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She trembled against me but pressed a kiss to my chest. “I want to hear it. Please, Zayde.” Her hand dipped lower until her finger was tracing across my scar, so fucking carefully.
“The night it happened…fuck…this is—” I had to pause, squeezing my eyes shut. Talking about anything deep went against my nature, but she was the one person that I’d do this for. And fuck it, she deserved to know. “You need to know that I’m not blaming you for any of this, baby. My actions were my responsibility, okay? No one else. Just me.”
When she nodded, I resumed stroking her hair, my fingers sifting through the long, silky strands. The action calmed me enough that I could tell her the rest. “After everything, and when I was confronted with what I’d done to you and how much you hated me—with good reason—I was in so much fucking pain. I’m not comparing it to yours, but I’m…fuck.” Why was it so fucking difficult to get the words out? Saying how I was feeling out loud went against every single one of my instincts. “I’m telling you how I felt. I…I fucking brokethat night.”
“Oh, Zayde.” She exhaled against my chest. “I want you to tell me, and I know you’re not comparing. Just tell me.”
“Cade took me home after everything had happened. He didn’t know about you and me, obviously, but we were all shaken up and left fucking reeling by what had happened, and he thought I was falling apart for the same reason he was. It was true, but I knew I’d lost you that night, too. He kept telling me over and over that it was an accident, but I blamed myself, and…fuck, I was in a really bad place.”
Fallon’s fingers continued tracing across the jagged scar, a physical reminder of what I’d done to myself.
“When everyone had fallen asleep, I went back there. Everything was covered in tape, and the house was a charred, wrecked ruin. I couldn’t get anywhere near it because they had police everywhere. But even seeing it from a distance…it really hit home. I’d have done anything to turn back time, but I couldn’t, and it was too fucking late.
“I rode my bike for a while, and I ended up back at the waste ground behind the block of flats I used to live in. I sat there until the sun came up, thinking of how everything had gone to shit because of me. I should never have been born. Then maybe my mum wouldn’t have died so young, maybe Tim would still be alive, and maybe you would’ve found someone good to be with, someone that was the complete fucking opposite of me. Someone who was nice, and kind, and fucking treated you like the queen you are.”
Her fingers stilled, and her gaze flew to mine, wide and horrified. “No. No. No. No. How can you say that? You’re…please tell me you don’t still feel that way.”
Telling her all of this was so fucking hard, but she needed to know every single ugly, twisted part of me. “I don’t…most of the time. I wish I could go back and change things, and I wish you were happy. The selfish part of me always wished it could be with me, but I know that you deserve so much better than a man as fucked up as I am inside.”
Fallon shook her head, her eyes filling with tears. “Zayde. I’veneverwanted anyone else. I know that our situation is all messed up right now, but I need you to know that you…you’re amazing. You’re loyal, and you’d do anything for the people you care about. Your experiences have made you who you are—made you into the man lying here with me right now, and there’s nothing I would change about you.” She paused, her hand coming up to stroke through my hair. “Nina, my therapist, always tells me that we can’t change the past, and we’re not responsible for how other people perceive us. What we need to do is to learn to accept ourselves and the things we can’t change and to learn to love ourselves.”
I was silent for a long time before I managed to reply. “I don’t hate myself…but I’m not sure I can ever love myself.” Taking her hand, I placed it back on the scar. “By the time I got back to the house, I was so fucking overwhelmed by everything that had happened and what my fucking brain was telling me. All my usual coping mechanisms had turned to ash. The only thing I could think was that I needed to hurt, and it had to be somewhere no one would see. The others would’ve noticed if I started covering up all the time inside the house. I took one of my knives into my bathroom—one with a serrated blade—stripped down, sat on the floor, and sliced.”
Fallon’s lip trembled, and a tear tracked its way down her cheek. “You don’t have to deal with feeling this way alone. Ever.” Her voice was so fucking quiet and shaky. “Can I give you Nina’s details, or will you at least think about it? Please? She’ll see you, Zayde.”
Catching her tear with my thumb, I cupped her chin. “Yeah, baby, I’ll think about it.”
“Thank you.” She leaned forwards to press her lips against mine. Then she shifted down the bed until her mouth was hovering right above my scar. “I know kissing it better doesn’t really work, but I’m going to do it anyway. I-if that’s okay.”
“It’s okay.”
Softly, carefully, she kissed across my scar, from one end to the other, and then up onto my IV tattoo, which was just above it. When she raised her head, she was smiling through her tears. “This feels right. You and me, taking care of each other. I know we have a lot of things to get through, but I feel like I might finally be ready to face it. Ready to let go of the things I’ve been holding on to for so long.”
“Come here,” I said gruffly. This was so fucking monumental. I’d opened up to her, and she had accepted everything, and she was giving us a chance. I couldn’t get my head around it. What had I done to deserve a second chance with this incredible girl?
She curled into my arms, resting her head back on my chest. “Z? I want to tell you something. In case you still had any doubts about my loyalty—”
“I don’t.” There wasn’t one single doubt in my mind.
“That’s good, but I still want to tell you. Do you know why I was at the abandoned house that night? I wanted to get out of my house before my parents got home, but I was too late. I ran into them in the kitchen, and they weren’t happy with me. I guess I’d ruined their plans for the evening, and my dad said something about me ducking out of school on a whim. He said that my brothers were of age, and he couldn’t punish them for my actions, so he—he hit me with the buckle of his belt.” Her voice cracked, and I wanted to kill that bastard for daring to lay his hands on my angel. “He hit me quite a few times, and I was b-bleeding, and I had to get out, to come and find you and T-Tim.”
“I. Am. Going. To. Kill. Him.”
Inhaling a deep, shuddering breath, she pressed her body into mine. “The medical staff…they said I was lucky that it only left a few little scars.”
“Scars?” I spoke through gritted teeth.
“Yes.” Sitting up, she turned around so her back was to me. “See them? At the bottom of my back.”
Leaning forwards, I traced a finger across the small, silvery lines. My fingers were fucking shaking with rage. Howdarehe mark her?
I moved to kiss the scars, like she’d done for me. When I lifted my head, she turned back around, and I tugged her back into my arms, holding her tight while I attempted to calm myself enough to speak. “You’re beautiful, every bit of you. And he will pay for what he did.”
“He’s in prison now. The next part…after the, um, the accident. I don’t remember much. Just flashes. Um. I’d never seen him so angry before. I suppose I couldn’t blame him after what happened to-to Tim, but do you know what? He blamedme. Said if I hadn’t been there that night, if I’d just stayed at school like I was supposed to, Tim would be alive.”
That fucking piece of scum. How fucking dare he? “It wasn’t your fault. Notanyof it.”
“I know. Well, there’s still a tiny part of me that blames myself. But Nina helped me to see that I wasn’t at fault for it or for what he did before and after.”
