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The man’s gaze moved over me, then shot a light-blue-eyed confused look at Smith before they settled on me again, recognizing, understanding.
He pushed away from the desk, moving to take a step toward me as my feet carried me forward.
I wasn’t sure what my plan was, what words I had wanted to say.
All I knew was something within me shattered when I was close to this man whose life I had ruined, whose family I had destroyed, whose future I had irrevocably changed because I hadn’t been strong enough to endure, hadn’t been brave enough to put a foot down, accept whatever consequences might come my way.
It was the pain of a thousand bones breaking all at once, reducing me to dust, stealing any strength left in my legs, sending me crumbling forward as the tears appeared and streamed out of nowhere.
“I’m so sorry.”
The words sobbed out of me as I fell.
Hands caught me before I hit the ground.
But not from behind.
Not the ever-present arms of Noah.
No.
These closed around me from in front of me, pulling me close to an unfamiliar chest that didn’t smell like sawdust.
I was pulled back up onto my feet, supported fully by his arm anchoring me to his chest, his other hand going to the back of my head as the words tumbled out over and over.
I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.
I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry. I’msosorry.
I was vaguely aware of a low, soothing sound of someone shushing me as my cheek rested on a shirt wet through with my tears.
“It’s okay,” Eli said when I was finally silent.
“It’s not,” I objected, pulling against his hold, scrubbing furiously at my cheeks, angry at myself for accepting comfort from a man from whom I didn’t deserve it.
“Don’t know how well you remember that night,” he said, tilting my chin up. “Can’t imagine it was well. You were barely conscious by the time I came upon you, face beaten unrecognizable. He was going to kill you,” he added. “I don’t know what he was on, but he was out of his mind. And he was going to kill you.”
“I lied on the stand,” I told him, trying to keep it together even if the urge to cry until I was dried out was almost overwhelming. “The only reason you lost almost a decade of your life was because of me.”
“No,” he said, shaking his head, giving me a small smile. “The reason I went to prison was because I beat a man. I was guilty of that, Jennifer,” he said, shrugging. “I was guilty of that hundreds of times over. I can’t even tell you how many men I have beaten in my life. And got off Scot-free. No consequences. Even when someone had to pull me off of someone before I killed them in my rage. Going away was only a matter of time. I’m glad if I had to go away, I did it for a reason. Not just because it was the family business. And I was too chickenshit to tell them that I wanted to follow a different path.”
“You might never have gone to prison if it wasn’t for me. You don’t know that.”
“Maybe not,” he agreed, knowing there was no way we could know what life had in store for us. “But if I didn’t go away when I did, my dog would never have been left alone outside a coffeeshop, this woman,” he said, waving a hand toward the woman at the desk behind him, “never would have taken him in, cared for him, let me know that he was okay. If you didn’t get on that stand, I never would have met Autumn. I would never have known love and happiness and a path that didn’t involve senseless violence that never came naturally to me.”
“You spent years of your life in a jail cell.”
“Made some interesting friends,” Eli said, giving me a smile that didn’t have any restraint, genuinely not holding onto any hard feelings. “Got good at art. Found the strength to tell my family I wanted a different life when I got out. Blessings come in unexpected packages sometimes, honey. Getting locked up, in the fucked up way that fate works, was the best thing that ever happened to me. So there’s no reason for you to feel so guilty. If there is one thing I’ve learned in life, it’s that shit happens for a reason. This all happened for a reason.”
He made it sound so easy to believe.
I wanted so badly to believe it.
“Listen, bitch,” a new voice entered the space from a back room, bringing with her the smell of Chinese food. “The next time you send me to pick up your food, the least you can do is put it under my name so they don’t have a shitfit like I am some Chinese food thief. Who pays for the food just to throw them off my scent. Oh, hey,” she said, dropping the bags on the counter with a flourish, reaching up to yank the hood off her head, revealing mermaid-colored hair. “It’s always fun when couples come in. Are you guys in the market for a good cock ring? I have some recommendations.”
