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“I went to her first,” I say. “I gave her an opportunity I don’t give anyone. Then, after everything in front of the mirror, I asked her to stay because I couldn’t take another fucking loss last night.”
Cade’s eyes hold mine. “What did she say?”
“She asked whether I was sure that was what I wanted.”
“That sounds like she gave you the choice,” Rider says.
“She did.”
I look down at the glass between my hands.
“I waited for her to see me. She looked right at my face, and I waited for her to notice the blood, the humiliation, or any piece of what the night had done to me. She searched for whether I regretted touching her. She wanted to know what my silence meant for her, and I watched her miss me while looking directly at me.”
No one attempts to defend her.
The lack of argument hurts worse than one would have.
“I told her I didn’t want to be alone,” I continue. “She heard that I wanted her to stay. She never heard everything I stopped asking her to see.”
Cade rubs one hand over his mouth. “That’s why you’ve been distant.”
“I resent the fuck out of her.”
Saying it aloud sends guilt straight through the center of the anger, but I refuse to take it back.
“I resent that I needed her for once and still ended up carrying both of us. I resent that she can describe every way she used my love, own every lie, and stand in front of a mirror facing something that almost killed her, but she still cannot hear me when I’m the one saying I can’t take any more.”
“She may not have understood what you were asking for,” Easton says.
“That’s the problem.”
He nods slowly.
“I don’t need Charm to read my fucking mind,” I say. “I told her I was barely holding it together. I came to her bleeding and asked her to walk with me. How much clearer do I have to make pain before she stops searching for what it means about her?”
“You shouldn’t have to beg someone to notice you’re hurting,” Briggs says.
My throat tightens. “I already spent our first relationship begging her to notice I was the only one fighting.”
Cade finally pours his own drink. “Do you regret last night?”
“No.”
The answer comes without hesitation.
“I don’t regret letting her into my room, telling her the truth, or what happened in front of the mirror. I watched her reclaim a piece of herself I don’t think she had ever seen without hating. I got comfort from it too. Her body against mine, her trust, and waking up with her still in my arms gave me something I needed.”
I turn the glass slowly between my fingers.
“That’s what makes the resentment feel so fucking ugly. I knew I was betraying myself while I did it, and I took the comfort anyway. She loves me. I know that now.”
“But?” Cade asks.
“She still doesn’t love me the way I need when I am the one falling apart.”
The fire shifts in the distance, throwing sparks into the night while Charm laughs softly at something Bliss says.
“She has healed so much,” I continue. “I see it everywhere. She owns the boutique, built a life outside her father, and says what she wants without checking the room first. She stood beside me publicly all weekend and made it clear I was with her. Last night, she gave me every ugly truth I spent fifteen months believing she would never be brave enough to admit.”
