Broken Barriers (Barriers Series Book 4)

by Shirley, Sara

  I grabbed my ringing phone and leaned forward on the sofa to place the beer bottle onto the coffee table. “Hi, Sam. To what do I owe the pleasure?” I teasingly asked since she had been calling all day, and I had avoided her as I attempted to get the house in order.

  I heard her voice on the other end of the line yelling at Josh to grab Dean before he got into any more trouble in the nursery.

  “Well, if that’s not an ad for protective sex, I don’t know what is.”

  “Har-har. You wait. One day, this will be your life.” She sighed heavily through the phone. “Josh! Can you get Dean, please?” Sam yelled so loudly that my hand pulled the phone away from my ear as I blinked through the onslaught of deafness.

  “Sam, seriously…I only have one good ear left for hearing, and your shouting is not making it any better.”

  “Sorry, Drew.” Sam sighed heavier this time and muttered under her breath. Then a loud clamoring of something sounded through the phone. “Grrr. Drew, hang on. I don’t know where Josh is, but Dean is getting into the kitchen cabinets again. I’ll just be a couple of minutes.”

  After I gave Sam the go-ahead, my head fell, and I leaned back into the soft brown microfiber sofa. My eyes closed, and I doubted Sam even realized she said the words until it was too late. She was the only one who knew exactly how I felt about Courtney years ago. She knew I wanted the wife and family. The timing just wasn’t right. Courtney surprised me during my leave on base in California shortly after Sam’s wedding. We spent a weekend traveling up the California coast and stopped in San Francisco. With one last sunset over the waters near Point Reyes National Seashore, I realized I loved her and wanted a future with her. I had hoped to have it all move in that direction, until she left for Europe.

  She sat there between my legs drawing nothing into the sandy beach with her finger. Her brown hair blew to the side with the light evening breeze. The strands tickled my face as a few brushed against my skin with the wind. My hands pushed her hair away from her neck as my lips gently pressed warm kisses against her skin at the nape of her neck. She moaned as she angled her head to the side, allowing me easier access to her skin. My body heated with carnal desire I had never felt for anyone before. I couldn’t tell her just how much I needed her to be mine. I couldn’t do that to her. After that night, I had no idea how long we’d be apart from each other. But, a part of me kept saying she needed to know. She needed to hear how I felt. I’d held it back from her so many times. With one final second of daylight, the flash over the water left us in the dark, and I knew the moment was gone. I never said the words that should have been said. I saw her close her eyes and release a long breath I could tell she had been holding. It was as though we were both waiting on the same thing at that moment. She was waiting for me to say something that never came.

  That night we slept at The Pelican Inn. It was probably the most romantic place you could ever bring someone you were about to confess your love to—except when those words never passed over your lips, even after making love one final time before saying goodbye. That was when you knew you were the biggest douchebag in America and didn’t deserve the girl standing before you at the airport in San Francisco. Tears rolled from her eyes as I did my best to put a smile back on her face.

  I watched her walk through those doors and out of my life. Needless to say, that was the longest drive back to base when all I had was open road and my lonely thoughts to keep me thinking for hours.

  That was when it all went to shit. Word started trickling in about our deployment, and phone calls and emails went dry. It was also about the time Sam called me one stormy night and broke the news that Courtney had hooked up with Adam. A year later, I walked away from her at the airport in Manchester, New Hampshire, and hadn’t spoken to her since.

  I heard a grumble through the phone and could tell Sam was out of breath from probably running back to the phone. “About time you got back to me,” I teased.

  “Yeah, well, it’s about time you got back to other people here, too,” she said. A soft yet audible gasp came from Sam’s end of the phone. She was referring to me avoiding Courtney. My eyes were still clamped shut as I tried my hardest not to let myself go there. I had been doing so well, too. I only heard her voice in my head this morning, and I didn’t think of her as I jerked myself off in the shower.

  After a long exhale of breath, I reluctantly continued my conversation with Sam. “Seriously, Sam, why did you call?” My eyes slowly opened, and I sat up again, leaning my elbows on my knees as the TV continued to run through its episode. Superheroes really had the best life. They possessed all those cool powers, and they got the girl they loved every time. Where did I go wrong in life?

  “Drew, I’m sorry. It just slipped out. It won’t happen again, but you know you will have to see her eventually. When she gets back, she’s going to hunt you down. You know that, right?”

  “Sam, you’re lucky you’re my sister, and I love you, but I’m not about to go there yet with her.”

  “All right. All right. So, anyway, reason for my calling is, I’ve got to fly out to Colorado next week to see Lucy. Josh wanted to bring Dean up for a couple of days to the lake. Would that be okay?”

  “Yeah, I’d love to see my nephew, and I guess that ape of a brother-in-law can come along as well.”

  As we continued with the usual pleasantries on current events and Sam’s old roommate, Lucy, my eyes remained focused on the framed picture on the buffet. I took a long pull of my beer, realizing that everyone else had moved on since then. I was the only one stuck in the past and moving backward.

  Jesus, what I wouldn’t give to go back to that one summer and change so much. Would I still be right here in the same spot? Who knew? There were a lot of variables that could have still led me down the same path, even if the route changed beforehand.

  I hung up the phone with Sam after she said she’d see me the following week on the way to the airport. Apparently, Josh would leave me with Dean while the two of them went to the airport. My sister was entrusting me with an eighteen-month-old toddler. What the fuck was she thinking? I heard the wails and screeching coming through the phone. I was sure to screw the kid up big time. That would teach them not to leave Dean with his Uncle Drew again.

  With a flick of the remote, I pushed myself off the sofa and headed to the kitchen to dump the beer bottle into the recycle bin. A quick check on the clock on the wall told me I should probably head down to Everett’s bonfire soon.

  I shut the lights off in the living room and left a single dimmed light on in the kitchen for when I returned. With the cooler handle in hand, I grabbed my keys, phone, and hoodie sweatshirt before stuffing my feet into my flip-flops. A quick glance around the house, and aside from the oranges from the evening sunset, the only thing reflecting off the water was the light in the lone house across the bay again.

  I suddenly halted halfway to the front door and gazed with narrowed eyes. I barely saw a boat, possibly a kayak, floating across the water away from the docks in front of the house. My eyes lingered on the image for a few seconds before I shook my head and swore I was seeing things.

  I adjusted everything in my hands and turned back to the door, the beer cooler rolling behind me. With a quick and easy toss of everything into the backseat of my Dodge Charger, I was following the GPS toward the address that Everett texted me earlier.

  As I pulled the car into the driveway, I saw at least five other cars and a roaring fire off in the distance beyond the cottage. Upon getting out of the car and unloading the supplies, I heard loud laughter between at least two girls. Everything came into focus the closer I walked to the party. I saw Everett standing near a table filled with food with a couple of other guys just chatting.

  He saw me and waved as he stuffed his face with food. Pushing through his company, he came over to greet me. “Hey, man.” He reached out to manly slap-shake my hand. “Glad you could make it.” Everett turned to the rest of the party as we walked closer to everyone
. The fire pit was set out front along the small sandy shoreline that was a lot flatter and less rocky than in front of my place since he was closer to town.

  Once I was standing near everyone, Everett began introducing me. I met the guys first. Everett’s friends from the Corps could seriously do some damage to me by the size of their muscles. Deroche and Locke were bouncers at some gentlemen’s club closer to the city. I needed to inquire about that.

  Then we made our way over to the girls around the fire. All of them turned at once with smiles on their faces and red plastic cups in hand—most likely mixed drinks—except for one. I was introduced to all of them including Morgan, finally. But, the last one standing before me was the one that had rendered me speechless. The sun didn’t block her face any longer. The fire’s light danced across her skin, and I watched her with her fancy wine glass walk closer to me. I didn’t hear any other chatter around me. It was so quiet I swore you could have heard a pin drop.

  The fire didn’t crackle. The music was nothing more than a whisper. It felt like that scene in West Side Story when Tony saw Maria for the first time and the rest of the world was a blur. If it weren’t for spending months helping Sam prepare for her role in the high school musical version of that play, I would have probably seen this moment in an entirely different light. I didn’t, though, and I could feel a connection that drew me closer to her.

  Her eyes on mine sent this tingling feeling across my skin. I was burning up next to the fire, and yet I felt as cold as ice. She reached out her hand and gently wrapped it around my outstretched hand. Not quite sure when I gained my mobility back to raise my hand, but there it was linking with hers. “So, you’re Drew. I’m Cole. It’s about time we finally met.”

  I stood there literally in shellshock. I didn’t hear a single word that she said. I was still transfixed on this stunning woman standing before me. She giggled as her eyes stared at our hands. “…Soooo, Drew. I’ve heard some rumors about you.” She giggled once more before looking back up at me. My mouth opened, but nothing came out until a slap on my back broke me from my stupefied state of mind.

  My hand snapped away from hers abruptly, and my body went rigid as a pole. My blood was suddenly hotter than the fire in front of me. It happened so fast that not even I could understand what was going on.

  My right hand flew over my left shoulder and wrapped around the hand on my opposite shoulder. Cole stumbled back a couple of steps with a loud audible gasp of shock. I turned sharply and managed to get the arm off me and pinned curtly behind his back. My other forearm wrapped around his neck, and I pulled tightly. Years of college wrestling and Marine Corps defensive training had been instilled in my mind for so long that I didn’t think before I did anything anymore.

  I felt a couple of other hands upon me, and I knew the guys were saying words, but I didn’t have a clue as to what they were saying. I heard the girls’ voices around me, fearing my actions as the guys managed to get me to release my grip on whom I saw was Everett, and my arms dropped from the body in my grasp.

  Everett turned and shook his arm and rubbed his neck before coming back over to me. If I were curious as to what those two other Marines could do as bouncers… Well, I had just found out. Once it all processed, I felt as though an apology just wouldn’t cut it. I went into immediate defense mode with Josh the other day and again just then. I looked at Everett’s face, assuming that I’d see anger, or better yet, scorn. Instead, I saw understanding and proof that he’d been where I had just gone.

  With slow and calculated steps, he approached me and stood at ease in front of me. With one look, his arms crossed in front of him, and I heard the words that had been spoken to me so many times before. “You better lock that shit up, Marine.” His voice was demanding, but sorrowful. Then with a slight tilt of his head, he softly said, “I’ve been there. I should have known before I approached. That’s all on me, and I’m sorry. But, trust me when I say that shit won’t fly around here, so get your head in check and work that shit out. Copy that?”

  My lips formed a thick line, and I nodded in understanding. I was FUBAR—Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition—and I needed to find some help. When I returned, Veterans Services really didn’t offer me much. If I said I was FUBAR, they would have committed me on the spot and probably said I suffered from PTSD or some shit like that. I most likely did have all the symptoms for PTSD, but they said it was just Adjustment Disorder. Plus, I wanted out. I didn’t want to be probed by USMC doctors and therapists any longer than necessary. I needed to be done with the Marine Corps. The shit I went through during my deployment: the convoys, the IEDs, the constant state of awareness and fear… Someone behind a desk with a piece of paper on the wall wasn’t going to help me with that shit. I needed someone who had been through the same as me. With one look at Everett, I could tell he knew.

  He reached out and rested his hand upon my shoulder. “Dude, you ever want to hash that shit out…you know where to find me. I know exactly what’s going on in there.” He pointed to his head with his finger. “Trust me. Get it all out. You’ll sleep better at night if it’s no longer bottled up.”

  With a final slap on the shoulder, Everett backed up a couple of steps. As I glanced around, everyone’s eyes were pinned on me. This was something I’d never get used to—the judging and the soft whispered voices of those who thought I was crazy. Nobody would ever truly understand the sacrifices made until they walked in my shoes. That bed of freedom everyone slept on each night…I fought for that. I’d lost a piece of me for that freedom.

  Everett turned away and told everyone there was nothing to see here. Just a little Marine roughhousing. Both Locke and Deroche came around me and nodded in understanding. With a snap of a piece of wood from the fire, my eyes trailed back to the brunette with golden flames dancing across her skin.

  Cole looked at me with concern, but not empathy like most others did. The girls around her gave me cautious looks and whispered into each others’ ears before moving farther away from me. One of them was Morgan. A few of the girls I hadn’t met yet. With a soft smile, I saw her turn back to Morgan, saying something out of earshot.

  Cole turned and walked in my direction again. I watched her as she moved closer. Her long legs and flip-flop covered feet were in front of me in the blink of an eye. The tunnel vision had returned, and I finally saw her then.

  Compared to my tall frame, she hovered close to my shoulders even in flats. Her light brown hair fell just below her breasts. My eyes wandered from her neck down to her just barely exposed cleavage of her flowing tank top. She was possibly one of the most naturally gorgeous women I’d ever laid eyes on. There was nothing fake about her. She reminded me so much of… Well, let me say that after just meeting Cole, I was already attracted to her.

  She cleared her throat as if knowing where my eyes were heading. She took a sip of her wine before my eyes returned to hers. The flames of the fire danced in the glaze within her eyes, but even in this light, I could tell they were a bright blue. They said a person’s eyes were the window to their soul. I had no idea why or how, but in that moment, I felt as though I’d been there before with her.

  “Everett tells me you just got back from overseas.” Cole shouted over the chatter of the other guests and the music coming from someone’s tablet on the snack table. I nodded at her as she moved closer to the food, grabbing a few cubes of cheese. I watched her long fingers pop each cube into her mouth one by one in slow movements.

  What I wouldn’t give to be one of those cheese cubes.

  Her face scrunched as she sipped her white wine and then raised her eyebrows as she waited for me to respond. Everyone else had gone about their other conversations except for her. Even with her friends nearby, she still only wanted to talk to me. The music grew louder, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to continue trying to talk with her by the snack table.

  I looked behind her at the water and noticed a couple of chairs along the shore, away from the noise. After I pointed in that
direction, she turned her head and then nodded in understanding. As she grabbed a refill of her wine, I dug into my cooler for a beer before we walked to a quieter corner of the yard.

  When I finally reached the edge of the yard and sat in the beach chair, Cole sat next to me. “So, Everett told you I was overseas? But, first let me say I’m sorry about what just happened back there. You could say after living in a war zone for so long I’m still a little tense at times.” I ran my hand through my hair and glanced down at my beer, hoping she wouldn’t feel the need to be sympathetic like most people.

  “You were in Afghanistan I assume? What was your job over there?”

  “Military Police. But somehow I managed to get attached to another unit, and well, the MP role really took a backseat when you headed into combat.” I looked over at her and caught her subtly running the tip of her finger over the rim of her wine glass. I could tell her mind was trying to think of what to say or ask next. She was focused entirely too much on her wine glass rather than talking with me.

  I had never really had any issue breaking the ice with other girls, but something about this one had me tongue-tied, and I had no idea why. Somehow, though, I remembered something Everett told me the other day about her.

  “Everett also mentioned you live up here year-round. You have family up here?” Without even having to look, I knew there wasn’t a wedding band on her ring finger. “Or perhaps your boyfriend lives up here, too?”

  Cole confined her laughter as she snorted into her wine glass now settled at her lips. After my last ballsy question, that reaction was kind of expected. Couldn’t really blame a guy for being curious. Who wouldn’t want to find out if there might be someone standing in your way or lurking off in the darkness behind you waiting to attack? A guy had to know how to swim before he treaded water, or however that saying went.