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His hands cupped my face, and he tilted my head back toward his. My hands wrapped around his, holding his palms to my skin. “I’ve never told you not to care about something, have I?”
A slow breath escaped me. “No.”
“Have I ever told you that any of your thoughts are ridiculous?” he pressed.
“No.”
“Then trust me, okay? Please?”
My eyes closed, and my face flushed. “When I was talking to Stewart, he said things. About me, when we were in bed. It’s embarrassing—I really don’t want to talk about it.”
“I know. Are you ever going to want to talk about it, though?” he asked.
“No,” I admitted.
He was quiet.
A sigh escaped me. “He said I was terrible in bed, okay? At sex. That I suck at it. And I mean, I never thought I was like a sex goddess or anything. But I never thought I was terrible. He cheated on me because I was shitty in the sack, and—”
“No.” Zed’s voice was hard.
My eyes opened.
“He cheated on you because he was a bastard,” the werewolf said. “Whether he liked the sex or not had nothing to do with his decision to treat you like shit, June. You had nothing to do with that decision. He chose to disrespect you in one of the worst ways, knowing your past, and absolutely not a drop of that blame is on your shoulders.”
My eyes closed again. “I knew you were going to say that.”
“Because it’s the damn truth,” he growled at me.
“He had no reason to lie when he was saying that I’m shitty at sex,” I protested.
“He had every reason to lie,” Zed countered. “You walked into that diner on the arm of an attractive, confident man. I don’t say that to be cocky, but because it’s a fact. You smiled. We kissed. When he knew you, you dodged him for months, and made him chase you. And based on what you’ve said, you weren’t happy. You may have had feelings for him, but he didn’t make you feel at home, like you do here.”
I nodded reluctantly.
“So you walked into that diner on my arm, happy, and beautiful. You’ve traveled the world, you’re done with school, you’re successful in a wild career that hardly anyone succeeds at, and as far as he could see, you were in love.”
He went on, “You think he didn’t have a reason to lie, just because the past was in the past. But in that moment, it wasn’t in the past—it was happening, right then. And you were successful and happy, and he was still working the same job, on his way to getting the same degree, and he was still an absolute fucker with so little respect for women that he’d cheat on the one he’d been talking about marriage with.”
“So what?” I shot back. “That doesn’t mean he lied.”
“He had power over you when you were together, June. You were sad, and lonely, and that gave him power. When he saw you in the diner, he realized he had lost that power—and he used the few things he knew he could still hurt you with to try to take it back.” Zed held up one finger. “Your past.” He added a second finger. “And the sex. All he had to do was fling facts you’d shared to hurt you with those, but hurting you with the sex was a hell of a lot easier; everyone’s sensitive about that shit. So he lied, and he hurt you, which was exactly what he wanted to do.”
Emotions rolled through me too fast to identify individually. He was probably right—I knew he was probably right.
But that didn’t take away my embarrassment.
“I don’t know what to believe, okay? All I know is that I feel like crap about all of it.” I gestured to my body.
“You don’t know what to believe? Believe me. I’ve been here this whole damn time. Can’t you trust me when I say that you’re incredible? That you’re beautiful, and sexy, and funny, and gorgeous? That you’re everything I could ever fucking want, and so much more that I ever could’ve imagined? You have scars, just like the rest of us, but they’ve made you so damn strong and so damn incredible. Believe me, June.” There was something in his voice that almost sounded like desperation.
My chest was too tight, though.
My emotions were too much of a whirlwind.
And that instinct to run was still on full-blast, pounding through my veins.
So I didn’t say anything.
