam has been holding me back. Her memories, the pain and guilt I felt at losing her. But that is nothing compared to what will happen if I lose you. Lose Macy. I was existing, not living, before meeting you both. I want to live again, Quinn, and you’re the one helping me do that. You’re the one showing me what the future holds. Your light, your goodness, and the very person you are. The woman who blushes when she’s embarrassed and when she’s being complimented. The woman that smiles at me like I’m the only thing that’s important to her in the room. The woman that can make me laugh just by being herself;. The woman that is pushing me to be a better man; the woman I want to be my everything.
“You think I don’t know that it’s going to fuck with your head, knowing that you look like her? That my story and history is going to create a problem for you? For us? I know that, and I wish like hell I could tell you that it didn’t matter, that it’s a coincidence. But you know what, Quinn? I can’t. I can’t make her disappear. She’s made me the man I am today for you.
“I go to her grave every damn year on Veteran’s Day, and I tell her about my life. And do you know what I asked her the last time? I asked her for you,” he says gruffly, emotion filling his eyes. The moment is so thick that tears fill my eyes even though I try to hold them back. “I asked her for you, Quinn. I asked her to send me a family of my own. A woman of my own that I could love. That I could move on in my life with. I asked her for something for myself. Some small reward for having lived. Something that could keep me from sliding back into the dark with the memories and the pain. Because that shit will never go away. No one gets over seeing their friends, their only family at the time, die. Some in my arms, some alone in the middle of the fucking field with no one there to comfort them because I couldn’t get to them in time. But I tried, and I live with that guilt, and I accept it. I’ve held on to it to keep going. I ask very little from anyone, but I asked Sam for that one thing. I asked her for the one thing I wanted, as selfish as it may be.
“I fully believe that Sam sent you to me, Quinn. I was stupid not to recognize it. I don’t give a shit what your face looks like. You’re beautiful, but beauty isn’t just on the outside. I want what’s on the inside. I don’t want Sam Nolans. I want Quinn Holt, and I want you just as you are. I cannot change my past, Quinn. But I can change my future. I can be selfish and ask for the one thing I want, and that is you. You’re my reward in this life, Quinn, not Sam. You are the reason I am still here. The reason I am still breathing. Sam Nolans is dead, and I accepted that a long time ago. And I’m sorry that you doubt what I’m saying, but it’s the truth. And that’s all I can give you until you’re ready to believe me.”
Then, without another word, he turns and walks out, leaving me standing with tears streaming down my face, reeling from his words.
I look down at the picture, and I slowly sink to the bed as I stare at the woman who tragically lost her life too soon, and the woman, who in some sense, is my biggest hurdle.
“Quinn?” a voice asks gently. I look up and see Rose in the doorway, looking tired but concerned.
I quickly wipe the tears from my face and jump to my feet, setting the picture down. “Rose, what are you doing out of bed?” I ask huskily.
She waves that away and moves slowly and carefully toward me, and I rush to help her and ease her down onto the bed. A fine sheen of sweat covers her forehead from the exertion of coming up the stairs, and guilt devours me. “I heard the hollering and figured you’d need some support,” she says, looking at me. “I’m fine, and I’m not leaving until we chat.” She reaches down and grabs the picture, looking at it. Her face shows some surprise but then morphs into understanding. “I take it you were arguing about this?” she asks.
I nod, sinking onto the bed beside her, too tired to hold myself up anymore. “How am I supposed to be okay with being second best, Rose?” I ask her sadly. “I don’t want to wonder all the time if when he’s looking at me he’s thinking of her.”
“Of course, you don’t,” she agrees. “Quinn, I firmly believe that you have a right to be upset. This is a surprise to you, and Shadow kept it from you. If he had been honest in the first place on who she is, and how you look like her, then you both could have made more informed decisions. Men are a bit dumb, honey, you have to remember that.” I chuckle softly as I wipe my eyes. “But I want to share something with you before you make your decision. And if you decide you can’t handle it, and you don’t want to be with Shadow anymore, then I will be the first one to help you get home and run interference so you never have to deal with him again. Did Shadow tell you about why I made him go to a shrink?” she asks.
“No, just that he was suffering from PTSD.”
“Some of this will be hard to hear, but I want you to hear it all so you understand.” Dread curdles my stomach, but I reluctantly nod. “When Shadow first joined the club, he was quiet, moody, and struggling with intense nightmares and signs of PTSD. Depression, anger, all of it. He would drink every night, just so he could get some sleep. Not that he got much, especially not with the nightmares. Other times, he would grab a club girl or two and spend a couple of hours with them.” I wince at the mention of them, but I know I have no right to be upset about it. It was long before me. “I saw a man spiraling out of control, and I didn’t know how to help him.
“Then, one night, not long after he became a fully patched member, he decided that it was a good idea to unwind with a club girl and get shitfaced drunk. So much so, that they both passed out. He had a terrible nightmare. The kind where we heard screaming from the girl, and Bullet and Viper had to go in and pull him away from her. He had her pressed against the wall, hands around her throat, and squeezing hard enough that if we hadn’t gotten there in time, he would have killed her.
“I’m not telling you this so you are scared of him, Quinn. I’m telling you this so you can see what kind of man he was, compared to what kind of man he is now. When he came to, it was with Viper holding him down and telling him that he was safe. That he was in the clubhouse, and that no one was trying to hurt us. I have never seen a man look so broken as he did that day, Quinn. It was horrible. He sat there, eyes terribly sad, horrified with himself, and like he wanted it to be over. He wanted to die that day, Quinn, and I knew if we didn’t get him help, he’d end up drinking himself to death, or he’d kill himself.
“So I browbeat him into agreeing to go to counseling. I researched every shrink I could find until I found one that I thought could reach him. He didn’t want to go, of course, being a man and not talking about his feelings. But I told him if he didn’t go, I wouldn’t show up at his funeral. That his team would be disappointed in him for wasting the gift he was given. For drinking it down the drain and deciding to eat a bullet by choice. It was like I slapped him, and I saw it. It was harsh, it was mean, and I knew it needed to be done.
“I drove him to that first appointment. I refused to leave, even when he wanted to walk away. I all but dragged him into that office and told the doctor that he was to bar the door and not let him leave until he talked. That I would pay him as much money as he wanted because I knew then that I would not lose Shadow. I would not let him become a statistic.
“He hated me for it, especially at first, and I knew it. For making him relive the pain over and over again. He refused to speak to me for months, other than when he absolutely had to. A few times, he was downright mean, but I never blamed him. I never told him how much it hurt because I knew it was for the best. Bullet let me fret and worry and cry, but he never tore Shadow down for it, even though I knew he wanted to.
“Then, I realized one day, he wasn’t fighting me anymore about going. That he wasn’t crying out or screaming in his sleep. He wasn’t reaching for a bottle or a woman to avoid the pain. I wasn’t sure at the time about what had been said or done to change his attitude. I didn’t say anything, carried on as normal. But on the last day I took him, he came out to the SUV and he looked at me and said he was sorry. So deeply sorry for the way he had treated me. How he had pushed me away.
“He told me that I saved his life. That I had done the one thing that no one else had dared to do. I had pushed him to choose to live. I had taken the hurt and thrown it back in his face, made him face it. He told me that the shrink told him that all he was doing was disgracing their memories. The memories of those who died fighting alongside him. That if he wanted to honor them, he had to live. He had to fight for a new kind of freedom. Then he hugged me tight and thanked me. Thanked me for being the only one that saw his pain for what it was and made him get help.
“From that day, it was like he wanted to be a better person. He strived to be the person he wanted to be, not the person he was. He wasn’t a soldier anymore, and he had to accept that. He had to accept that he was a civilian, but he didn’t have to waste his talents and skills. So he went to Bullet, apologized, and he suggested the security company. Bullet agreed, and then Shadow went about mending fences with his brothers, and the club girl. It takes a lot of strength and humility to do that.
“There were still dark days, and times when the bottle called to him and he started to sink, but I refused to let him go under and I dragged him into some kind of plot or scheme or whatever was going on. I pissed him off by making him do the things he had to do as a Prospect, and I made him realize that he was falling into old habits. Now, those occasions are few and far between.
“And now, you’re here and you’re reminding him of that past. And I don’t mean that in a bad way, dear,” she says gently when I stiffen beside her. “I really like you, and that little girl of yours is going to have me in stitches as she gets older with the things she gets into. But you are a reminder of his past, Quinn, and that can’t be changed. But you are also hope for his future. Shadow has been looking for a woman for himself for a few years. He finally felt like he deserved some happiness. And he wants that with you.
“Now, I know that you have your reservations, as you should with this new evidence.” She picks up the picture again and holds it, letting me see it. “We all deal with pain, Quinn, and while I would like to know your story, we’ll get to that later, because I see you have your own pain to deal with. This woman,” she says firmly, tapping on Sam’s figure, “is gone. She’s dead and buried, and that is something that you will have to accept if you stay. She is always going to be there as a memory, but you don’t need to fear a dead woman. Because when Shadow has looked at this picture before, when he didn’t know I was watching, he looked sad and guilty. Not forlorn, not like he was searching for her again. It was grief and guilt, plain and simple.
“When he looks at you, though, there isn’t sadness or guilt or doubt. There is joy and hope. There is a longing for what could be. Shadow is letting go of his past and embracing his future. Not out of some kind of misplaced idea that he can save you because he didn’t save her. Because he sees you for who you are. For the woman he could have in his life. A partner, a mother to his children, including Macy, and a friend. Is it unfortunate that you look like Sam? Sure, but you’re not her and everything about you shows that, and in the right way. Hair and facial features can be changed. But who you are as a person can’t be.
“I want you to make the right decision for yourself, Quinn. I’m a big believer that women should always have the right to choose. But I do hope that you stick around and give Shadow a chance. He went about this in the wrong way, and I’ll slap him upside the head for it when I’m not so damn tired, but I do hope you give him a chance. Let him make it up to you, and show it to you with his actions, not just with a bunch of words. And if you don’t want to do that, then I completely respect that and want you to know that I’m still going to insist on being your friend. We women have to stick together, and honestly, I can’t wait to see him lose his shit when I involve you and Macy in some of our stunts to get him worked up.” She winks at me. “Just some of the fun you get to experience with us.”
I give a watery chuckle. “I’ve heard about those.” I sigh. “I don’t know, Rose. I just don’t know what to do. I’m so hurt and confused. And I kind of want to go find him and kick him the balls for it.”
She grins wickedly. “Honey, I’ll be the first one to hold him down. He wouldn’t dare try and push me away, being injured and all.”
I shake my head. I’m still confused, and Rose has given me a lot to think about. But is it enough?