Jane stared at me for a while. You could see her brain working and I figured she was about to tell me to fuck off.

“Ok,” she said, looking at me expectantly.

“Uh…” I fumbled on my words, not expecting her to agree to hear me out.

“This is all my fault,” I said, cleaning the scrape on her leg. “I knew the moment Callum decided to protect you, it was a bad idea, and I still went along with it. His argument made sense. Protecting you was more important than discovering what was happening between us. Lucio is psychotic, and we’ve all seen the depravity of that man. He didn’t get to where he is today by being nice.”

I put a Band-Aid on her knee, smoothing the edges, so it stayed on properly. Not thinking, I leaned forward, placing a soft kiss on her knee right over the Band-Aid. Looking up, Jane looked conflicted. “If we took you out of the picture, we assumed Lucio wouldn’t care or would lose interest. That’s why we shut you out and even though we usually agree on things, this was not one of them. Callum fucked up even more by sleeping with you and Nathan thought everything was back to normal, which is why he joined you guys.”

Standing up, I packed up the kit, breaking one of the instant ice packs across my thigh. I laid it on her knee, being as gentle as I could. “Nathan and Cal beat the crap out of each other that night because Nathan was furious. Cal made such a shitty and selfish decision. I don’t think we’ve ever gone so long not speaking to each other, and we deserved your anger. We were acting like idiots.” Jane leaned forward and wrapped her arms around her legs.

“At the fight when we all saw you there, I assumed you were there with Lucio.” Jane gave me a disgusted look. “I know, I know, it was dumb to think that, but in order for you to understand where that thinking came from, I need to tell you a little bit about me. After bootcamp, I married my high school sweetheart, so she could be with me wherever the Marines stationed me.”

I took a deep breath, hating that I had to relive this, but for Jane, it was worth it. I would relive my past every day if it meant she would understand and give us a chance. “After my second tour, I came home early to a pregnant wife, but I hadn’t been home in eight months.”