And I realize out loud, “Sorry isn't good enough.”
His answer comes more immediately this time. “I know it’s not good enough. I'll do anything to make those ten years up to you. Anything.”
He signs that last word with such emphasis. I can tell he honestly does want me to name my price. Anything.
And there are a million things I could say. I could ask him to buy that house I have been scrimping and saving for. I could ask him to sign those custody papers Amber offered to bring up on Friday. Pay for Yolanda’s salary if I can get her to agree to move to Pittsburgh…and a full-time nanny on top. The list is endless.
But there's only one price that fits. And that's the one that comes out of my mouth.
“Tell me why,” I demand. “Tell me why you did what you did.”
26
VICTOR
Tell me why.
A Dragon should conduct his business in a way that he is never surprised.
If a Dragon is somehow taken by surprise, he should never show it… Unless, of course, that display of surprise is actually a bit of cunning.
There are rules for this life he has chosen. Yet they all fall away when Dawn names her price.
Her demand shocks Victor. So much so that for a second time that night, he actually allows that surprise to seep into his expression.
His first instinct is to change the subject. Perhaps he can distract her with another orgasm….
That idea shrivels away almost as fast as it appears.
He has already denied two of her requests. That's two more than he wanted.
He remembers the sight of her when he’d come into that hospital hallway. How he vowed to himself to do whatever it took to win her back before wrapping her up in his arms.
Also, last night he slept peacefully for the first time in months. He’d woken the next morning feeling refreshed and new. Because of her.
But above all other rules, a Dragon must be honorable. He had asked Dawn her price, promising to pay anything, and she had named it.
So an explanation… Yes, he owes her that much for more reasons than one.
But the words don't come easily.
They pause and repeat and stutter halt his hands before he finally manages to say, “I chose you. I chose you, and I lost you in Japan. And that made me feel very weak. I was not used to feeling so weak. But that is how the loss of you made me feel. Betrayed and weak. I wanted to punish you. For your betrayal, I thought. But I also wanted to punish myself for loving you in the first place. For continuing to love you despite everything.”
She bows her head and considers his words for a long time before saying, “You wanted to punish me because you loved me? Because you considered loving me as a weakness. Even when we were together in high school?”
The disappointment in her voice squeezes at his heart, but her summation is accurate, so he simply nods.
He expects her to castigate him. To tell him his reasoning is stupid. To withdraw all respect and affection she might ever have had for him before.
But she ends up saying something even worse.
“What happened to you?” she asks. “What happened to you to make you like that? Will you tell me?”
Victor sucks in a breath. Her question cuts him deep. Deeper than an enemy’s knife ever could.
The little boy cries in a room, filling Victor up with weakness.
There are many ways he could respond to her fatal question. He could pretend not to know what she was asking about. He could say what he told her fifteen years ago, that this particular story is one he never tells.
And that’s true. He has never talked about this with anyone. Not even with Han, who played such a vital part in it.
Nightmares had plagued him for months without her. But the terror that fills him at the prospect of answering her question—that is the real nightmare.
His hands, which have always been so steady before, are doing something strange. He looks down to find them shaking, trembling to the point that they can’t form words.
He can’t…
“It's okay, Victor,” Dawn suddenly reaches out to touch him. She cups his face underneath her soft hand and whispers, “It's okay.”
He doesn’t know if she’s reassuring him or letting him off the hook when she takes her hand away. But the understanding in her brown eyes as she does so…it cracks something inside of him.
Cracks him all the way open.
And suddenly, his hands are no longer shaking. Words return to his fingers as he signs, “My real name….my Chinese name is T-A-K-L-U-N. But only my mother called me by this name. I had a nanny when I was three. I spent even more time with her than I did with my mother, and I loved her nearly the same.”