* * *

I can’t let her go, but I must, and it’s tearing me apart. I’ve faced down death, put myself in the line of fire to save my men, but I have no answer for this. I’d even thought of taking her away from here, but the strings of duty and birthrights held me captive.

My love for her was like an albatross around my neck. She was the absolute center of everything that I am. My every thought, every deed since the day we met has revolved around her. I find myself doing things that I knew would please her.

Where I’d once been hard in my dealings, I find her warmth and compassion reaching out to me whether she was in the room or not. It got so I can hear her in my head, or imagine her tapping her little feet if she’s displeased at something I’ve done.

I don’t know where she’d heard that I was having nightmares when I first returned from the war, but one night I awoke to find her sitting in the dark next to my bed.

At first I thought she was a figment of my imagination. That she’d somehow followed me out of my dreams, but her cool hand against my brow brought me fully awake. “What are you doing in here?”

She’d sat back in her chair with her book and turned the page as if it was normal for her to be alone in my room with me naked in bed. “Somebody has to watch over you. Wanna talk about it?” I opened my mouth to tell her no, to get out, but instead it all came pouring out of me.

Things I hadn’t shared with family, peers, anyone. I unloaded in that dark room until I felt a weight lifted. Of course I kept the worst of it back, she’s too young for that shit. But I got out enough of the poison to feel human again.

I knew three weeks after we met that she was as in love with me as I was with her, poor little girl. But I knew from the beginning it would never be. She was too good for me and this lot. I won’t give them the chance to destroy her.

Someone looking in from the outside might find me weak, might think why not just take what you want and everything else be damned. Some may even encourage me to fuck her and move on. They’d both be wrong in their assumptions.

It’s not weakness that stays my hand, but love, pure unadulterated love, the likes of which I never knew could exist in the same world where I’d seen the most horrendous things men could inflict on one another.

But can I afford to lose her? Can I afford to let her go? What would that do to me? Better yet, what would it do to her? She pretends to be strong and worldly, but I see the innocence written so plainly in her eyes each time she looks at me.

Even when she’s facing off with me, I see the pleading in her eyes. And I know, that if I ever make the mistake of letting her see my true feelings for her we’d both be lost.

Now I let her go as she’d asked and stepped back, not looking at her but at a place over her head. “What did you mean by leaving?” Please don’t tell me you’re going away.

It’s selfish as fuck, but I can’t let her go. I could’ve paid for her to go to university, had even been tempted. But in the end I couldn’t stand the thought of her being that far away from me.

So instead she was taking classes at the local community college because it was all her family could afford. She wasn’t an apt pupil, my baby was more interested in fixing cars and building things with her hands than in what could be found in a book.

Not that she was illiterate, far from it. She just chose her own interest and apparently it wasn’t available in any high school in America. Her parents, were over indulgent. So instead of forcing her to keep her head in a book, they let her go her own way, follow her own interests.

“I’ve decided I’m going to join the navy.”

“Over my dead body.” I grabbed her collar roughly and pulled her back to me. Her words were like ice water dousing me from head to toe. They sent fear rushing through me, and my mind splintered into a million pieces at the thought of my sweet girl in the middle of that hell.

“You have no say in what I do. Besides, didn’t you tell me how great being a marine is?” She would throw my words back in my face, but when I told her that it wasn’t to sell her on the idea. Fuck it, she’s not going, that life is not for her.

“I didn’t tell you that so you could go get yourself killed you little idiot.”

“If you can do it so can I. Or is it because I’m a woman?” She put her hands on her hips and glared up at me, always ready for a fight.

“Your being a woman has fuck all to do with it. I know many women who have fought for their country and done it well. But not my woman damn you.” Fuck!

Her eyes went wide and her mouth fell open, and what did I do? I let her go and walked away. What the fuck had I done? We’ve been playing this game for months now and I knew the only reason it hadn’t gone any farther was because I’ve been hiding what I feel from her. It was for the best.

But hearing her say that she was willing to put her life in danger to get away from me, from the specter of us and what can never be, was too damn much. Just how fucking much is a man supposed to take?

I headed back to the house and the privacy of my room to face this new thing, this door that I’d unwittingly opened. I knew she wouldn’t follow me, the hardheaded little shit. She has too much pride for that, and I needed to think. I haven’t been able to do that clearly since we started this little dance.

I slammed the door behind me and made my way to the window for one last look at her. I was just in time to see her enter the little cottage that was her family’s home while they worked for my family.

Her bent head made me feel like ten kinds of a bastard and I wanted to go to her. Funny how the things I’d once seen as soft and weak in others, the very things I’d sworn would never befall me, had now become part and parcel of my own life.

Love wasn’t the weak emotion I once thought it to be. If the shit could bring a man like me to his knees, then I’d say it was extremely fucking powerful. See, this is what happens whenever I try to think. My mind becomes crowded with that damn word and its tentacles.

She has me so wrapped up in her that I don’t know which way is up. I can orchestrate battles, face down death without a second thought, but I don’t know what to do with her. I know what I want to do to her, with her, for her, but my own principles won’t let me.

As if to compound that point there was a knock at the door before my mother opened it and walked in. “Oh, you’re here. I saw Helen has left, do you two have plans for this evening dear?” I looked at her, the woman I’ve loved since birth.

Her cool air and faint detachment not withstanding, she’s always been in my corner. Had she been any different, someone I could hurt and not give a damn, this would be so easy. But how could I break her heart? How can you hurt Lucia’s? Not now.

“No, I’ll see her in a day or two.” I shoved my hands into my pockets and turned back to the window. “What is it son? What’s eating away at you? I know it’s not your service, is it the wedding?” She moved closer and joined me at the window. I moved away quickly so she wouldn’t guess what I was doing. Who I was staring at.

“It’s nothing mother I’m fine.” I felt stifled with her here, and hated myself for it. It’s the same feeling I had earlier when Helen was here. Like the noose was tightening harder around my neck with each passing day.

She didn’t stay long, just said something about dinner before leaving the way she came, and I went back to my brooding. I don’t know how long I stood at that window waiting to get another glimpse of her, but she never emerged from the house again.

“What am I going to do Lucia? What the fuck am I supposed to do?” I’ll have to talk to her old man first things first. No way is she joining the navy, not on my watch. I have nothing against our armed forces, but as I’d so stupidly let slip to her, no way in fucking hell am I letting her go through the horrors that plague me at night.

I don’t give a damn about women’s rights and glass ceilings. My mind doesn’t go in that direction, not when it comes to her safety. I may not be able to have her, but I’m fucked if some asshole somewhere is going to take her life because she was running away from me.

I had to remind myself of all the reasons I couldn’t, shouldn’t have her. She was barely nineteen, she was innocent and she was too fucking good for me. That old argument didn’t seem to pack as much punch as it once did. I could feel myself weakening by the minute.

Where will it all end? When will this daily confusion come to an end? When will the day come when I go to sleep and wake up without her being the first and last thing on my mind? When will my dick stop getting hard at just the mere thought of her? That last one I could answer easily enough. Never!