Page 68 of The Intimacy of Finding You

Callum’s hand stopped on my arm, and I wanted to tell him not to. I wanted to tell him to never stop. To never leave me, though that wouldn’t be fair because I’d left him. Hypocrite.

It only took him a second to start back up, whispering to me. “Okay. I don’t think I knew this.”

I kept my gaze on the ceiling, trying to get my breathing under control. “Well, a stepbrother. Mom got married again right after camp.” I hiccupped through a sob. “They called us brothers, though. ‘Cause we were so close. He was older. Fun. I-I trusted him. I liked him. I’d just gone through all that shit with Thompson and Crew, and it felt like I had a new best friend.”

Callum came in closer, pushing his arm beneath my head. I knew he wanted to hold me but was hesitant. I would’ve been, too.

“He was nice. Too nice. Thompson nice. But I didn’t think anythin’ of it ‘cause he was my brother, you know? But then he started playin’ this game with me. A bad one. A really bad one.”

“Tobi.” Callum’s voice cracked. “No, don’t tell me⁠—”

“He was the second person to ever hurt me like Thompson did. But nothin’ happened with Thompson, so why would something happen with Mason?”

“Mason. You’ve mentioned him.”

I closed my eyes, letting the tears fall from them. They were cold. So fucking cold. “Yeah. Thompson taught me what to expect, and Mason taught me to accept it. I learned it didn’t matter. I never told no one. Never even told my mom. It happened for a long time. Until he was eighteen and went off to the army.”

“You’ve never told anyone?”

“Only me, you, and Mason know what happened now. When he went off to the army, I thought I was safe. He jumped from station to station, never comin’ home. Not even when Mom divorced his dad.”

Callum pressed his forehead against my shoulder, taking in a shuddering breath. “You’ve just held it in all this time?”

“What else was I gonna do? Tell someone? And for what?” I sniffled. “It wouldn’t have made no difference. It wouldn’t have mattered.”

“How could so many people fail you?”

“I don’t know. Maybe it was on purpose. Maybe I was never meant to have justice.”

He shook his head. “No. No, everyone deserves justice. No one deserves to hold all of that in like that.”

But I had. For almost twenty years. “Remember the day I called my mom about Thanksgiving?”

“Yeah, I do. You left not too long after.”

“She told me Mason was comin’ home. He’d be there at Thanksgiving, even though he wasn’t a part of the family no more. She said he told her he was excited to see me. Excited to play that game with me we used to play when we were young.”

“Oh, my God,” he whispered.

I turned my head, pressing my nose into his hair. “I’d been waiting for the other shoe to drop. I was too happy with you. It was inevitable. And it did. The shoe did drop. And the shoe was fucking horrific, and it reminded me of all the bad things and the horrible people and the awful, horrible things I’d had to do.” I gripped the back of Callum’s neck, craving the warmth of him. Needing to feel his pulse beneath my skin. “I ran. I ran from my past. I ran from the good. I ran from the bad, and I ran straight to a new bad without even realizing it. I put myself back in the cycle, Cal. I did that to myself because I thought it was all I’d ever deserve. Thompson was the first, Mason was the second, but the cycle kept going, and things kept happening, and all I thought I was good for was violence. Misfortune. A life not even worth living.”

Callum lifted onto his arm, looking down at me. His lower lip was trembling as he cradled my face with one hand, his eyes searching all over. “No, baby. You were always worth so much more than that. They were in the wrong. You didn’t have to punish yourself for something they did. You are my everything. My everything good. My everything perfect. You are the love of my life. You were then, and you are now, and I promise. Fucking promise,” he pressed his forehead against mine. “That I’ll fight the bad with you. I promise I’ll fight the demons. I promise to show you what you deserve because you deserve the entire universe and so much more. If I could give you anything, I’d give you everything, and I’d fucking murder everyone who ever treated you differently.”

He loved me, didn’t he? He really loved me. He loved me so much that he didn’t cringe away from the bad. He loved me so deeply that he’d rather cradle my face and tell me that than let me suffer alone. He loved me just as I loved him. “I know. I trust you.”

“I feel so honored to have that trust.”

“Thank you for loving me.”

“Loving you is the easiest thing I’ve ever fucking done, Tobias Weaver. Loving you completes me. Not loving you was never an option.”

I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, touching my nose to his as I whispered. “I want to drink.”

“I know.”

“I thought about it all day. I thought about getting up and going out to get some.”

“I understand.”