Broken Barriers (Barriers Series Book 4) Read online

  Lord knew this charming little Norman Rockwell-esque village would never see the likes of a strip club, but that didn’t stop the lonely vacationing “family men” from showing their faces in there when they claimed to be out having a couple of beers in town with the guys.

  I rested my forearm over my eyes and let my hand wander below the thin cotton sheet that barely covered my morning hard-on. My rough and calloused fingers scratched at my balls before I realized I never changed back into boxers last night. I wrapped my long fingers firmly around my semi-hard cock, giving it a few strokes, instantly feeling the blood start pumping through my veins as it hardened even more.

  The only problem was, it was the image of her that I couldn’t get out of my head, and I had to. She was never mine to begin with, and now she would never belong to me.

  I stopped stroking my cock and let out a frustrated sigh. As my one hand let go of my cock, it pushed the sheet off me as my other arm fell from my eyes. The sun’s rays were now shining brightly into the room. In all my glory, I threw my legs over the edge of the bed and stood naked and erect in front of the full windows that overlooked the bay. My head throbbed with the rush of adrenaline, telling me I stood up way too fast.

  I squinted my eyes to focus on the rocking boats that were still docked at the marina across the way. I leaned over the old bureau, my hands anchoring me as I stood. I stared blankly at the serene setting that used to bring me happiness before I left here. Right now, I had nothing.

  Well, that wasn’t entirely accurate. I was sporting a semi, the blazing hot sun was blinding me, I’d had only a couple of hours of uninterrupted sleep, and clearly, too many craft beers last night had given me an instant pounding headache.

  Life was good.

  I let out a low growl before pulling open the bureau drawer. I grabbed an old ratty pair of college sweat shorts that were left here from summers ago. They most likely smelled of cedar and mothballs, but I didn’t really care. I pushed my legs through, adjusting myself. When I stood with my hands on the bureau drawer, I paused. A glint in the window in front of me caught my eye. A symbol of everything that was my life for many years dangled around my neck. I slowly wrapped my hand around the metal tags and pulled them from my neck. I dropped everything those dog tags represented into that drawer and pushed it shut with a little extra force. It was time to start putting my past behind me.

  As I made my way into the open concept kitchen, the sun hadn’t hit that side of the house yet. Fortunately for me, it would help ease the throbbing in my head until the coffee and painkillers got into my system.

  The minute I turned on the one-cup coffee brewer, I searched through the desert camouflage duffel bag that I was too lazy to put away last night after my little heart-to-heart with Josh. I barely had enough time to unpack from my deployment, and most of the toiletries in the bag were no good anyway and would need to be trashed before long. Ibuprofen, however, never went bad.

  I heard the rattle of the pills in the plastic bottle and pulled it from the bag. By the time I was back in the kitchen, the brewer was blinking its blue lights and ready to go. Sometimes you really had to enjoy the simple luxuries that you had here at home. This shit would have been a luxury if we had them overseas. One of the guys had to jimmie-rig a two-cup coffee maker in order to brew coffee overseas, but even then we had to walk to another building just to grab bottled water to brew the coffee. Needless to say, two-month-old coffee granules mixed with lukewarm water and powdered creamer didn’t exactly scream your local Starbucks.

  I rotated the coffee pod holder in search of the flavor I wanted. Knowing my mother, she’d stocked it full of some of my favorites. I found the usual hazelnut, Vermont blend, Blonde Blend, and caramel macchiato. Everyone laughed at my love of girlie flavors, but I’d have you know that shit was the freaking bomb. I also guaranteed that if I opened the cabinets I’d find a jar of creamy peanut butter, strawberry jam, and Fluff waiting for me. It was my go-to comfort food for years, and my mom knew it still was.

  I grabbed one of the caramel macchiato flavors and popped it into the brewer, hitting the button to start the process just as I pulled an old Daley & Davis Law Firm coffee mug from the cabinet above. While that brewed, I sneaked a peek into the upper cabinet and saw the supplies for my PBJ and Fluff sandwich all ready to go.

  I loved my freaking mom. She was the best. Just not the I-was-willing-to-live-with-you-after-a- deployment best. I was also pretty sure I’d find plenty of pre-made meals from her in the freezer to keep me from starving for nearly a month.

  I heard the percolating sound of the brewer finishing the coffee and grabbed the two ibuprofen pills I took out of the bottle a few moments before. After quickly turning on the faucet and tilting my head under the flowing cool liquid to wash down the pills, I grabbed my steaming coffee mug.

  I debated over turning on the television versus sitting on the back deck and checking my emails to see if there was any word from the guys in my unit. Snatching my phone off the charger from the kitchen counter, I made my way to the door. Summer television wouldn’t offer me anything new anyway. At this time of day, all that would be on were those stupid reality talk shows that focused on ignorant pop stars and the latest celebrity gossip. To that I said, who the fuck cares?!

  It was all a bunch of drama, and honestly, I despised it. Everything caused it these days, especially social media. I watched, as that did nothing but cause more issues for the guys in my unit overseas. Stupid shit was all that was. People needed to seriously just get off those sites and get back to their real life. Here we were fighting for our fucking lives and those girls were more concerned about stupid gossip and bullying one another over stupid shit.

  I just didn’t get it.

  I unlocked the door to the back porch and pulled it open. The cool fresh air instantly hit my face, opening my eyes to the new day. The screen door creaked as I stepped out onto the weathered wooden deck. Sliding back a patio seat, I parked my ass on the cushioned seat. My legs lifted to rest my heels onto the edge of the small log table that sat between the two chairs.

  The steaming cup of hot black coffee hit my lips, and it was almost as marvelous as the first, long, hot shower I had the minute I got home last week. As I slid my finger across the screen of my phone, I began to scroll through the number of unread emails and not a single one was from anyone of interest to me. Well, that wasn’t entirely true. There were at least fifty unopened emails from the one person who woke me from my nightmares nearly every day. Since the day I found out she had gone off and eloped with that asshole, I had avoided her completely.

  Every day I said I was going to either read them or delete them. One way or the other, I had to make the decision soon. My finger hovered over her name, but today was not the day I chose what to do with them. I clicked off the phone and tossed it onto the table.

  Taking another sip of coffee, I rose to my feet and walked to the railing of the deck. I rested my elbows on the edges and continued sipping my coffee. My headache had all but gone away, and my mind was settled slightly since waking up on edge.

  Of course, the one thing that would take the most amount of tension away was probably not going to happen today since there wasn’t a brown-haired, blue-eyed woman lying naked anywhere under the roof in the house behind me.

  I let out an aggravated sigh before catching a glimpse of the kayak tied to our dock on the small sandy portion of the inner bay. I could easily take my car into town to get new toiletries and supplies at the general store, but since this was summer and parking in downtown Wolfeboro was very limited, it was just as easy to kayak to the other side of the bay at the public marina and “park” that way instead.

  Wolfeboro wasn’t exactly the place you went to find chain stores or big high-end retailers. In fact, they didn’t have a fast-food chain, either. In my quick pass through town to get to this side of Wolfeboro Bay, I only saw the old marina, ice cream shop, café, Pizza Factory, pharmacy, and of course, the most important plac
e—the tavern. Nothing about this town had changed in well over fifty years. Probably half of those townies didn’t even know what an ATM or Starbucks was.

  And before anyone went into panic mode, there was a packie that had beer and liquor just before entering town. It was just not within the downtown area per se. Trust me, I’d made sure I already stocked up on all those essentials before pulling in front of this house. With a bottle of tequila, a thirty pack of beer, and craft beer, I should be good for at least a couple of days.

  I was kidding.

  I pushed my elbows off the railing after taking the last sip of coffee from my cup. Before walking back into the house, I snatched my cell phone on the way and decided that a quick trip into town wouldn’t be so bad. My bare feet thudded against the creaky, old wooden floors. As I passed through the living area, I noticed a newly framed picture on the buffet next to the kitchen table. I quickly tossed my coffee cup into the dishwasher and shoved my phone onto the charger with more force than needed.

  The picture behind me burned holes into my back as it taunted me to take a closer look. I should have just kept walking and grabbed my stuff for a hot shower and got my ass out on the water, but I couldn’t help myself. My feet trudged their way across the room again, and my hands reached out to bring it closer.

  It was the entire family here at the cottage for Sam and Josh’s wedding. Everyone was smiling and holding their wine glasses up. The bright red and orange sunset over the water illuminated the backdrop, but that wasn’t what caught my eyes. No. The only two people not looking at the camera had stopped me from breathing.

  It was that moment with her that had forever changed me. Courtney’s eyes were fixated on me as I whispered something into her ear.

  I held her waist and pulled her close to me, away from everyone’s eyes. I snagged a moment of reprieve with Courtney as my sister and her new husband were entertaining everyone while they ate dinner. Courtney had just finished taking the wedding pictures and had come inside the house to pack up her camera. There was nothing about her that didn’t make me crave just one more second with her. We played this game of being “just friends” for much of the summer. But, damn, if that whole plan hadn’t just become the main reason I needed to sneak in to see her now.

  Her eyes burned into me the moment she heard my fingers lock the door behind me as I entered her bedroom. With three short steps I was on her, pushing her against the wall, taking advantage of our few moments alone.

  This was how we started things between us. Wild and reckless right from the start. I vaguely remembered Sam introducing Courtney to me. It was an instant attraction that pulled us together. The laws of physics couldn’t keep us away from each other. Fate had us meet that night under difficult circumstances as Sam struggled to deal with her own demons. But, the moment I turned around to see Courtney standing in my sister’s doorway, my eyes were transfixed, and I barely blinked even as we shook hands for the first time. In a hallway at my sister’s place, I took one look at her face and knew I had to have her. Even though Sam was never fond of us hooking up that night, nothing would have kept us apart.

  I deepened our kiss. Her hands fisted my button-down dress shirt as her hips pushed into my throbbing erection. She knew what she did to me, and we’d done this plenty of times that summer, but this moment felt different. I was leaving her in a few days for the Marine Corps, and she didn’t deserve a five-minute quickie. Not after she whispered how much she wished we had more time for “us” before I had to leave.

  Courtney deserved to be loved and caressed into a state of euphoria that I didn’t know I could give her. That night, I made love to her all night long, and she understood how much she possessed my heart and soul.

  The sound of a boat horn out on the bay broke me from the memory that would forever be embedded in my mind. I should have told her that night how much I needed her and loved her, but when a knock on the door interrupted that moment of truth, I never found my voice before leaving. Another lost opportunity.

  I quickly placed the photo back onto the buffet and walked away from it. That was the reason why I was here. I needed to face the fact that I screwed up and needed to push myself in the right direction.

  What direction was that? How the hell did I know?

  All I knew was that my ass was getting in the shower, and I was about to start my first day figuring out what my future held.

  It took me damn near an hour to paddle across that one bay. Now, I wasn’t a fuckin’ yachtsman, but I could tell you that getting the kayak from my dock to the marina shouldn’t have taken more than fifteen…twenty minutes, tops.

  My arms were shot to hell, shaking before I reached my final destination. I was clearly out of shape, even after doing push-ups and sit-ups every chance I got overseas. I found myself gasping for air as I heaved the kayak out of the water and onto the docks. Old timers on their old, rundown rowboats shook their heads at me as I passed them on the bay. While their fishing rods dangled off the back of their boats yielding nothing more than maybe a trout or two, I pushed the paddle in the water and gained short ground, like I was pushing through thick mud.

  Then to top it off, I had all the summer vacationers raising their eyebrows as my dented old kayak sat next to their precious, shiny, overpriced powerboats on the docks. They glared at me, as though it embarrassed them. That look silently said all I needed to know. They had big money boats and wore their polo shirts and leather boat shoes, while their wives or mistresses sat on board with their big hats and sunglasses gossiping. They clearly didn’t like the fact that I left my kayak anywhere near them.

  They’d get over it. If they really knew how much my family was worth, they might have thought differently, but that was nobody’s goddamn business. All those years of active duty had also managed to get me to a place that should have allowed me to live comfortably for many years. It wasn’t like I had a lot of opportunities to spend money on base. The supply shop, or PX as we called it, didn’t exactly have a big red bulls-eye logo on the front. The inside looked more like a twenty-four hour convenience store than a mall or department store.

  I laughed at the shit the guys and I would come back to the can with some days. We’d have ten pounds of Tang and enough beef jerky and sugary snacks to guarantee a dentist’s wet dream once we came home. Sure enough, last week when I visited my dentist in Connecticut, I received three shiny new fillings before I left for the lake.

  I still hadn’t made it to the general store here in town. In fact, I hadn’t left the dock area. It was nearly noon by the time I yanked the kayak out of the water and sat at Wolfe’s Tavern grabbing lunch and catching my breath. It was just the liquid form of lunch, though. I was planning on getting food, eventually. I was in no rush. Days were short, but nights were long around here. I was supposed to be enjoying life, right?

  As I let out a deep belly laugh at that one, the bartender came over from the other end of the bar. This guy seriously had to have been making all the girls and married ladies in town wet themselves. He didn’t fit the image of Wolfe’s; that was for damn sure.

  The dining room might not have boasted cream-colored tablecloths, but silver tavern mugs hanging from the ceiling and flat screen televisions behind the bar didn’t say dive bar, either. He was possibly the same age as me—maybe a few years older—and a near match to my height of about six-foot-one. He had a short, scruffy beard and flowing untamed hair he kept pushing behind his ears to keep out of his face every time he stood up. Me, well, mine was still short, but it was getting back to the length it used to be before my deployment. I needed a good haircut.

  I noticed the college-aged waitresses gawking and whispering as they stared at him each time they came inside from the outside patio tables to pick up their drink orders. The guy knew what he was doing. Bartending here in the summer looking like that definitely got him tits…I meant, tips galore. Christ, even I might come in my pants if he stared at me the right way.

  He stopped in front of me bef
ore pulling another beer bottle from the cooler. He replaced my empty bottle with a cold full one without me even asking. I guffawed. Guess I was staying for another. My eyes raised from the shimmering copper bar top to stare at him. He tossed the bottle into the nearby trash bin and leaned back against the bar, folding his arms over his chest, staring back at me. His muscles flexed, and I caught the sight of some black ink peeking out from under his T-shirt sleeve.

  “Looked like you weren’t planning on going anywhere anytime soon,” he said to me as the drink order machine spat out a couple of new orders. He pushed off the bar and began preparing the drinks. He turned and stared at the ceiling full of tin beer mugs. Each one had a different number on the bottom. He stretched his arm high up to pull one of the mugs down for an order. He stood there, pulling on the tap handle filling the mug with beer.

  My eyes narrowed as the ink from his tattoo peeked out a little more, and I caught the familiar Victorian-style letters etched behind his bicep more clearly. My hands wrapped around the cold glass of my new beer bottle as I tipped my head in his direction. “Marine Corps?” I asked, knowing you didn’t brand yourself with those four letters if you hadn’t served.

  I watched him narrow his eyes in my direction and drop the drinks at the pick-up station at the end of the bar. He pushed the drink order receipts onto the pin, wiping his hands on the bar towel before making his way back toward me.

  “You in the Corps, too?”

  I nodded as I took a long sip of my beer. “Was. Just got out a month ago.”

  “No shit. What unit?”