Fractured Trust by L. M. Dalgleish
Chapter 28
Summer’s heart thundered in her chest. Her whole body in fight-or-flight mode. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t be responsible for the future of his career. Not with her bad track record of making assumptions and hurting him. There was no way she could risk his drumming. She wasn’t worth it. Her mouth trembled and she turned away.
Noah grabbed her arm again, swinging her back toward him. “Look at me, Summer. Just stop and look at me!”
He gripped her other arm and pulled her close. Pain and anger blazed brightly in his eyes as she stared up at him, her heart slamming against her ribs.
“Don’t do this. Not again. I love you. I have always loved you. Even when I thought I’d never see you again, I couldn’t stop loving you. You are all I’ve ever wanted. All I will ever want. You just need to trust me. I don’t want anyone else. I will never want anyone else.”
Noah dropped his hands from her arms and speared them through his hair. “You’re it for me, Summer. I’m sorry if I scared you by telling you I’d give up everything for you, but it’s the truth. I need you to know how much you mean to me. And if that involves removing myself from a situation that makes you uncomfortable, then that’s what I’ll do. I just need you to give me a chance. I think I deserve that.”
Sorrow welled up in Summer, vast and seemingly bottomless. She’d thought she could be brave enough, but she’d been fooling herself. And now her cowardice was hurting him again. God, why couldn’t she be a better person for him, a more trusting person? And the saddest part of all of this was that it wasn’t him she didn’t trust right now, it was herself. Tears overflowed her eyes and dripped down her cheeks.
“God, Noah, you deserve… so much more.”
“I deserve you,” he said, voice fierce.
Tears clogged her throat, blurred her vision. “I wish I could be the woman for you. But I can’t. I can’t. I’m too insecure, too needy. I would never forgive myself if I took drumming away from you, it’s who you are.”
Noah was shaking his head. “Don’t do this, Summer. Not again. We’ve wasted too much time already.”
The pain coating his words burned her nerves, seared her heart. She could barely speak past the glass-shard-encrusted lump in her throat. “I can’t do this to you. And I can’t do it to me. We’re just not meant to be. We’re not compatible.”
“Bullshit. We’re compatible in every way. You just need to trust me. Why the fuck can’t you just trust me?”
She looked at him helplessly. Unable to explain how she could love him so much, so completely, and yet know that once he was away from her, that insidious little voice in her head would take over. The one that told her that he wouldn’t be able to resist once he was surrounded by all those women throwing themselves at him. Memories sparked in her head. Memories of words spoken that still made her chest feel tight. Even now. Even after all these years.
And one that clawed at her harder than the rest.
I thought he loved me! I thought I was enough for him. But I wasn’t. I wasn’t enough…
Summer sucked in a sharp, pained breath. Because that was the true fear, wasn’t it? That just like her mom, she wouldn’t be enough. Not enough to hold his interest forever. And the fear of finding the truth of that out one day would overcome her, and she’d let it destroy them again. She refused to do that to him. She was going to let him go to live the life he loved. The life he’d been living and loving before she came crashing back in and ruined everything.
She stepped forward and wrapped her arms around him, laying her cheek on his chest. She could hear the double-time thump of his heart under her ear as his arms automatically went around her. He pressed his lips to her the top of her head, and she spoke into his chest. “I love you, Noah. I will always love you. But I don’t love who I become when I’m with you. And that’s on me, not you. And I don’t want you to change who you are for me. That’s not the answer. As much as it kills me to say it, I know there’s someone better out there for you, and I have to let you go so you can find her.”
He jerked back from her, fury tightening his features. “That’s bullshit, Summer. You’re just scared, and you’re refusing to face your fears. I know it’s hard, but you need to at least try. You can’t keep running away. At some stage, you’re going to have to stand your ground and fight for what you want—what you love. Who you love.” His body was rigid, his jaw tight, but his eyes were pleading.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, “There’s too much at stake.”
Noah’s eyes shuttered, his face wiped of all expression. “That’s when you know it’s something worth fighting for. But that’s okay, Summer. I think you’ve made your feelings clear. I’ll let you go. I’m not about to keep fighting for someone who won’t fight for me. Maybe you’ll be able to find another Deacon to waste the next eleven years of your life on. Someone you don’t have to be brave for because you don’t love them enough to care.” He stared at her, the ice in his gaze chilling her to the core.
Summer wrapped her arms around her stomach and swallowed against the harshness of his tone. She guessed she deserved that, although it didn’t make it any easier to hear. Didn’t he know she was doing this for him? Noah lived and breathed drumming; she couldn’t have him offering to throw it all away because of her and her insecurities. She’d never live with herself.
So instead of flinging herself at him and begging him to forgive her, to take her in his arms and keep her forever, she simply took deep breaths in and out, in and out, willing her legs to work, willing them to turn and take that first step away from him.
And eventually, they did.