Page 111 of Running to You

“That explains your fear of making decisions. The way you so often bow to her wishes and rely on the counsel of others.” Like friends. Cult leaders…

“Yeah.”

“Thank you for telling me.” He stood and joined her, placing his hands on her hips. He lowered his forehead to rest against hers. “I’m sorry for what happened to you. Thank you for trusting me with it.”

She gazed up, eyes red from emotion. What he saw wasn’t sadness but hope.

“Can I tell you the truth?” he asked.

Worry crossed her features, so he pulled her close, wanting to reassure her. When she was nestled against his chest, he said what he was thinking. “It doesn’t make me like your mother any more.”

She didn’t pull away. The sound she made was more humorless laugh than anything. “You would have loved my father, though.” She leaned back, and her smile lifted her face. “He was a good man.”

“I believe that.” He took her hand and urged her back to the sofa.

Eliza nestled against his side again. “He told me a million times that Kristen’s death wasn’t my fault. And Mom’s tactics, so effective when I was young, became obvious to me over the years. I recognized the manipulation. Dad encouraged me to make my own decisions, even if they were opposed to what she said. Even if they were mistakes. That’s why he wanted me to work for him. He taught me to run things, to learn to make decisions and live with them, and realize wrong ones wouldn’t kill me—or anybody else.”

He sounded like a good man, a lot like Sam’s father. “I wish I’d met him.”

“When he died, I was shocked to find that he’d left the business to me. He said in his will that he trusted me to take care of Mom. But all that responsibility… It was the grief, and the weight of all those people depending on me, that had me backsliding. Leaning on Mom again.”

“Is that why you sold the business?”

“No. Honestly, it wasn’t my dream. I liked working for Dad, but when he was gone, it was time for me to move on. Dad had been my rock, which I realize now… Depending on Dad was no better than depending on Mom. And when I started to pull away from her, I turned to you. And then Jed and Lola.” Her sigh brushed through his whiskers. “In the last year, I’ve learned not to lean on people but to depend on God.”

Oh.

That was new. Sam had been praying for Eliza for so long—for her safety and her salvation. Seemed like God had listened.

“I hired you against her wishes,” Eliza said. “And I started dating you against her wishes. So I was standing up for myself.”

She shifted away to face him and took his hand. “I know you don’t like my mother, and I don’t blame you. But I came to realize it wasn’t that Mom didn’t like you. She didn’t want me to marry anybody. It was a little—”

“Selfish?” He should shut up. But he added, “Hateful?”

Eliza smiled. “She’s still my mom.”

“Sorry.” Why were they still talking about Linda? What did she have to do with anything? With the story she’d told him? With the mysterious Levi?

“Mom was terrified I was going to leave her,” Eliza said. “After Dad’s death, I think she was afraid of being alone. It doesn’t make her behavior okay. I’m just saying that I saw it. I wasn’t going to let her ruin my life.” She stared down at their joined hands. “I loved you.” She looked up, held his eye contact. “I loved you so much. You were pulling away from me, and maybe I did blame you a little for what happened to Dad’s company. Maybe I was preparing for when you’d leave me.”

“Never,” he said.

She sighed. “The point is, I want you to know, I need you to know… If you’d proposed…”

He stilled. And suddenly, everything seemed very quiet, as if even the air waited for her to finish her sentence.

“I would have said yes.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Eliza wanted to dip her head again, to hide from Sam’s reaction to her words.

Because he said nothing. For an agonizing moment, he just stared at her. And she knew all this kindness, his calling her sweetheart and holding her close… She knew it didn’t mean what she wanted it to mean. He didn’t love her anymore. He didn’t want her.

But then he cradled her face in his palms and kissed her.

Softly at first, maybe waiting to see if she’d pull away. As if she had the strength. As if this wasn’t what she’d been dreaming of, longing for, for five years.