"You could have told me!" My voice cracked like glass, sharp and splintering. "You should have told me! I had no idea I was in danger, Ryder. No idea what you were dragging me into. You were selfish. You were just thinking about yourself!"
His face crumpled, and when he spoke his voice was barely a whisper, trembling under its own weight. "Yes," he said, nodding once, eyes glistening. "Yes, Dec. I was selfish. I admit it. I needed you. I needed the moments of quiet and warmth you gave me, the only bright spot in a life that felt like it was drowning me. I clung to you like a lifeline."
He dragged a hand down his face, tears streaking his fingers. "It was selfish. Wrong. Cruel. I turned you into an unwitting accomplice to my hiding, to my shame. I didn't mean to, I swear I didn't, but that's what I did. You deserved safety, truth, freedom. Instead I made you part of my cage."
His voice broke completely, the last words spilling out like confession. "at that time... you were my reason to keep going when everything else felt like it was killing me. I was selfish, Dec. I know it now, and I am so, so sorry."
I could barely breathe, my chest heaving like something was clawing its way out. "That night..." My voice came out shredded, more a rasp than a sound. "That night you broke something in me when I was already broken. Do you even understand that? Do you understand what it's like to already be bleeding inside and then have the one person you trusted twist the knife?"
His face twisted, a sound escaped him, half sob, half groan. "Yes," he choked out, his hands trembling at his sides. "Yes, Dec. That night at the gym... that will forever be my rock bottom and I thought I'd hit it before, but nothing..nothing compares to the look on your face. The pain. The defeat. It's burned into me." His voice cracked, the words dragging out of him like confession under torture.
"When I insulted you with her there..." His voice faltered. "God, I wanted to hold you. Kiss you. Drop to my knees and tell you not to believe a word. But I knew how vicious she was, how far she'd go to destroy you if she knew what you actually meant to me" He swallowed hard, tears running unchecked now. "and in doing that, I destroyed you. I destroyed me too. I haven't been whole since."
"A charity case,Ryder." The words ripped out of me, my voice so jagged with rage it hardly sounded human."You said I was a freaking charity case. Do you know what that did to me? And then you said you'd never go for 'that'—" The word splintered in my throat, burning like acid. "You said it like I was garbage. Like I was something disgusting you'd picked up out of pity." My fists curled at my sides, nails biting into my palms. "I may know why you said but I can still hear you saying it. Over and over."
His face crumpled, the color draining from it. "I know," he whispered, almost choking on the words. "God, Dec, I know. I hate myself for it. I was trying to convince her. I was desperate to keep you away from her, do you understand? I panicked. I grabbed for anything that would make it believable. Everything she ever said about any woman who even looked at me, I threw it at you. I repeated her poison word for word. I wanted her to think you meant nothing so she wouldn't touch you." His voice cracked, trembling. "I didn't mean a single syllable, but I know what it sounded like. I know what it did to you, and I will carry that for the rest of my life."
"I didn't deserve this!" I screamed, the sound ripping out of me like it had claws. My whole body shook, my fists hammering the empty air between us. "I didn't deserve any of this, Ryder! I did nothing wrong! NOTHING! All I did was love you!" My voice cracked so hard it hurt. "I gave you everything I had, even when Ihad nothing left to give, and you—" My chest heaved. "You broke me. You broke me when I was already broken!"
My anger folded in on itself, collapsing under its own weight. My voice was hoarse, small now, frayed like old rope. "All I did was love you... All I did was love you..." The words came out as a sob, my face burning, my breath shuddering like it couldn't find a rhythm.
He stepped forward and pulled me in even as my fists thudded weakly against his chest. I let myself collapse against him, sobbing, the fight gone but the pain still raw and alive.
"I know," he whispered, his own tears hot against my hair. His voice was almost unrecognizable — rough, breaking, desperate. "I know, Dec. I'm so sorry. Forever sorry. I love you and if you let me.." He swallowed hard, his arms tightening around me. "If you let me, I will rewrite every bad memory. I'll spend a lifetime making it up to you in any shape or any form. I'll crawl if I have to. I'll try to become the man you thought you had. The man you deserved all along. "
"Please... let me in, Dec. Let me carry some of the weight I put on you. Let me love you the way I should have."
Chapter 25: Tiny Choices
The following three days slipped into a strange rhythm. I worked, went home, and avoided Ryder. He did the same. It wasas though we had both agreed to circle each other, nursing our wounds in silence, close enough to feel each other's presence, but never daring to meet head-on.
After that evening, after the tears and the clinging embraces that wrung us both dry, we had calmed down enough to walk back home together. The air between us had been thick with things unsaid. Since then, Ryder had thrown himself into the workshop with an almost feverish energy.
Billy mentioned it casually, but his tone carried a hint of worry. Ryder was "working on something," he said, though he wouldn't explain what. The speed at which he was learning, pushing himself, was almost alarming. Every time I passed the workshop door, I heard the faint whir of polishing wheels, the clean scrape of files against metal, and Ryder's low mutters of concentration. It wasn't noise so much as a rhythm.
At home, our interactions had shrunk to bare essentials: a nod in the kitchen, a murmured "good night," the sound of footsteps moving from one room to another. And yet, even in that fragile distance, I could feel the gravity between us, like two magnets turned the wrong way, pushing apart, yet straining toward the moment when one of us would finally shift.
On the third day, I stood in the kitchen, blender humming, pouring a white smoothie into a glass. The color reminded me of calmness, like a white flag raised between us. I carried it with me, my mind still heavy from therapy earlier that afternoon. My therapist had made me pause, made me see what I'd been doing: bracing myself so tightly against hurt that I couldn't move forward at all. The truth was, the hurt was already there, pulsing. Being near him might not erase it, but maybe... maybe it could start to mend it.
I pushed open the workshop door. Heat and the faint tang of solder drifted out, sharp and metallic, mingling with the sweeter notes of polish and resin. The air shimmered with dust motes that caught the light, and everywhere I looked, benches gleamed with scattered gemstones, tiny files, spools of wire, and half-finished pieces catching the glow from the lamps. It smelled of fire and silver, of creation itself. Ryder was bent over the bench, sleeves rolled up, his hands steady as he worked. When he looked up and saw me, his face broke into the biggest smile I'd seen from him in weeks.
"Heyy...That's my signature," he said, nodding toward the glass I held.
"Yeah, sorry," I replied with a small grin, stepping closer. "I had to borrow it today."
He raised a brow, wiping his palms on a rag. "It's white," he said, almost like a question.
I shifted the glass between my hands, feeling its cool weight. "Sharp, Sherlock," I laughed, though my voice trembled at the edges. "Yes, it's white. It's...a peace offering."
He tilted his head, the lines around his eyes softening. "So, what are you saying, Dec?" His voice gentled as he spoke, cautious but hopeful.
I swallowed hard, staring at the glass instead of him. "I'm saying I'm tired. Tired of feeling pain, anger, hurt—all the time. Tired of waiting... maybe we can change that." My fingers tightened around the glass before I added, quieter, "And also... I'm sorry. For getting so intense with you the other night and maybe making it worse."
He took the glass, his eyes unreadable but softer than they'd been in days.
"Don't apologize, Dec." His voice was steady, kind, almost too gentle for the heaviness in my chest. "You bottled those feelings for over a year. They were bound to come out."
I smiled, the air between us taut with something unspoken. My eyes wandered to the workbench—a scattering of tools, a half-finished piece of glass, and, beside him, a small chain threaded with a pale gem that caught the light. I moved suddenly to have a closer look and Ryder flinched and my chest twisted.
