Love in the Light (Hearts in Darkness, #2)(40)

“Thoughts of hurting yourself bad?” Joe asked.

Humiliation roiling through his gut, Caden couldn’t look Joe in the eye. Yeah, he had those thoughts. The ones that sometimes taunted him with the promise of freedom from all this f*cking misery. He hadn’t considered them seriously, but he couldn’t deny having them.

“Shit. Okay. What are we going to do about this?”

“We?” Caden’s gaze cut to his captain.

“Yeah, we. You think I’m leaving you alone like this? You’re coming to my house today, and tomorrow you’re either going to your doctor or to the hospital. And I’m taking your ass. And I’ll keep taking you until you get this under control. In fact, I’ll help you pack a bag. You’re staying with me until we turn this thing around.” Joe arched a brow and nailed him with a stare.

“Cap—”

“None of that’s up for discussion, Grayson. In case that isn’t clear.” Joe glared at him, but it was a glare Caden had seen many times before, when something hadn’t gone quite right on a call—one born of concern, and maybe even a little fear.

“Okay,” Caden said, too tired to fight the man. “I got meds, but I’ve missed some.”

“Did you take one today?” Joe asked. Caden shook his head. “Then do it. How long have you been on them?”

He’d gone back to his therapist the day before he’d walked out of Makenna’s life. “The tenth, I think it was.”

Joe nodded. “Good. That’s good. Even if you’ve missed some, that’s two weeks’ worth of medicine. Fucking shame antidepressants take so long to build up in your system. But at least you have a jump on it.”

“Wait,” Caden said, frowning. “Two weeks?” His eyes went wide. “Shit. What day is it?” His leave of absence ended on the twenty-third so he could take shifts to let the guys with families have the Christmas holidays off.

His captain clasped him on the back of the neck and gave him a look filled with so much compassion that Caden actually got a little choked up. “It’s Christmas, Caden.”

Christmas? Christmas?

“Fuck,” he said, shoving into a standing position. Adrenaline punched through his system, leaving him wired and wobbly. “I…I’m sorry…f*ck…I can’t believe…I missed…everything.”

“Don’t give it a second thought. That’s how I knew something was wrong,” Joe said, standing up beside him. “You’ve never missed a day of work in almost ten years until all this happened. And then Bear told me that Makenna had called a few weeks ago because she didn’t know where you were. Knowing you’d checked out on work and her, I knew something was wrong.”

Makenna.

Hearing her name out loud was like a punch to the gut. Caden pressed his fist against the jagged throb in his chest.

Makenna.

The sob came out of nowhere.

Caden slapped his hand over his mouth, horrified to fall apart in front of Joe, to show him just how weak he really was.

But it was like her name unlocked something inside him, and it felt like whatever it was had been the very last thing holding him together. “Fuck,” Caden choked out, falling heavily to the couch. He dropped his face into his hands, a vain effort to hide the unhideable. His tears. His sobs. His grief.

His failure.

Joe was right there with him. Hand on his shoulder, the man sat beside him. “It’ll get better. Just hang on. We’ll get you through this.”

When Caden could manage to talk again, he shook his head. “She’s gone,” he rasped, sliding his wet hands to cradle his throbbing forehead. “I…I f*cked everything up.”

“Don’t worry about that. Worry about you. Fix you. Then you can work on whatever else you want. But it starts with you.” Joe squeezed his shoulder. “And I’ll be here to help.”

Caden tilted his head to the side just enough to see Joe’s face. “Why?”

His captain nailed him with a stare. “You really gotta ask?”

“Yeah,” he rasped.

“Because you’re a great part of my team, Caden. Excellent at what you do. More than that, after all these years, I consider you a friend. And if all that wasn’t enough, you’re a good f*cking human being, and I’m not losing you to whatever bullshit lies your head is telling you. I know you don’t have any family, so I’m officially stepping in and stepping up. I will fight for you until you can fight for yourself. You hear me?”

The words reached inside Caden’s chest…and eased him. Not a lot. Not permanently. But enough to take a deep breath. Enough to let his shoulders loosen. Enough to begin to think beyond the next five minutes.

Caden respected the hell out of Joe Flaherty. Had for his entire adult life. And if Joe believed all that about Caden, maybe there was truth in what he said. And if Joe was willing to fight for Caden, maybe Caden could figure out how to fight for himself, too.

It starts with you.

That idea connected to something deep inside Caden. He didn’t know what it was. He didn’t know what it meant. But he grasped onto it, and he grasped onto Joe’s support. Because he had to grasp on to something.

Before he lost himself forever.





CHAPTER EIGHTEEN