Pieces of Us (Confessions of the Heart, #3)(48)

It’d done a number on me.

“You’re the one who told me I needed to tell him, and look what happened,” I accused without an ounce of anger.

I could almost feel the shift of her demeanor, her mood sobering as she exhaled in what sounded like sympathy. “You knew it wasn’t gonna be easy, but you knew it had to happen. Living with that weight was nothin’ but a burden to you, Izzy. It was time. Way past time.”

“I know.” Exhaling long, I pressed my trembling fingers to my forehead where I stood beneath a tree trying to hide out from the blazing sun.

I’d slipped out for my lunch break and called Faith, needing someone to confide in.

Get this disorder of emotions off my chest.

“I’m proud of you for going back over there. That took a lot of courage,” she added.

I paced a circle. “I just . . . I’m terrified of what happens now. He’s insisting he wants to be a part of Benjamin’s life, but he doesn’t have the first clue what that really means. I mean, God, you should have seen the way he took off runnin’ when he saw Benjamin. The man was the definition of a cowardly cat with his tail caught on fire.”

“Did you expect anything different? You knocked that man for a loop . . . Jace and Ian got a call to go down to Monty’s to talk the guy down, he was so distraught. Shocked. He deserved that time, and it didn’t take him all that long to come to his senses.”

“Whose side are you on?”

“Yours. Mack’s. Benjamin’s. Love’s. Whatever you want to call it.”

Sometimes her belief was infuriating.

“Can’t you just man bash him with me for a little while?” I all but begged. Still, the hint of a tease was weaving its way into my tone.

I could almost see her pursing her lips, not sure if she wanted to laugh or chastise me. “Is that what you really want? To bash that man more after what he went through last night? Not to mention the fact that you walloped him a good one, too.”

Regret churned in my spirit as I let myself grasp how serious this was.

The man could have died.

What she was so conveniently forgettin’ was that he’d walloped me a good one first.

And that was the crux of Maxon Chambers.

He’d give. Give and give and give. In all the wrong ways.

Believing his own safety wasn’t of worth. Making all the wrong decisions when he thought he was bein’ noble.

And I couldn’t help but worry that was exactly what he was doing now.

Doing the honorable thing and trying to do right by his son. That was all good and well except for the fact our hearts were tangled in the middle of it.

“No, it’s not. Of course, not. Doesn’t mean that makes it any easier.”

Faith pushed out a slow sigh, and I could hear her wavering, struggling with what to say, and I knew she was getting ready to lay it out the way she always did.

No holds barred.

“Think you need to ask yourself what it is you’re really scared of, Izzy.”

“You know exactly what it is I’m scared of,” I whispered bluntly.

No use in hiding it.

I blinked away the moisture that threatened my eyes.

Truth was, I was terrified. Terrified of the way he made me feel. Terrified of the power he still wielded. Terrified of those blue eyes that screamed sincerity.

The man just standing there with that beautiful body, begging for my trust.

And trust?

It was the pinnacle of loyalty.

The culmination of hope.

Grace given in love.

He’d held all of mine in the palms of those hands.

Fisted it so tightly that he’d crushed it.

I knew it.

Knew it in my gut.

That man could wreck me anew, and I couldn’t afford for that to happen.

“And maybe that is exactly what makes it worth it, taking this chance,” she urged in her soft way.

“I have to be strong for my boys.” It was nothin’ but a defense.

“And sometimes strength reveals itself in our vulnerabilities. In our willingness to lay ourselves on the line. Maybe that’s exactly what he’s doing.”

“Well, I guess we’re going to figure that out pretty quick since I went and invited him over to dinner tonight.”

I almost rolled my eyes at myself. I couldn’t even make the man suffer it out for a day or two before I was inviting him back through my door.

Nothing but a masochist.

But there’d been no resisting the sorrow that had been clear. The truth of it. The intensity of it.

Maxon was broken over this. But he’d been broken all his life. And I just prayed that brokenness didn’t destroy us all in the end.

Heaving out the weight of the worries, I glanced at my watch. “I better go. Lunch is almost over. I need to get back inside.”

“Okay, call me later and let me know how it goes tonight.”

“I will,” I said before I ended the call and peeked over at the office door where I’d started my new job little more than four hours before.

Luckily, I’d taken to it quickly, the software they used the same as at my old office. Suffice it to say, Helen had been pleased, going on about how I was going to work out just fine while I’d been struggling to focus on work at all.

Leaving the shade of the tree, I jogged across the parking lot and hopped onto the sidewalk running the front of the strip mall.