Pushed Too Far,
Chapter 4
She stared after him for a moment, unable to believe that he had actually done it. She had feared it for three years, him walking away, but she'd never thought that he would. She needed to believe that he wouldn't.
"To hell with that!" she yelled and took off after him.
She caught him outside, the rain pouring down in sheets like the earth was crying with him, her, them, and she caught him and turned him around, pinning him against his car.
"Listen to me. You don't get to leave. You can't. I know I don't deserve you, and I've put you through hell, and you want to go, but that's what you can't do," she told him. "I need you too damn much to let you go. And that scares the hell out of me. I don't want to know what it's like if you're gone. So you just... You can't leave. Tell me what I have to do to make you stay."
He looked at her and then closed his eyes like he was in pain. He probably was, damn it.
"Mary, I can't do this. I'm not going to stay because you're afraid. You can get along without me. You know that. I know that. You just don't want to because I make it easier for you."
"You're my only friend, Marshall. Don't tell me I'll be fine without you because it's not true," she insisted. "I can't let the only person who's ever gotten close to me go. You got past every defense I had, you bastard, and I love you, and that means that you can't go."
His eyes opened, and he stared at her. "Did you just say what I think you just said?"
She winced. "Okay, so calling you a bastard isn't a good way to make you stay, but I—"
"Not that part," he interrupted, "the other part."
"That?" she asked, thinking over what she'd said. "Shit."
