Protect Me From Myself

Book 8 - Caution - ChapterOne

Welcome to book 8! This is Paige and Enzo's story. Just a little heads up - Enzo is an utter bastar.d, and you may feel he is un-redeemable. I know I did and still do all these years later. But you know what they say, love is blind! I hope you enjoy the story regardless :)

Paige

Breathe. Don't scream. Keep it in until you're alone. That's all you have to do, Paige. That's all you have to do.

Easier said than done.

Why do I have to repeat myself over and over again?

I'm not a bad person; I'm actually a really good person. Okay, I may be a little hot-headed and a little stubborn. But that's not a bad thing. It just means I know my own mind. I have every right as a woman to stand my ground. But right now, I feel like I'm talking to myself. Nothing I say seems to be sinking into this man's head!

“You're not leaving me, Paige.”

“Yes, I am, Kyle. How many times do I have to say it?”

“You can't just throw us aside!”

Raising his voice won't change what's about to happen. I've had enough. I can't take anymore. Eighteen months we've been together. Eighteen months, and he really thinks I don't know about his extracurricular activities with half the town?

It never used to bother me. Kyle isn't the love of my life. There isn't even any natural chemistry between us. Hell, we haven't had se.x in ten months. Ten months!

And why?

Because I can't bear to have him touch me in that way.

You would think he'd at least try to sleep with me. Okay, he did for a while, but he soon gave up. So, in all honesty, I don't have anyone to blame for his infidelities but myself.

But just lately, I feel like a fool. I know everyone is talking about me. I hear them whispering whenever I walk by. Even at work, people talk about me. It's time for me to face facts; I need to end this sham of a relationship.

I only said yes to dating Kyle because I needed to try to forget about the man I had been in love with for the past thirteen years.

How do you forget that kind of love?

I may have only been ten when I realized I loved him, but he was my hero.

Stop thinking about him, Paige! He doesn't want you, never has. The sooner you get that through your head, the sooner you can move on with your life and actually have one!

“We're getting married, Paige!”

Yeah. Right!

“Hell no, we are not! You've never asked. And I would have turned you down if you did!”

“No, you wouldn't. You'd be damn lucky to be my wife.”

I can't help laughing sarcastically.

Is he for real?

“You cannot be serious right now?”

He raises his eyebrow.

How have I let this cocky son of a bit.ch etch his way into my life?

“I'd be lucky to be your wife? You'd be lucky if I ever said yes in the first place!”

He rakes his fingers through his hair and turns away from me.

“Look, Kyle, I'm not trying to be a bit.ch. But you and I are... It was ridiculous to ever think we could be more than friends.”

“I love you, Paige.”

“No, you don't. You love running around town with any woman who so much as smiles at you.” He opens his mouth to speak, but I'm not done yet. “Please don't try to justify what you've done. There's really no need.”

“So this is it? We're over?” I nod my head while crossing my arms over my body. “There's nothing I can do to change your mind?”

I shake my head no and smile slightly. “Whichever way you look at this, we're over.”

“You've just been waiting for the chance to run off to that pric.k, haven't you?”

I roll my eyes. It's always the same thing, we argue, and Kyle throws Enzo in my face. It's not like the whole town, including Enzo, doesn't know that I still have feelings for him. God, it's not like I haven't tried to stop loving him.

My friends have repeatedly told me over the past year that I shouldn't have been with Kyle, that it would only end badly. I knew it, yet I didn't stop our relationship, nor did I pull him up about his cheating ways. Even though we live in a small town where nothing is ever secret. I only learned about his latest squeeze in the next town over because he got the girl pregnant, and she came looking for him.

“My decision to end things has nothing to do with Enzo and everything to do with the fact you got someone else pregnant!”

He stares at me for a long moment, not saying anything, just looking at me.

“Look, it's over, Kyle. Go be with Daphne and your unborn child. Have the life you've dreamed of, but leave me alone. It's over.”

He nods, lifts the bag I packed his clothes into, hooks it over his shoulder, and leaves without another word.

I sink down onto my bed with my head in my hands. I am in no way upset; I'm relieved that this is finally over. Kyle and I didn't live together, but he stayed over sometimes. Not once in the last six months, though.

Why would he when he's been off with whoever, doing whatever?

And obviously, getting someone else pregnant.

Shouldn't I feel something?

Shouldn't I feel upset that he's obviously been sleeping with other girls?

That he must see them as sexier than me?

I should, but I just don't.

Is that weird?

I wanted this, I wanted my freedom from him, but now I feel a little lost.

Where do I go from here?

Yes, I have a good job working as a nurse at Oak Springs General Hospital. I love my job because I love helping people.

But what do I do now?

I'm not good on my own. No, I don't need a man to complete my life, but all my friends are either married or getting married. That will never be me. I'm not lucky enough.

Ha! It's more like I measure every man I date to the one man I can never have. Lorenzo Ryker. Or Enzo, as everyone calls him. God, he doesn't even know I exist.

Okay, he does, we've been friends for years. But he sees me more as the little girl who used to follow him around, the little sister of his best friend. I doubt I'll ever be anything but that in his eyes.

My best friend's big sister, Callie, married Enzo's little brother, Sonny, last year. They've loved each other for so many years now, since they were four years old, in fact. He left town for five years, leaving her behind.

Callie was hurt badly in a vicious attack by a madman. She was left scarred across the left side of her face and most of her abdomen. She spent a year in the shadows until Hudson came home and showed Callie just how beautiful she still was in his eyes. How much he still loved her. Callie then went through plastic surgery to help repair some of the damage to her body. It worked to a degree, and Callie now walks around with her head held high. Just as she always should have done.

Callie and Hudson also became the proud adoptive parents of twins just after her surgery to fix the scars on her face. Those babies came into the hospital I work in, orphaned due to a car accident. Took me a while to convince Callie that she could be their mother. She's unable to have children of her own after what that lunatic did to her.

When Hudson met them, he knew he'd be their father. Callie and Hudson took those babies into their hearts, took away their fears, and showed them it was okay to be loved again. Little Todd and Robyn are now Ryker's, and they love their Uncle Enzo.

But a miracle happened a few months ago: Callie gave birth to a little boy. And he really was a miracle. After being told, you could never have a child to suddenly find out you're pregnant? I can't imagine the joy she felt in that moment.

Della, Callie's sister and my best friend is married to my big brother. He's not technically my brother, but our parents have been together for years, so in our hearts, we're brother and sister.

Freddy and Della are so in love. It makes me sick sometimes watching the way they are with each other. The way they're always so considerate of each other. The way they hold each other no matter who's looking.

Yeah, I'm jealous; I wish that could be me. With all my heart, I wish I could have that with Enzo. I won't, and I fear I will never get over him should I stay in this town.

When is it my turn to be happy?

I can't think about this any longer. Kyle is finally out of my life, and I can move on. On to what, I don't know. I can't think about it now; work calls. I may not be in the mood for it right now, but it's my job, and I need to get going. I slip on my light purple scrubs and head out. I don't want to be late.

* * *

“Paige?!” My name is yelled out, and the voice behind it reverberates off the walls of the hallway I'm walking down. I turn to see Tori running up behind me.

God, what does she want?

I'm too tired for her dramas.

“You're needed.”

“For what? I'm heading to the nurse's station to hand in these files.” I lift the files in my arms enough for her to see.

She practically snatches them from my hands. “I'll take them. We have a patient, and the family is asking for you to be his nurse. They don't want anybody else.”

“Oookay...” It's not unusual for a patient's family to ask for a specific nurse to tend to their loved ones. But, it's not normally me who is asked for, apart from when Callie was admitted a couple years ago after her attack. I wasn't even fully qualified then, but I was the one they wanted to help. “Does this patient have a name?”

“Yes,”

What's with the smirk?

I'm really too tired for this. I've been awake for two days straight. I've worked two sixteen-hour shifts and haven't been able to sleep when I have gone home. What with Kyle and the breakup.

“Enzo.”

I think my heart just fell through my ass!

“Ryker?” She nods, still smiling. Of course, that's who she means. How many Enzo's are there in this town? “What's wrong with him?”

I don't think I can swallow. My throat is so dry there's a huge lump stuck there, and my heart is beating too quickly.

What if he got hurt in one of his stupid underground cage fights?

What if he got caught in a fire and was burned beyond recognition?

Please don't let anything terrible have happened to him.

“Well, according to Dr. Lawson, Enzo was coming along Anderson up on Hill Side?” She asks in the form of a question.

As if I don't know where Hill Side is, I live there!

Why would he be driving down by where I live?

Anderson is two streets over from mine. Enzo has no reason to be up on Hill Side.

“Well, he turned left in his SUV, and a truck hit him.”

“Oh my God.” I clasp my hands over my mouth.

“He's okay. He just hit his head pretty hard on the steering wheel due to the fact the airbag didn't inflate like it should have. Plus, his ankle was broken, and he's cracked a couple of ribs. He'll be fine. But he's a goddamned terrible patient...”

“Okay, I get it.” I didn't mean to snap, but she could have just told me what was wrong instead of rambling. This is the man I love, for Christ's sake! I was scared enough without her going on and on. “Where is he?”

“Third floor. Room 208.”

I nod in thanks and walk quickly to the elevator. I need to get to Enzo. There must be a reason Sonny asked for me specifically. Sonny is Hudson, Enzo's little brother, but we've always called him Sonny. There are plenty of good nurses in this hospital; any one of them could have been chosen.

Maybe it has something to do with the fact most of the women around here would do anything to get Enzo in a position where they'd have to touch him. Him being the local firefighter and all. But Enzo hasn't dated anyone since his girlfriend Autumn died last year after giving birth to their daughter four months prematurely. Charlie was born sleeping. Autumn took her own life just three days later. Enzo was left to bury both of them. He's been quite withdrawn ever since.

I've tried to be there for him as a friend, but he snaps at me a lot lately. Everything I do is wrong in his eyes. I think, deep down, he's still grieving, and I irritate him no end. Typical.

I take a deep breath as I reach his room.

Be professional, Paige. That's all you have to do. Forget that you have loved this man since you were ten years old. He's your patient, nothing more.

Lord help me!