A Fire That Burns (28 page)

Chapter Fifty

FOR
fucks sake, Michael!
I loved you, but not enough!” Austin bellowed, her chest heaving, her throat
constricting. This was not how Austin wanted her day to begin. It seemed that
Michael’s incessant
behavior
had pushed her over the
edge.

“I only ever loved you!” Michael exclaimed at her and grabbed her wrist,
“What don’t you understand? I wanted you stay in New York with me because I
love you so much that you leaving hurt and I lashed out.”

“Lashed out by sleeping with other women!”
Austin fought back
and tore her arm away to get free from his hold on her wrist, but failed
miserably. “Let me go Michael,” she said with a warning tone.
“Now.”

“Please come back to me,” he begged her as he loosened his grip. “I’m
not the same man without you. I’m the wrong man. I do stupid things, make wrong
decisions.”

“You did those before you knew me,” Austin told him with a head shake,
“Don’t tell me I’m the reason you stopped those.” She then let out a laugh full
of irony, “Plus, I was still around when you made the wrong decision of
sleeping with three other women!”

“I’m sorry for that, I was angry,” Michael defended, trying everything
to grapple onto her.

“Angry doesn’t make you do that, Michael!” Austin fought back, “I tried,
I really did try to give you my all, but when I broke, you did that to me. I
can’t run the risk of that happening again.”

“Anger does make me do that! I did it, I admit that. Being angry made me
make that decision, but only because you said you wanted to leave. I was so
angry I needed a release and instead of hitting the gym or a bar, I went for a
sexual release and I am truly sorry for that, Austin. I am paying for doing
that.”

“If you loved me you wouldn’t have done that! It wouldn’t have been the
last resort you ended up at. It wouldn’t even have been a resort at all,” Austin
shouted back, she couldn’t get over that night as he tried to spout his
apologies at her. Sorry didn’t right this wrong at that moment in time. Sorry
didn’t take away the sting that seeing three women in bed with the man that she
had tried and searched to move on with, and sorry didn’t make this okay.

“Tyler did it though!” Michael called to her, “I was told he did. He was
going to get hitched to the woman that took everything from you, Austin, and
yet, you took him back. He lied and deceived you, but he gets forgiveness. Look
what he did to you,” he said and motioned to her arm. “Look at everything he’s
caused.”

“I can’t believe you just said that,” Austin bit back with a venomously
dark tone. “Out of all of the things you’ve said, you’re really going to try
and make me hate Tyler? You clearly don’t know me at all.”

“I’m trying anything here,” Michael said with a shrug. He knew he was
losing, but the more he tried to salvage their relationship, the more he seemed
to soil it. He was losing this battle and he wasn’t accepting it lightly.

“You know I loved Tyler,” Austin told him as the tears coursed down her
face as they finally broke their thresholds. “He was the reason I could never
be truly happy with you, Michael, and you knew that.”

Michael went to pass judgment yet again.

“Can you understand that?” Austin asked Michael outright, stopping him
from making some snide remark about Tyler. “I nearly caved and gave you all of
me and you weren’t there for me when I needed you most. You let me down and I
wanted out. You shut me out when I said what I wanted.”

“It was a kneejerk reaction. I’m sorry for that ever happening, but we
were working towards something, Aus! We were great as a duo at work, everyone said
so. If-If it’s nicknames you want, I can give you that! If it’s gifts, then
I’ll go and buy out a whole store. I can do that. I can,” Michael tried to
grovel, “I’ll move here if you want me too. I will. I’ll do whatever to prove I
am sorry.”

Shaking her head, Austin knew this was going to be a vicious cycle as
Michael wasn’t getting the idea easily. Putting her hand on her arm to soothe
the agitated soreness, she looked to him, “I’m going to go and lay down before
we all go out. If you want to be my best friend then be there, but if you want
to carry on this torture of apologizing for something that isn’t worth it
anymore, then don’t even bother turning up. My decision is final, Michael. I
love Tyler.”

     
Austin
left him to it and headed into the house feeling like the biggest monster all
over again. She just wanted to sleep for an escape.

***

“Did you lie to me?” Tyler asked Austin as he followed
his girl to the bedroom in Tom’s house. He could see from her face that she had
taken her pain meds and was now completely wiped out. He knew she needed to
sleep, but he needed answers to what he had heard. He needed to hear Austin out
on what she had been arguing over with Michael.

Austin looked up at Tyler; sitting up to get away from his grasp as he
stepped in and his accusation hit her hard. “No,” she responded a little hurt,
“What are you going on about?”

“I heard you tell Michael you loved him,” Tyler admitted to her quietly
as he sat down on the edge of the bed. All of his pent up doubts seemed to start
tumbling out all at once and he didn’t even need to utter a word to get that
noticed.

Looking solemn, Austin took a breath, “I tried to love him,” she
admitted. “God, did I try everything to just give myself fully to him like I
had you, but it never worked, and when that case hit too close to home, I had
to run. I had to come back and salvage everything because I was more scared at
the prospect of everything consuming me than ever losing it all.” She looked up
at him, “He didn’t understand why I couldn’t stay around, and that night I went
to him, to make amends, and he was having more than enough fun with three other
women.”

“Oh,
Aust
,” Tyler whispered as he saw the look
of hurt cross Austin’s face.

“If he loved me, Tyler, if he ever meant a word, then he wouldn’t have
done that. No matter how hurt he was, he wouldn’t have taken those women home,
and he wouldn’t have been caught in a compromising situation.”

Remaining quiet, Tyler felt guilt consume his every
fiber
.

“Tyler,” Austin called to him, drawing him back to reality.

 
He looked up at her, and gave
her direct eye contact as he spoke, “I did what he did, though,” Tyler told her
and it was as though his heart break was taking over every strand of his voice.
“I went with another woman when you ran.”

“After I had run from you,” Austin corrected Tyler truthfully, “He did
it while I was still in clear view. You had no other option, he had every
option available.” Austin got off of the bed as she felt the need to work out
the nervous energy in her. “He had every opportunity to make me stay, and yet
he didn’t. He had a helping hand in sealing the end of my life in New York,
Tyler. I don’t want the high maintenance life that comes with that job, I want
the good life. I want to be here and know I won’t get a phone call dragging me
halfway across the country and not know when the hell I’m going to be back. I
want to have a husband that’s going to come home every night.”

“You should give it a chance though,” Tyler pondered loudly.

“What?” Austin asked as confusion knitted across her forehead.

“He loves you, Aus, give him a chance,” Tyler told her selflessly. “Give
him a chance to prove that that life is worth fighting for.”

As his words hit her, she felt her heart falter its beating and she
snapped at the idea of leaving Tyler behind. “I don’t want to!” Austin
responded as her eyes watered with how much she was dedicated to that
statement. “I love him, he is one of my best friends, but he isn’t the man that
I can envisage the rest of my life with, Tyler! That’s you! No matter how hard
I tried, it was always you. Why can’t you understand that? It’s always going to
be you who
makes
me happiest, you make me safe. You
give me a reason. You make me want to get up in the morning. You make me trust
my heart again.”

Tyler remained silent.

“Well?” she pressed him. “Why can you not understand that, Tyler?”

“I just want you to have the best in life, Austin,” he told her
truthfully and lifted his gaze to meet hers, and what Austin was met with was
pure, eternal love. Tyler was offering her the world to find herself before
concluding it was only ever him. “I want you to be truly happy without any
regrets.”

Austin could see that Tyler needed a sealant on this matter. Words
weren’t enough to cover this anymore. She needed to act as well. She gave him a
little smirk and got onto the bed so she could pull him closer. “I love you,
Tyler. If I didn’t, then all of this – the miscarriage, leaving, the fire – it
didn’t mean a thing. It would have been pointless in bringing us back together.
Everything happens for a reason, and we are that reason.” Austin shared her
faith with him.

Feeling her hand on his cheek, Tyler couldn’t stop himself from leaning
into the hold.

“We were brought back together, Tyler, and Michael, he was an option,
but he ruined that. I know that option’s there, but why have that when the man
my heart wants is the man that arrested his fiancée and then was by my bedside
most mornings while I was in hospital?” she smiled softly at Tyler, “Why waste
knowing that there is a man that knows me regardless of the time that comes
between us? Why lose who knows how I work, and why lose the man that still
knows how to keep me happy? Especially after he won my heart back, even after I
thought he didn’t need to win it back.”

“That’s me?” Tyler asked incredulously. His voice hopeful and shocked
all at once.

Austin smiled sweetly and leaned in closer to him, “That’s you.”

    
Austin
ended this moment with a kiss. One that, for once, sent Tyler sky high and allowed
him to feel the everlasting tingle of unadulterated love as it
spiraled
through his system. He had won the love back he
had always wanted to.

Chapter Fifty-One

EVEN
after a few nights,
it appeared that Michael couldn’t take being an underdog. It seemed that banter
had turned brutal, and now Tyler and Michael were finally on the verge of
snapping one another’s neck to help the ultimate decision of Austin’s heart.

Tyler knew Austin wanted him, but jealousy took a hold of him just as
Michael’s had done.

They’d all gone out as a group for a meal and the rivalry had only
manifested to the maximum. For the entire two hours, Austin had tried to be
herself
and allow her time to be split between both men in
her life, but she was finding it hard. If she spent too much time on Tyler,
Michael kicked up, and if she spent too much time on Michael, Tyler kicked up.

She was just thankful for her brother being able to take control.
Without Tom she would have literally resulted to cutting herself in half and
offering herself equally to both Tyler and Michael – even then one would have
argued the other had a bigger piece of her, she had chided herself jokingly.

Getting home though, the moment they began to go towards the Pearson’s
house, the two men had just become so enraged that they couldn’t keep
themselves controlled. After Michael had muttered that calling Austin ‘
Sunny’
and
‘Baby Girl’
were lame ass excuses to rekindle a high school sweet
heart kind of romance, Tyler finally snapped.

Little did Michael know that Austin and Tyler were never just high
school sweethearts, and that the nickname ‘Baby Girl’ had come about in the
most romantic way
possible.
Tyler had used it to seal
the deal with Austin; he had called her that the very first time they made
love. The night they had both given their all and gave to one another wholly as
teenagers was the first night Tyler had used it. It was in the middle of the
night, when they lay awake contemplating if they felt different or not, that he
had whispered it to her so delicately, each syllable, letter, sound had just
draped over her and she knew there was only one place in Tyler’s heart and that
was hers to keep.

That memory was distant in Austin’s mind at that moment.

Now she was watching them both lash out and attack one another.
Horrifyingly, it was like two animals fighting over one piece of prey – and
that was her! Here were the two men that she loved most, for two different
reasons entirely,
both
pummeling
each other, attacking one another, and hurting each other with pure rage.

“Stop it!” Austin screamed out in fear, “Stop it, the both of you!”
Austin felt sick almost immediately, and the need to throw up just built in her
throat threatening to make an appearance. Swallowing hard she stepped forward,
but Tom stopped her from going in too close.

“I don’t want you getting hurt, Aus,” he told her worriedly. She was
already hurt and in constant pain, he didn’t want her taking a stray punch as
one of the men drew back. The last thing he wanted was for Austin to bear the
brunt of this situation because the two men couldn’t realize that one of them
had already won while the other had lost.

As she watched, calling at them to stop, Austin felt like the culprit.
She hadn’t broken just one man’s heart, she had broken two hearts. Michael’s
was an obvious, but Tyler was caught in this as well and Austin had driven them
to violence.

Shaking, Austin looked as her brothers came down from the house with her
father. She felt him wrap his arms around her to soothe her as her brothers tried
to separate the two men. She looked to see Liam helping, as Jessica held onto
Archie’s hand while he had his other arm around Emma. The two women looked as
spooked as she did.

As both men were finally pulled apart, Dean standing between them, his
broad steady build working well to keep them that way, they looked to Austin.
They both stood panting, recovering from their brawl and they both kept looking
at Austin expectantly. Both men were waiting on her for the judgment call – for
her call on the survival of the fittest.

Except, they weren’t met with a woman impressed that two men were
fighting over her. They were met with a woman that was heartbroken that it had
come down to this. They had both hurt the one woman that was more than caught
up in the middle of their love and lust for her. They had failed to listen to
the call of her heart even after she had told them both who she chose.

Michael had seen this as his opportunity to win Austin back, make her
understand that he was so in love with her he would fight for her even after he
had
lost
. Tyler, however, felt like he had to fight to keep Austin as
his. He felt like if he didn’t fight back then Austin was going to run off with
Michael.

“I don’t want you to fight over me like this,” Austin said as she tried
her hardest to stop crying. She finally let her father let her go, “I don’t
want you getting hurt over me.”

There was silence from all angles, including everyone that had stood
around and watched and helped break the fight up. There were really no words to
total this moment.

“You’re both my best friends, and I know you love me, and I love you
both too, but I can’t help who I want. If you’re going to act like animals then
I refuse to hang around to just watch you destroy each other. I don’t want
either of you if that is going to happen.”

“It’s not like that,” Tyler defended as he wiped his mouth and saw
Michael shake his head to show his stand point on Austin’s action.

“Is it not?” Austin exclaimed as she noticed Michael’s shining eye and
Tyler’s bleeding lip. “I won’t be the cause of this. It scares me to actually
think that you two change just because you love me. That isn’t the kind of love
I want.”

    
With that
Austin fled altogether, her control completely disappearing, and all that was
left were her sobs ricocheting into the night.