AllFreeNovel
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“Why did you do all of it?” I ask. “The money. Marrying me. I don’t get it. You got nothing out of it, so why?”
His fingers run down the side of my face and dip underneath my jaw. He gently nudges me to look at him, so I prop my arms on his chest and lean my chin on them.
“Because it’s you,” he says.
“What does that even mean?”
He tilts his head to the side like he’s not quite sure what I don’t get about this.
“Means I’m in your corner. I know you think you’re this badass loner with nobody on your side, but ever since we met, I’ve always been there. On your side. In your corner. On your team. You’ve always had me.”
I stare at him.
He shrugs.
“Now you have me even more.” He eyes me carefully. “I’m not sorry I did it.”
“You just said—” I start.
He shakes his head.
“I’m sorry I hurt you,” he says. “Believe me, I’m more sorry about that than I’ve ever been about anything. But… I’m not sorry I got you the money. If I could go back in time? I’d do it again.”
“You do realize you’re making it worse?”
“We wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t,” he simply says.
I look at him for a long time before I lay my head down on his chest again.
“Damn you,” I mutter.
“What?”
“This whole thing would be so much simpler if you were an asshole.”
“What would be simpler?”
“I don’t know. Stuff.”
“Stuff?” he asks.
“Stuff.”
There’s a beat of silence.
“By ‘stuff’ you mean us?”
“We’re not…” My voice dies down.
“An us?” he finishes for me. “What are we, then?”
I can’t answer that.
Because, for a change, I see things clearly again.
I can’t make this real. And it’s not because I think Ryker would be cruel in the way my father was. The money thing? Yeah, I can see the logic there. I can see how, in a twisted way, he was putting my interests above everything else. How he was putting me first.
And I do think he feels something for me.
