Punch to the fucking chest.

“Bullshit,” I seethe. I take a menacing step toward her, crowding her space. “You can trust me more than anyone. I know you better than anyone.”

She pushes against my chest, fury igniting in her eyes. “You haven’t seen me in ten years, Roman. You may have known me when I was a teenager and naively in love with you, but you don’t know me now.”

“I will always fucking know you, Harper,” I growl through clenched teeth. Harper is as much a part of me as my blood, bones, and muscles. She fucking lives inside of me and I live for her.

Harper shakes her head, denying everything I’m saying and feeling. “I can’t trust you.”

I take a step back, pain radiating through me. Her words may have well have been bullets burning through my system. “How can you say that?”

She slowly approaches me, and our eyes are locked on each other. When she reaches me, she cranes her neck to keep looking me in the eye. She’s so close, I can feel her soft breasts grazing my chest. She venomously whispers her words, but they’re as catastrophic as an atomic bomb. “You left me. On the worst day of my life, I went to you. Even though you had already fucking shattered me, I still went to you. Some whore wearing your t-shirt answered your door. I’ll never forget that. I’ll never forgive that. I’ll never trust you.”

She spits out the last words as if she’s disgusted by the thought of trusting me. She walks away and leaves me there stunned, racking my mind for what she’s talking about. What girl? There’s no way she would have come to me, and there’s no chance in hell I would have had another woman wearing my shirt. I haven’t been celibate for the last decade, but it took a long fucking time before I was able to form any sort of life outside of Harper. She’s right about one thing though—I did leave. I left for her.

* * *

Ten Years Ago

“Roman, I can’t take this.”

A piece of me hates myself even more each time I hear Harper’s soft cries through the phone. I’m clutching the phone so hard between my hands I wouldn’t be surprised if the piece of shit broke in half.

I don’t ask her what she can’t take. I already know. She needs to leave me, she’s better off without me. Even being barely out of basic training, I know I can’t put her through this. Every time I see one of the wives looking broken and beaten down, I refuse to put Harper through that life. She’s better off without me. She’s always been too good for me. I’m a fucking trailer park kid, with a junkie for a mom and a sperm donor for a dad. My mom sold her body for drugs throughout my life, I’m sure she was doing it before I was born, probably doesn’t even know my father’s name.

Harper’s the opposite of me. A goddamned princess or angel. Perfect family. Perfect house. Perfect face. Smart. Kind. Generous. Beautiful. This could never last. I’m a fucking fool to ever think it could actually be anything. She needs more than me, and now she’s killing herself applying to colleges in every state, so she can go wherever I get stationed. It can’t work like that. She’s destined for better than me. Stubborn. My smart, kind, generous, beautiful angel who smells like sugar is also stubborn as a fucking mule. She won’t listen to reason and go where she could actually get a good education for what she wants to do. I won’t allow her to put her life on hold for me.

Silence is what I’ve been giving to her for weeks. Silence and broken promises. I promised to come home on leave after boot camp. I didn’t. She’s called, written letters, and sent care packages, which I’ve been ignoring. When she does get me on the phone, I treat her like trash and I want to beat my own ass each time I’m an asshole. I need her to realize she’s better than me, deserves more than me, and then fucking leave my sorry ass. Here I am sitting on an army base with the knowledge that I’ll probably be receiving orders for my first tour of duty soon. I’m going to be in a war in a country halfway around the world, and I’m too much of a pussy coward to leave her. She needs to leave me.

I close my eyes, listening to quiet crying.

“Roman?” she asks softly.

“Yeah.”

She sucks in a tiny breath, taken back by my cold response. Men and women are walking by me with guns strapped to them. I wonder if I could convince any of them to put a bullet into my good-for-nothing skull.

“Why are you doing this?” Her voice is so quiet and defeated, I hate myself even more with each syllable.

“Doing what?” I make myself sound bored and irritated.

“Acting like you don’t care.”

I don’t respond. I close my eyes, pinching the bridge of my nose and wishing she would leave me. I’ll never be able to give her the life she deserves.

After the heavy silence, she speaks again. “Do you care?”

“About what?” I blow out a frustrated breath.

She takes a moment to respond. I hear her inhaling, preparing for my answer before she even asks the question. “Do you care about me?”

“Yes,” I answer automatically. I hate that I’ve done such a good job at being a bastard that she questions if I even care about her. I’m doing what I have to do, though.

“You’re acting like you don’t want to be with me anymore.”

More silence. I’m not speaking a word, but on the inside I’m roaring. She’s everything. When a choked sob breaks over the line, I want to forget about my plan and go to her on my knees begging for forgiveness and worship her in every way. Refusing to break, I remain silent.

“You said you cared.”

“I do,” I urge. We can’t be together, she needs more than whatever life I can give her, but she needs to know that if she needed me, I’d come running. “I do care. I would do anything for you, Harper. Anything. Even if we aren’t together.”

She sucks in a sharp breath. “Even if…”

Her words trail off before I finish them for her. “We aren’t together.”

I pull the phone from my ear, making sure we’re still connected, the silence is so intense. I want to beg and plead and make her understand. If she knew the real reason. If she actually knew why, she’d never let me go. She’d follow me to the ends of the earth and wait for me, hoping and praying I don’t come home in a body bag with a folded flag as her only consolation. Army people move, we move a lot. Kids of people in the armed forces are called army brats for a reason. She’d never accomplish her dream if she followed me from base to base.

“Don’t do this, Roman.”

Again, I give her nothing but silence.

“Please,” she begs over a broken sob. “I love you so much. You’re everything to me. Please don’t leave me, Roman. Please.”

“I already left,” I state.

“I’ll come to you as soon as I graduate. We can be together. I know the distance is hard but don’t do this. Please, baby. Please. Don’t leave me.”

Her sobs and pleas are cracking me in half. I grit my teeth, holding back the tears that are flooding my eyes. I can barely hear her whispered question over the line. I swallow, holding back my bile. This is it. When I answer, it will be done.

“Do you love me?”

Even though the words are so quiet, they are filled with determination. She thinks she knows what I will say and thinks that she can use it against me. I’ve never lied to her before. I’ve always told her the truth, every single time. I’m about to give her my first lie and I’m doing it for her.

“Not anymore.”

Her sniffling stops immediately as silence takes over the line. I’ve shocked her. I wait for her answer as I fight against my urge to tell her the truth and beg for forgiveness. Fuck. We can figure this out. She may be too good for me but I can fight her harder and make her go to the best college and not follow me. We can still be together. I’m a fucking idiot. I’ll find a way to give her everything. I’ll find a way to come home safe. She loves me. I love her. She’ll wait for me and I’ll still make her dreams come true. I open my mouth to plead for forgiveness and tell her truth but the line clicks. I look at the phone.

Call ended.