Losing Control

I raise unsteady fingers to my face. ‘What did you say?’

He turns to me now, his eyes ablaze. ‘You heard me. I want you to marry me.’

I shake my head. ‘You don’t mean that.’

‘Don’t I?’

My heart is screaming at me to shut the hell up. To say yes and live the life I always dreamed of with him. But, no—not like this.

‘You don’t know what you’re saying...’

‘I’m not a child, Lexi. Credit me with knowing my own mind.’

‘You’ve been drinking,’ I say quietly, my arms falling to wrap around my middle.

‘And?’ He laughs, but it’s deranged. His eyes are dark and glittering as he pins me with their glare. ‘After the news I’ve just received, I think I deserve a drink, don’t you?’

I don’t say anything. I can’t.

One second passes. Two.

The bubbling kettle fills the void.

He looks away and takes a ragged breath, rubbing his hand over his face as if that will somehow sober him up.

‘I’m sorry, Cain.’

It’s all I can think to say, and the words come from the very heart of me, quiet but no less earnest.

‘I’m sorry I didn’t do more to reassure you, to understand you, to convince you of my love for you all those years ago, and I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the truth—that I didn’t tell you about...about Rose sooner. I’m sorry. I truly am.’

‘I don’t want your apologies,’ he says, his eyes coming back to me. ‘I want you to be my wife.’

‘Why?’

‘Because you should have been my wife seven years ago. You should have married me. We should have had our child together. We should have...’

His eyes fall to my stomach and I see him quiver. Tears well in his eyes and I can’t bear it any more. I close the distance between us, wrap my arms around him and hug him to me. He doesn’t move, doesn’t react. He’s like a statue in my hold.

‘We should have said goodbye together.’

I squeeze my eyes shut over his whispered words, hear his heartbeat under my ear and the air that shudders through his lungs.

‘I’m so sorry.’

He grips my arms and sets me away from him so that he can look into my eyes.

‘Then marry me. Help me fix this.’

Fix this? I shake my head, my voice cracking. ‘It can’t be fixed. Not this kind of pain.’

‘Let me try.’

I remove myself from his hold, knowing I need to be strong, knowing that no matter how much it hurts, this isn’t right; it isn’t the answer. Not when the reason is guilt, an act of desperation.

‘I married for the wrong reasons once. I won’t make that mistake again.’

‘We belong together, Lexi. We always have. I should have made you mine seven years ago. I never should have left.’