***
My eyes felt crusty as I tried to open them, consciousness coming to me, and with it the feel of a heavy warmth resting on my waist.
As I opened my peepers I realized they felt swollen and that’s when I remembered why. I tensed at the memory of crying in Liv’s arms at the same time I looked into my husband’s sleeping face.
The heavy warmth across my waist was his arm.
We were lying in bed together.
I didn’t know how we’d gotten there.
I started to cry again.
Braden’s arm tightened around me and through the blur of tears I saw I’d woken him.
“I wasn’t not happy,” I whispered, licking the salt water off my lips. “I was so happy I was terrified. ”
His warm fingers brushed my chin and I felt the gentle pressure of his touch as he tilted my head back so I would meet his questioning eyes. “Terrified?”
I nodded. “Just because I’ve come a long way, doesn’t mean I still don’t feel that way. You wouldn’t let me explain. I’m still terrified of losing all the good we have together. ” Had together.
Braden frowned as he sat up. “You’re afraid of losing our baby, so you shut me out before I—”
“No!” I sat up, glaring at him. “You shut me out. ”
“I thought we were past all this. ”
“Then let me fucking explain!”
He glowered at me but shut up.
I glowered back. “You know I’m afraid of losing the people I love. But my kid, our kid, I already love this kid so much I can’t breathe. The thought of something happening . . . ”
Braden shook his head slowly. “You kept avoiding talking about having kids. . . . I started to worry that you didn’t want them. I thought with you running off to the castle it meant you were gearing up to shut me out because . . . you didn’t want our kid. Then when you tried to explain, I was . . . ” He sighed.
“You were what?”
“Scared,” he admitted softly, his eyes locked with mine. “My mother never wanted me, Jocelyn. Never. I was not a happy kid and I would never wish that kind of childhood on anyone, let alone my own kids. I promised myself if I ever had children I’d be the kind of father mine never was and I certainly wouldn’t marry a woman who wouldn’t treat them like they were her whole world. So I didn’t know how to feel about my wife not wanting our kid. I didn’t know how to react to that and what it meant for us. ”
A knifelike pain cut across my chest. “Is that why you’re moving out?”
“What?” he asked incredulously, his eyes darkening. “What are you talking about?”
“The letter. ” I lifted a shaky hand, pointing out to the hall. “I found the letter in the guest room. The one asking the tenants of your old apartment to move out within the month. ”
A thick silence fell between us.
Braden slipped out of bed, staring at nothing for a moment before turning to me with a very familiar anger. “That’s the second letter to those tenants. The first one told them they were being evicted because of the complaints I’d received from residents of the building. The letter you saw was a standard notice telling them how much time they had to get out. ”
Oh.
Fuck.
“You thought withou
t talking to you, or trying to work this shit out that I . . . that I . . . was leaving you!” he yelled in disbelief.
Oh, no, he did not get to be angry anymore. I got out of the bed on the opposite side. “You froze me out. I was scared and confused and you left me on my own!” My voice cracked as I yelled back at him, and the break lowered my voice. “You wouldn’t let me touch you. You flinched from me. ” I watched his face soften. “You promised me I wasn’t alone anymore, but instead you made me think you hated me. And I think I hate you a little for that. ”
I turned away so he wouldn’t see me cry again.
Two seconds later he was turning me into his arms. “Fuck, baby,” he whispered hoarsely. “You could bring a man to his knees. ”
There was so much relief in feeling his arms around me, his chest beneath my cheek. Inhaling his scent. Soaking him in. But I didn’t hold him in return.
“I’m so sorry,” he said gruffly, desperately, in my ear, easing me back to stare into my eyes. He brushed my hair off my face before cupping it in his hands. There was something like panic in them. “Jocelyn, I will never make you feel that way again. I promise. I’m so sorry. ” He kissed me hard, tasting my tears. “I was scared. I acted like an idiot but it was just because this is our kid. It means more to me than anything ever has. I fucked up. I fucked up this time, but I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, sweetheart. I love you. You believe me?” He pulled me against him, his hands running down my back. “You believe me?”
I took a deep breath, trying to let go of the last few days. It would be so easy to hold on to the hurt and anger. But instead I looked back a few years when I was lying in Braden’s arms, grateful he’d forgiven me for everything I’d put him through.
I lifted my arms and wrapped them around his back. “I believe you. ”
He kissed me again, this time slower, deeper. When he pulled back he was frowning. “I fucked up,” he repeated quietly.
“Well, it was your turn. ”
“There will be times,” he murmured against my lips, “when we don’t like each other very much, but I need you to know that I will never stop loving you. This time it was me who was terrified of losing you, and I pushed you away because I was afraid to hear what you had to say. If, God forbid, I ever hurt you again, tell me. Don’t lock me out. Don’t shut the shower door on my face. Scream at me. Don’t let me get away with it until you’re storing that shit up and looking at me like you’re haunted. Because . . . I swear to God, that look in your eyes that night, it almost broke my fucking heart. We need to stop doing that to each other. Right now. ”