Page 8 of Twice in a Lifetime

He shot me a cocky grin and buffed his nails on the shoulder of his shirt. “I have my moments.”

“I see that.” I released a slow, steady breath, feeling some of the weight lift away that had been sitting on my chest for the past several months. “Thank you, Tris.”

His arm came around my shoulders, and he pulled me into his side. “Always, B. Don’t ever forget that. I willalwaysbe here for you.”

He couldn’t possibly know how much that meant to me.

Chapter Five

Rhodes

I’d been at my computer for so long the information on the screen was starting to blur. The blue light was giving me a headache that was steadily building into a migraine, but I couldn’t make myself look away. I kept hoping what I was looking at was wrong, that I’d stumbled across incorrect information, but I knew that wasn’t the case. It wasn’t my ego talking when I claimed I was good at my job. It was the truth.

There was a reason Lincoln had chosen me to take over when he retired, and it wasn’t the family connections. Well, notjustthe family connections. He and Marco were still tight, and his wife Eden was part of my sister Gypsy’s crew of besties—had been since I was back in high school.

They were family by choice, not blood, but family all the same.

“You look like you’re contemplatin’ pickin’ up that monitor and chuckin’ it out the window.”

I cast a quick look to my opened office door to find Linc standing in the doorway. Leaning back in my chair, I pushed outa heavy breath and pinched the bridge of my nose. “You aren’t too far off the mark.”

My boss and mentor moved into my office and, taking one of the chairs across from me, kicked his feet up on the edge of my desk, making himself comfortable. “Three guesses as to what’s got you lookin’ like you’re ready to commit murder, and I don’t need the second two.”

I remained silent, knowing I didn’t need to speak to prompt him to continue. Sure enough, he spoke a second later. “This have to do with the case your girl brought us?”

My chest tightened like my ribs were doing their best to squeeze the air from my lungs. “She’s not my girl,” I said in a low rumble.

Lincoln arched a brow at me. “Could’ve fooled me, the way you acted when you first laid eyes on her. Thought I was gonna have to lock you down to keep you from doin’ somethin’ stupid.”

I shot him a bored look. “Did you forget why she came in here in the first place?” Because I sure as hell hadn’t. “She’s been off living her own life for years now.”

“And you’ve been sitting here stagnant that whole damn time.”

I jerked back in my chair at his declaration. My lips parted, but I couldn’t seem to form any words.

“Don’t think I haven’t noticed, son. That we haven’tallnoticed.”

My throat grew uncomfortably tight, causing my words to come out in a rasp as I said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I’m talkin’ about the fact that there hasn’t been a single woman who’s played a significant role in your life since you took off for the Army when you were eighteen. I’m talkin’ about the fact that you’ve spent the past several years goin’ throughwomen like most people go through underwear, and you never once got close to settlin’ down.”

“That’s not true,” I argued. “I’ve had relationships.”

Linc’s mouth flattened into a thin line. “And did a single one of those relationships have any substance to them? Did you ever really let any of them in?” He lifted a single brow. “Did you ever introduce any of them to your family?”

I clamped down on the inside of my cheek to keep from telling him to fuck off. This was a man I respected the hell out of, but just then, I was pissed as hell that he’d managed to read me so damn well.

I also hated that what he said made me feel like a dick. I didn’t want to be that asshole when it came to women, but what he said was the truth. I’d made a few attempts at something real and lasting over the years, but no matter how hard I tried, I always seemed to have one foot out the door.

The last woman I’d seen exclusively lasted a little over six months, and that had been the longest relationship I’d had since Blythe. I’d been happy enough and was content to keep things going. Until Grace started talking about the future. She’d casually started asking if I thought I might want kids some day and if I saw myself getting married, and more than once she mentioned coming along with me to the family dinners I had with my siblings once a week. I’d hated hurting her, but I couldn’t see any of those things with her, so I ended it.

The breakup had been painful on both sides, but necessary. She was a good woman and she deserved a man who could give her what she wanted. That man wasn’t me.

“I don’t know why we’re even talking about this. Blythe and I ended more than twenty years ago. We were just kids back then, for Christ’s sake.”

Lincoln crossed his thick arms over his barrel chest. The man might have been well past middle age, but damn if he looked it.“So were Tempie and Hayes when they first found each other,” he reminded me, speaking of two more close friends tied to Gypsy’s inner circle. “If you recall, they’d been split for nearly as long as you and Blythe. And look what happened there.”

The parallels between my relationship with Blythe and the police captain’s marriage were uncanny. They’d also been high school sweethearts. They’d also broken up and gone their separate ways—Tempie to Chicago and Hayes to the Marines. Tempie had come back when the aunt who raised her passed away, and the two of them discovered they’d never stopped loving each other. They were still happily married to this day.