A Hope Divided by Alyssa Cole

Author:Alyssa Cole [Cole, Alyssa]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kensington
Published: 2017-10-06T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 11

Ewan was shaking. He was shaking and didn’t know what to do with the rage that made him want to lunge and kick and lash out.

“Breathe in,” his mother had told him when he was small and that feeling came over him, her lilt soothing. “And then breathe out. Then do that again. It’s the only way we get through life, my boy.”

His mother knew better than most how to move past the terrible things life could subject a person to. The only time he’d ever seen her break was when she’d discovered his father dead by his own hand, when he’d finally grown ashamed enough to put an end to the wretched abuse he’d laid down on his wife and family for years. That had been Ewan’s only regret—that after that last argument with his father, when the man had grabbed his gun and stalked into the woods, Ewan hadn’t found him first. He’d been glad that his father was gone from their lives and hadn’t understood why his mother mourned him.

“It’s been weeks. Why is she still so sad?” Ewan asked as he and Malcolm watched their mother stare blankly into the fireplace.

“Love,” Malcolm said. His expression was pinched and serious, as if their father were still there. “Nothing good can come of it. Remember that.”

It was their father who had first inspired Ewan’s impulse to lash out and cause pain, as well as the desire to control such base emotions lest he emulate the man he hated. But when he’d seen Cahill attack Marlie, all the years of training, all the methods for funneling the ugly bursts of energy—they all fell to the wayside. He’d wanted to hurt Cahill, again. Worse than he had before. And when he saw Marlie stand up unharmed, he wanted to pull her back up into her rooms and hide her away from the world with him.

Why hadn’t she listened when he’d warned her to avoid the man? Instead she’d run right at him.

Ewan pressed his fingers into his scalp, as if that could relieve the frustrating itch that began in his skull and grew each time he thought about what he’d seen.

When the shot had gone off and she’d been thrown to the ground . . . at the angle from which he’d viewed the scene, Ewan had been unable to piece together what had happened. For a brief, terrifying instant, he’d been certain Marlie was dead. Certain that he’d let Cahill kill her.

Even the memory of the despair that had near caved in his chest left him reeling in a way none of his wartime experiences had. In the wake of their near kiss, he’d said the first thing that had come to mind that would put space between them, and had hurt her deeply. When he’d seen Marlie lunge for the gun and heard its report, he’d been sure that she was gone and that he would never get to make amends. And she still hadn’t returned.

Remember the nature of anything which pleases the soul or is loved.

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