BWWM Interracial Romance 6: Her Protector by Elena Brown Page B

be running out of time for that kind of life.”
    Jacob shook his head. “Bro, it’s not the sort of thing you run out of time to do. There are 60-year-old guys starting families for the first time.” Jacob wagged a finger at him. “You’re just scared, deep down. You don’t want to trust that you’ll find someone better than Lisa.”
    Sawyer took another long drink of his beer and sighed. “I’m finally rid of Kent as a partner,” Sawyer said, running his fingers through his hair. “I still have to deal with him as a member of the same department, but I won’t have to go with him on calls.” Jacob nodded slowly.
    “That’s a step in the right direction at least,” he said. “It’d be easier to handle if you don’t have to spend forty or more hours a week right next to him.”
    “He already moved desks,” Sawyer said, remembering the moment with relief. It had been as if a literal weight had been taken off of him. He glanced at Jacob’s twin sons, hard at work, talking in the kind of half-sentences that seemed to be part and parcel of twin interactions. The boys had Rebecca’s olive complexion but Sawyer could easily see his brother’s genes in their features—the nose, the set of the jaw, the lips. “It just sucks so much—I mean, the guy was my best friend.” Sawyer felt the bile rising in his stomach at the memory of the betrayal. He had noticed that things weren’t going well with Lisa months before he had discovered the cause; he had even confided in Kent about the tension between himself and his wife, asking for input, for impartial advice.
    When Kent had finally come clean—after Sawyer had found messages of a sexual nature between Kent and Lisa on her computer—Sawyer’s reaction had been immediate. All of his ability to contain his temper had evaporated in an instant, and he had cocked his fist and slammed it into the side of Kent’s face before he had even consciously thought of doing it. The shockwave of the blow traveling through his hand and up his arm had been just enough to snap him out of his instinctual rage; he’d turned on his heel and walked out of the locker room before he could say anything and before Kent could react to what had happened.
    He had filed for a change of partner immediately, punishing himself for the outburst by using his still-aching hand to fill out the paperwork. He cited that there was a conflict between the two of them without going into the gritty details—details that he would later have to explain to the review board responsible for placing partners together. The same day, during his lunch break, he had started making calls to divorce lawyers.
    Lisa hadn’t fought the divorce; she was ashamed of what she had done, of who she had done it with, but her shame didn’t seem to matter at all when Sawyer thought about the situation. There had been exactly one conversation, when he had arrived at home at the end of his shift. Lisa had tried to greet him normally—she had put on makeup, but Sawyer could see the fear in her eyes and knew that Kent had informed her about the altercation. “I’m not going to hit you, I’m not even going to yell at you,” Sawyer had said, sitting down, feeling tired beyond belief. Lisa had sat down a few feet away.
    “I didn’t mean to, Sawyer,” she had said. Sawyer shook his head.
    “You meant to or you wouldn’t have done it,” he said simply. “Whatever reasons you’ve given yourself for what you did don’t matter a hill of beans to me. I don’t care. I can’t care. You did it, and I can’t live with you anymore.” He had tilted his head back, looking up at the ceiling, unable to even look at the woman he had loved so deeply. There was a stain on the ceiling roughly the shape of India, an odd splotch that Sawyer couldn’t take his eyes off of. “I’m getting a divorce. You’d better find a lawyer of your own.”
    “We can work it out, baby,” Lisa had said. Sawyer had taken a deep breath, shook his