Page 94 of Declan

“I found her before I went into the Marines. I needed my birth certificate. My adoption was closed like hers. When I saw I was a multiple, I started looking. The day I went to see her, I stood across the street and watched her. It was her graduation party. She looked so happy, I didn’t want to ruin that. I was so messed up I didn’t want her to see me. I didn’t have the life she had. When our parents died, the Meyers adopted her immediately. I was bounced around from one foster home to the next. In and out of boys’ homes between. I didn’t want her to know. She was sunlight and smiles. I was nothing more than a hoodlum whose only option was to join the military or be homeless, in jail, or running some game on the street. She lived in an upper-middle-class neighborhood with a bright future so I stayed away.

“And when I saw her again, she was with the CIA. I sat across the table from her while she did my interview before I took a long-term undercover assignment. She was right there, still sunlight and smiles. And I was nothing more than a highly trained government assassin with more marks on my soul than I could count. I had a dead wife and daughter and I didn’t want one damn thing to do with my sister. I didn’t want to know her, I didn’t want her to know me, I wanted far away from everything she was.”

Declan’s face twisted into an angry grimace and his chest rose and fell with every shallow breath he took. I didn’t know how to help him, how to take his pain away, which I’d have gladly done. I’d absorb every ounce of it if it meant he’d feel the same peace he’d offered me.

I reached for his hand, untangled his fingers from my hair, then laced them together and held tight, silently begging for him to continue.

And after a few more moments, he did.

“After I turned my back on her, she still protected me. She was willing to give up her life to protect my cover. Jesus fuck, how do I make that right? She betrayed her oath for me. She could be dead right now, she would be dead right now if it wasn’t for Jaxon and Zane. And still, what do I do? I keep her at arm’s length. I refuse to let her near me, to get to know me because I’m still that fucked-up eighteen-year-old boy not wanting to tarnish all her goodness. I do that knowing it guts her. So, baby, I get it. I understand why you’re struggling with Emerson. All I can tell you is, it’s your choice, and whatever you decide, I’m with you.”

Declan stared down at me, his jaw tight, but still, I saw the tic under his right eye. Eyes that incidentally were blazing red, something I was coming to understand they did when he was pissed. When he was relaxed, not-pissed-off—because I couldn’t say Declan was ever really truly happy, so the best you got was not-totally-pissed—they were more brown than red. But right then, they were red, they were hard, his jaw was clenched, and I hated that. I just didn’t know what to do to make it better.

“Dec—”

“We need to get going, the team’s waiting,” he cut me off.

“Maybe we—”

“Not now.” His tone was firm and left no room for argument, yet still weirdly gentle.

He wasn’t biting my head off but he made it clear the conversation was over. I could give him that. Besides, it gave me time to come up with a way to help him. I figured I didn’t need all that much time, because I knew what I needed to do. I was just too scared to do it.

Growing up, my dad had given me and Emmy a lot of advice, he’d give us words of wisdom, and always had time to teach his girls important lessons. One of those was: always lead by example. Another thing he’d drilled into us was: only a weak-minded person lives by the saying, do as I say, not as I do.

Which meant, before I offered my opinion or advice, I’d better be ready to follow it. And I wasn’t sure I was ready to face Emmy, so I needed to keep my mouth shut about Violet. Even though I wanted him to talk to her. He would never agree, but he needed her. Maybe more than she needed him. By the sound of it, she’d grown up in a good home surrounded by family. Declan had not. So, yeah, he needed her. And I was going to make sure he had her. As soon as I found the gumption to fix things with Emmy.

“Okay,” I agreed and he blinked. I ignored his surprise and continued. “Do I have time for a shower or is this one of those, pull my hair into a ponytail and get a move on it times?”

He blinked again, this time slower, then muttered a painful, “Fuck.”

“Well? Which it?”

“Just like that. Fucking hell.”

I didn’t answer because I didn’t think it was a question nor did he need confirmation that yes, indeed, it was just like that. He’d asked for the topic to drop, therefore I dropped it. It was the least I could do when he did the same for me.

“You take an hour to get ready?”

That was a question, one that I deemed idiotic since he already knew what kind of woman I was, and that was not the kind who needed an hour.

“Right. You jump in the shower and I’ll make coffee.”

That was disappointing, I’d rather him shower with me. At that thought, my hand spasmed in his and he gave me a quizzical look. I wasn’t touching on the topic of how I’d gone from a reclusive, shut-out with steel-reinforced walls, to a woman who wanted intimacy. Or more accurately, I craved intimacy with Declan.

How freaking weird was that?

“I’ll just be a few minutes,” I told him.

“Everything all right?”

“Peachy.”

Declan didn’t believe that for one second but just like I’d done for him, he dropped it, bent forward, brushed his lips on mine, and said, “You know it’s you, right?”

“Me what?” I whispered.

“The only one who’s strong enough to take scraps, the fragments, the remnants I have left and patch them together. I’ll never be whole in the way normal people are. There will always be chunks missing. But you’ve shown me those missing pieces don’t have to be black holes. They can be there, I can mourn them, I can miss them, and now I can acknowledge them and move on. There’s no one else, Autumn, just you, baby. Only you.”