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“This right here.” He raises a hand. “This is why you terrify me.”
I frown, a strange emotion rising in my chest. “What are you talking about?”
He stares at me for a long moment, his eyes strange and remote. “I could worship you. I could give up the God I love. For you.”
I swallow. “I’d never ask you to do that.”
His lips tighten into a twisted smile. “I know you wouldn’t. That’s why you’re so remarkable, my Mariana. You called to my heart the same way God did four years ago. Except I wasn’t afraid of him. I’m afraid of you.”
“What are you afraid of?”
His eyes drift from the top of my head to my toes, then back up again. “I already threw my principles into the wind because I coveted you. I’m afraid of becoming so greedy for you that I’ll suffocate you. I have this wicked impulse to bind you and keep you all to myself.” His voice grows hushed. “Forever.”
When I smile and take a step in his direction, his expression grows almost fearful. Is he worried he’s not going to be able to stop himself from touching me?
Good.
“That doesn’t scare me,” I say. “No man could bind me if I didn’t want him to. If you’re able to keep me with you forever, it’s because I want to be there.”
He swallows. “You say that now. But who knows how you’d feel years from now. After graduate school. After giving your youth away to be with an old—”
“Brandon, if you call yourself an old man one more time, I might hit you.”
His lips quirk slightly, but that somber expression remains.
I let out a long breath, feeling like my spirit is drifting away with it. “You should go back inside before anyone notices you’re gone. And I think we should try not to interact at all at the wedding tomorrow.”
His dark eyes fill with pain, but he doesn’t say any more.
ChapterThirty-Three
Brandon
The salt-laced breeze brushes against my skin as I stand in front of the gathered crowd. Livvy and Cole have been beaming at each other since the moment they took their positions at the altar, but my gaze keeps drifting to my left.
Mariana.
Her lilac dress dances in the wind. She’d probably wear something like that to her own wedding—something light and bright just like her.
Our wedding.
It would be just the two of us, because my willful Mariana would probably decide to do it on a passionate impulse, like the night I baptized her. Maybe we’d do it at that very spot on the beach. At sunset of course, just like that magical night that changed my life forever.
“You’re going to have to officiate your own wedding, Pastor,” she’d say in that playful voice.
When mist rises to my eyes, I take a deep breath, pulling my attention back to the wedding. Longing won’t do me any good, and there’s a job to do, after all.
“I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty happy about this breeze.” My voice carries over the rhythmic pulse of the ocean. “If I sweat any more in this suit, this could become a really uncomfortable ceremony. For all of us.”
A few people chuckle, probably out of relief that I’m not going to deliver a fire and brimstone sermon at a wedding.
“We’ve come together on this beautiful day to celebrate something so special, so profoundly human. Love.”
Don’t look her way. Don’t do it.
I keep my eyes fixed on Livvy as she smiles up at Cole. He looks at her with heavy-lidded eyes, his smile faint. His hands tremble slightly at his sides. He looks like he can’t even believe his good fortune at getting to marry this woman.
I know exactly what he’s feeling.
