Page 56 of Warrior Security
I needed to turn around. I needed to go somewhere else before I said anything worse.
I needed to find somewhere and scream until this ball of rage inside me dissipated.
But I knew I wouldn’t do that. So I had to find a way to push it all back down.
He stopped at the woodpile behind the kitchen. Logs stacked against the side of the house, a splitting stump set into the ground, the axe leaning against the pile. He picked it up, set a log on the stump, and positioned his feet.
“You pissed?”
I bit back a nasty comment and nodded.
“When I was a kid, my dad used to send me out to the woodpile when I was pissed about things I couldn’t control.” He said it as if this were a normal conversation on a normal morning. “Dad was a mechanic. Practical guy. Said anger was only useful if you turned it into something, and firewood was as good as anything.”
“I’ve never cut wood.”
“Well, you’re about to start.” He showed me where to grip, hands spaced apart on the handle. “You aim with your eyes, not the axe. Look at where you want it to land. Let the weight of the head do the work.”
He swung once, clean and smooth, and the log split down the center and fell open on either side of the stump. Then he held the axe out to me, handle first.
I took it. The wood was smooth and heavier than I expected, and my hands were still shaking when I wrapped them around it.
“Feet apart. Dominant foot back. Swing through the wood, not at it.”
I swung. The first one was terrible, off-center, the blade glancing sideways, the jolt rattling up through my elbows. I didn’t care.
I set another log and swung again. Better. The blade caught the grain and the wood cracked, and I felt the impact travel from my hands through my shoulders and into my chest where all the rage was still boiling.
Logan corrected my grip once, adjusted my stance. “Go for it.”
He set up another log and stepped back.
The crack of splitting wood filled the yard, and I swung harder, my arms burning, the axe finding a groove I didn’t have to think about. Each log that split open was Carter’s voice sayingEleanor. Was his wounded performance, his generous offer, his smooth, practiced concern that covered the rot underneath.
I don’t understand what I did that was so terrible.
Six years of swallowed fury broke the surface one strike at a time.
I lost count. I kept going until my arms were trembling so badly the axe wobbled on the backswing, until my palms were raw and my shoulders were on fire and the pile of split wood at my feet had tripled. I planted the blade in the stump and stood there, breathing hard, sweat cooling on the back of my neck.
Logan was still standing there. Still watching me with no judgment, no anger of his own despite me being ugly to him earlier.
“That was my ex-husband on the phone.” I said it to the woodpile, not to Logan. My voice was rough from the exertion, but it held. “Carter Hollis.”
I pulled the axe out of the stump and set another log. Swung. The crack of it punctuated the sentence, and I kept talking.
“I married him when I was twenty-two. It was the one thing I could do that my family would actually approve of. His parents and mine were best friends. The great Carter Hollis, the son everyone wanted their daughter to marry. And I was so goddamn desperate to be the daughter they wanted that I walked straight into it.”
Another swing. The wood split clean.
“The problems started small. He was charming and attentive, and he made me feel like the center of everything. But then the charm started to come with conditions. A comment about what I was wearing. An opinion about which friends were worth my time.”
I swung again. “He offered to handle the money so I wouldn’t have to worry about it. He drove me to appointments so I didn’t have to deal with parking. He made every decision for me and called it taking care of me, and by the time I could see what it was, I couldn’t name a single thing I still chose for myself.”
Another log. Another swing. My arms were screaming.
“He monitored my spending. He decided who I talked to and when I left the house. He told me I was stupid so many times I believed him. He made me ask permission for things so small, I eventually stopped wanting things at all.” I set the axe down and turned around. Looked straight at Logan. “And when I finally told him I was leaving, he picked up a glass and threw it at the wall next to my head. I put my arm up to protect my face.”
I held up my left forearm. The scar ran along the inside, four inches, slightly raised. I didn’t cover it, and I didn’t look away from his face.
