AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Burning eyes.
And my heart—it was screaming his name.
But still, something held me back.
“What changed? You were gone for weeks, and you didn’t say a word.” I looked around the entryway. “What does this mean?”
His chest expanded on a deep inhale, and he took another step closer. Close enough that he could’ve reached out. I could’ve too.
“I had to make peace with a few things,” he admitted. “It wasn’t easy. And I might not be done with it—I might be working on it for the rest of my life—but I’d rather do it with you.” His face was so heartbreakingly earnest, so determined. “I don’t deserve your forgiveness, Charlotte, I know that.”
A tear slid down my cheek. “No one deserves forgiveness, Burke. That’s why it matters so much. None of us deserve grace for our mistakes, but if you love someone”—my voice trembled—“you give it anyway.”
His shoulders slumped in relief. He took another step.
“Make a home with me here, Charlotte,” he said simply. “Make a life with me. All this time, nothing felt right, and nothing else has given me a purpose or made me feel like I belonged. Because it wasn’t a place I was missing. It was you.”
My stomach trembled, like I was standing on the edge of a tightrope. Nothing below me. Nothing to hold on to.
What I wanted to do was leap into his arms, let his mouth lock into place over mine. I wanted him to catch me because I was nervous to leap.
He saw all of it in my face. And what I saw in his was just exactly how much this meant to him.
How muchImeant to him.
“Don’t be scared,” he whispered.
“You’re the first thing I’ve ever lost that I wasn’t sure I could live without,” I admitted, tears coursing down my face. “Do you know how terrifying that is?”
Burke took the final step. He moved to where I was, coming closer when I wasn’t sure I could, because all along he’d been the one to run when it got to be too much.
But he wasn’t running anymore. And I needed to see that.
“Yes, I do.” He settled his nose against my hair and breathed. “It’s how I felt, even before we left the hotel.”
He slid his hands up my arms, grazing his lips over my forehead while I cried quiet tears.
“We both need some fixing, Burke.” My hand spread over his chest, and when I looked up into his face, he exhaled quietly. His thumb brushed underneath my eye, wiping at my tears so gently. “But I’d rather do that together, wouldn’t you?”
My hands clutched at his shirt as my soul took its first deep breath in weeks. His frame shook as he pulled me into his arms and inhaled deeply at the crown of my head.
“Yes, Charlotte, that’s exactly what I want.”
We stood there, holding each other, for a long, soul-sighing moment.
“I still have my job,” I said, my voice thick and full. “I leave in a couple of weeks.”
His hands glided up the length of my spine. “And I will come see you every weekend,” he promised. “We’ll meet in the middle sometimes.Get a room at an inn that’ll serve horrible tea and tiny sandwiches, and we’ll have sex in a bed that will probably break.”
I exhaled a laugh. I could see it. It was the kind of life that I’d never even thought to imagine for myself.
We could have it all. His dream and mine.
Some new version of both—something better, something sweeter.
“You didn’t even ask which job I took,” I said quietly.
His gaze was direct when he answered. “It doesn’t matter. Our life can look however we want it to.”
