“I have a story to tell you.”
She stared at him for a moment. She wanted to stand her ground and demand he explain himself, but the coolness inside her car beckoned. She slid behind the wheel, waited until he walked around the hood and slid into the passenger seat. Then she turned to him, suspicion making her voice sharper than she’d planned. “What kind of story exactly?”
Sighing, he pulled off his cover and rubbed a hand over his hairless head. Libby had always liked his baldness. He used to bend over as he tucked her in every night so she could kiss the crown of his head. The memory made her smile inwardly. If there was one constant in her life, it was her father’s love.
“It’s the story,” he began without meeting her gaze, “of a father trying to protect his daughter. Of him taking it a step too far when she fell in love with a man he didn’t want her with.”
Libby sucked in a breath. “Oh my God, Dad. What did you do to Jude? Is he okay?”
He flinched as if her words had slapped him across the face. “He’s fine. Back home, working with his brothers. I wouldn’t hurt him, and it shames me that you think I would.”
“I don’t! At least—I just—The way you said—” She pressed her lips together and took a second to gather her wits. “What did you mean by that?”
“I was talking about the past.”
Her stomach sank into her toes. “When?”
“Jude came to our house one day eight years ago in full uniform, even saluted when he saw me. He’d come to ask me for my blessing to marry you.”
She could picture it so clearly, Jude walking into the lion’s den in full dress uniform. Saluting her father. Asking his question…and getting shot down. “You told him he didn’t have your blessing, didn’t you?”
Misery radiated off him as he shook his head. “I didn’t want you marrying a Marine.”
“How could you?”
He finally met her gaze, and in his eyes, she saw his shame, but also a kind of desperation she’d never seen before. “Elizabeth, do you have any idea what I put your mother through every time I left for a tour? Neither of us wanted that for you. I didn’t want to take the risk you’d end up a young, heartbroken widow. Or, God forbid, a young widow with young children to care for. I wanted you to finish school, make a career for yourself.”
Tears blurred her vision, and she blinked them furiously back. “Who says I wouldn’t have?”
“Statistics.”
She shook her head in disbelief. “What about what I wanted?”
“It wasn’t a consideration,” he admitted. “It’s my job to protect you.”
Funny, Jude once said those exact same words to her.
“Dad…” But she couldn’t yell at him. He was obviously already aware of his mistake so what would yelling accomplish? “Oh, Daddy.”
“A day later, I found out he’d already proposed to you before he ever came to ask my permission.” He hung his head. “It was not one of my proudest moments. I had this ugly idea of your future embedded in my mind, and I thought I had to stop it, so I tracked Jude down, roughed him up a little, threatened to ruin his career, his life, to poison you against him while he was overseas. That last bit broke him. You should know he would have endured all of the rest, would have put up with me making him miserable for the rest of his life, but the thought of returning home to find out you hated him—that broke him.”
You’ve indulged him?
The surprise in Jude’s voice at that realization suddenly made a lot more sense. For years, he’d thought her father had absolute sway over her. What must have gone through his head when he found out that wasn’t the case?
I’m a fucking idiot.
Oh, he wasn’t the only one in this situation. She punched her father’s shoulder as hard as she could. His head snapped up in surprise, and his eyes flashed anger followed by hurt.
“That was for ruining the best thing I ever had!” It wasn’t until he reached over and folded her in his arms that she realized she was crying freely. He rocked her as he had in her childhood when soothing her from a nightmare.
“I’m so sorry, Libby. As much as I try—” His voice broke. “I’m not perfect. I hope someday you can forgive me.”
She held on to him as tightly as she could and buried her tears in the front of his uniform. “He cheated on me again. After you left, I followed him to a bar and saw him with another brunette. Why is it always a brunette?”
“Oh, sweetie, no.” Firmly, he set her away from him and wiped at her tears with his big thumbs. “I don’t know what you think you saw, but it wasn’t Jude Wilde cheating. For all of his faults, he’s not a cheater. He never has been.”
She sniffled. “He cheated before.”
“No. I told him he had to break things off with you in a way that you’d never want to take him back. The woman you saw him with? She was another Marine. I asked her to help him with the charade.”