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Holy cluckaduck. Is it weird that I find Kayden super sexy dressed up like that? Maybe I have a fetish for tacos, and I didn’t even realize it.
Kayden digs deep into his taco costume of glory and hands me a note with hands that resemble lettuce and cheese. I unfold it, and when I scan it, my stomach sinks past my toes to land in a pile of oh, no, holy shit, she DID NOT right on the front step.
Sadie. I have no idea how she could have written this.
“Don’t be mad,” Kayden cautions. He can probably see my face turning a vivid shade of purple. “She was just trying to help, and I’m glad she told me.”
Before he can go on about things that are best said without the entire neighborhood hearing them, I grab him by the taco arm and haul him inside. He doesn’t fit through the door, though, and it takes some wrangling of that crispy shell before he pops through.
“I want you to know,” Kayden says, shutting the door behind him before continuing, “I’ve made my stance clear. To my dad, I mean. Once I found out, we talked, and I made him see how wrong it was, what he did. My dad doesn’t want to lose me. It’s going to be a long road to repairing our relationship, but I guess we’re in it for the long haul. My dad needs some time to think clearly, but he’s taking the first steps toward that. He wants you to know he’s sorry. He would have come here to tell you himself, but I made him promise not to do that.”
“Ugh, great,” I moan. “Now he hates me for sure.”
“Nope.” Kayden’s taco face moves back and forth as he shakes his head. “He doesn’t. He never did. It wasn’t about you as a person so much as it was an abstract idea my dad had.”
“Thanks. That makes me feel so much better.”
Kayden’s cheesy hand slips out and takes mine, making my heart flutter madly again. “My dad didn’t know about any of this. He didn’t know you were the reason I came here and that you were the reason I convinced him to buy the factory. He had no idea my heart was destroyed by what he did and that when he threw down his ultimatum, he was ultimately the one responsible for me coming here to fix it. He was the one who told me to get my shit together, so I did. The only way I could have.”
“So, you expect me to believe that after all these years and those threats, your dad is just sorry, and everything is fine?”
“No. I mean, he is sorry. He actually broke down when I made him realize how much he’d hurt me. He was standoffish at first, but when I started really getting into it, he realized the full impact he’d had on both of our lives. When I told him I’d been empty for nearly a decade, that’s when he broke and admitted he was wrong. He never wanted to hurt me. He wanted to protect me, but he went about it in a terrible way—the worst way anyone could ever have. Threatening you and breaking your heart to save me and also the family was the worst thing he could have ever done. Our family didn’t need saving, and I didn’t need saving. Not from you. I needed you, Rea. I’ve always needed you. I still need you. So freaking desperately that I’m willing to do anything for another chance.”
“Kayden, I—”
“I’m so sorry for what happened, Rea. I truly, truly am.”
I can tell he really is. His face is so sincere in the taco costume that it melts my heart, and the waterworks are becoming a serious threat. I want to be one of those tough holdout people who can punish someone into infinity because it’s what the world and society say we should do to protect ourselves, but the more sensible part of me—call it my heart maybe—knows acting that way won’t bring about anything but misery and heartache. I really am scared because I have no idea how we’d work any of this out, but maybe we can treat this like an amber light and move forward with the ultimate caution.
“It wasn’t your fault.” I grasp Kayden’s hand back since he’s still holding mine. “It wasn’t your fault at all. You couldn’t change who you were. Maybe I should have told you. It wasn’t that I didn’t trust you. I guess I was trying to protect you too because I didn’t want you to have to choose between your family and me. That would have just turned our happiness into a big poo pile, which I couldn’t have handled. I was just trying to keep you safe, and I thought me leaving was the only way.”
