She took another deep, deep breath and met my gaze again. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you I loved you when you asked me to. The only excuse I have is I was scared. Of you. Of me. Of us. Of this thing between us,” she said, waving a hand at the space dividing us. “But even though I’m still scared, I can’t go another minute without you knowing how I really feel. I can’t toss and turn another night alone in my bed knowing you could be in it with me if I’d just get over myself.”
She held her arms out for a moment before letting them fall against her thighs. “So, this is me, telling you I was wrong and that I’m sorry and that I love you more than I could ever put into words. This is me begging you to give me another chance. This is me telling you I don’t want to face another day without you. This is me hoping there’s still some part of you that loves me back.”
Chapter 36
Wyatt
“What the hell did you just say?”
At some point, I’d climbed to my feet, but I didn’t remember when. I took a cautious step toward her, worried if I moved too fast, she’d run away. Or disappear. Or maybe I’d wake up and this would all be some kind of sick, fucked up dream.
She rubbed her lips together again. “I’m sorry?”
I took another step closer. “No. The other thing.”
She looked away for a moment before meeting my gaze again. “I was wrong?”
“Try again,” I said, closing the distance between us some more.
When I was within reaching distance, she blew out a deep breath, stared right into my eyes, and said, “I love you?”
Holy shit.
I reached shaky hands out to grasp her hips and drag her closer to me because I couldn’t make my feet work anymore. “That’s it,” I rasped. I dug my fingers into her and ducked my head closer. “Say it one more time.”
The corner of her pink lips curled into the smallest smile. “I love you,” she whispered.
I closed my eyes and let a stuttering breath out of my straining lungs. When I opened them again, she was still there. She was still between my hands. She was still smiling at me.
I didn’t want to ask my next question, but I had to. I needed to know. My heart needed permission to burst in my chest. “Do you mean it? You really love me?”
Her smile grew on her beautiful face as she reached up and cupped my whiskered jaw. “Yes. I mean it. I really love you. And I have for so long–I was just scared,” she admitted, her voice growing small.
I grasped her face between both my hands and brought my lips to hers. This kiss wasn’t gentle. It was hungry and brutal and full of all the pain we’d felt while we’d been apart. This kiss made up for all the kisses we’d missed.
When I finally pulled away, I was breathless, but it didn’t stop me from kissing that birthmark next to her perfect lips and trailing my mouth down her neck.
She gasped, and it only spurred me on. “I thought you were mad at me,” she said, her voice trembling.
I shook my head, my lips trailing across her erratic pulse. “No, love. I wasn’t mad. I was sad.”
She grabbed my shoulders and dug her nails in as I sucked on the delicate skin of her throat. “But you wouldn’t even look at me the other day after the enforcer meeting. And at the office, you were mean to me.”
I winced as a layer of shame coated my insides. Pulling away, I kept her face between my hands and made sure she was focused on me before I spoke. “I was sad, love,” I said again. “I missed you so much and it hurt just looking at you. I was doing what I had to do to get over you. I thought we were done for good.”
“I did too,” I said softly.
I kissed her forehead before pulling back again. “If I’d known you loved me, I never would have given up.”
She smiled sweetly and my heart tripped over itself in my chest. “But I’ve always loved you, Wyatt. Always.”
I breathed in deeply, pulling her into my lungs, into my soul, where she belonged. Where I’d never let her leave again.
“You realize you’re never getting rid of me again, right? I’ll never let you go now I know you love me.”
She smiled and reached up to kiss the tip of my chin. “That works for me.”
Reality set in as my heart grew in my chest, pushing the other organs out of its way and thumping so loudly, it was almost deafening.
She loved me.
She fucking loved me.
I swore in that moment, that I’d spend the rest of my life earning that love. That I’d never let her go. That I’d never walk away again, no matter how bad things got, or what I thought she wanted. I loved her and she loved me, and the rest we could figure out.
I dragged her lips to mine and kissed her like I’d been starving. Like all I needed was her to survive, which wasn’t far from the truth. I wrapped my arms around her waist, tugging her shirt up so I could feel her silky skin beneath my fingertips.
I walked us backward until my heels bumped into the rock chair and I took a seat, pulling her onto my lap. Our mouths stayed fused together as I grabbed each side of her flannel shirt and ripped it apart, making buttons fly everywhere. She gasped and inched
