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His eyes were the most tormented things Mei-li had ever seen. “That’s why,” he added softly. “That’s why. God knows what was in my heart. And now you. I never told anyone else the truth, not even Bree. She might have suspected, but I never told her.”
Mei-li walked toward him. “God doesn’t work that way,” she said, brushing a shock of brown hair out of Dirk’s eyes, then letting her fingers caress his cheek. “He doesn’t. He didn’t take Bree’s life to make you pay—that just happened. Bad things happen to good people, Dirk. You know that. I’m a perfect example. And God didn’t allow Blackwood to arrange your daughters’ kidnapping as a way of punishing you. That’s all on Blackwood.”
“But—”
She placed her fingers against his mouth to cut him off. “No. I won’t let you blame yourself for this.” Her mind was racing, trying to figure out what to do, what to say, to convince him. “Survivor’s guilt, Dirk. That’s what you’re feeling. Your wife died and you lived, and because you couldn’t save her you feel guilty about it. So you’ve built this all up in your mind as God punishing you for something you did that is a perfectly human reaction to a situation not of your making.”
She let her emotions free. “Did you make Lyon rape that other girl?” she asked fiercely, grasping his upper arms, feeling them tense against her touch. “No. Did you make him try to rape Bree? No, again. Did you make him turn the knife on you? No, a third time. You did what you had to do to protect yourself and Bree. You cannot know what you would have done if he’d dropped the knife!”
Suddenly she was in his arms, held so tightly she could barely breathe. But she wrapped her arms around him in return, knowing he needed this from her more than she needed her next breath.
Eventually his hold slackened, and she gulped in air. Still in his embrace, she forced herself to a calmness she was far from feeling. “Bree died,” she said, feeling the shudder that ran through his entire body. “Just like Sean died. Those things happened, and we just have to live with them. But that doesn’t mean our lives are over. And it doesn’t mean we can’t find happiness again.”
Dirk raised his head and stared down at her, and she knew he could see the tears trembling in her eyes. “You’re a good man, Dirk,” she whispered. “You are. Are you perfect? Of course not. No one is. But you’re a good man. And you have so much love to give...if you just let yourself.”
Chapter 17
Afterward, Mei-li could never remember how they ended up in her bedroom. One kiss had led to another. And another. Then one thing had led to another. And another. And suddenly they were standing next to her bed.
“Let me,” she whispered, tugging his shirt loose from his pants and stripping it off over his head. “Let me.” Then her hands were roaming his chest, her fingers sliding through the silky thatch of golden-brown chest hair, finding his beaded nipples and toying with them. This is my seduction, she was telling him with each kiss, each caress. You just have to let yourself enjoy it.
Her hands slid down and found his belt buckle, and he sucked in his breath as she loosened his belt, undid his jeans and unzipped his zipper.
He whispered her name, and it was both a question and a surrender.
“Let me,” she breathed, as her lips sought his again, her tongue luring his into an intimacy she’d only ever allowed with one person before. At the same time, one hand slipped into the opening of his jeans, burrowed beneath soft cotton and found him. He was already hard and needy, his erection threatening to escape the boundaries of cotton and denim. Mei-li stroked and Dirk groaned his pleasure into her mouth.
Then he cursed and pulled away. “I can’t.” He was breathing as if he’d been running, and he was still hard, so she knew that despite his words he could...but did he want to?
“I want to,” he whispered, cradling her cheeks with hands that weren’t quite steady, answering the question her eyes had silently asked. “God knows I want to, but I—” He laughed abruptly. “No condoms. I never thought I’d need them.”
The relief she felt was all out of proportion to his statement. “It’s okay,” she reassured him softly. “I’m on birth control. To regulate my system,” she was quick to add, not wanting him to think she made a habit of sleeping with men she barely knew.
