Page 131 of Lesson In Forgiveness

“Jasper could’ve told you from the start—”

“I wouldn’t have believed him. You have a suspicious mind, Tabitha—if you saw someone die, if you knew that person was dead, and you were told an hour, a day, a week later that actually, no, they didn’t really die… what would you think?”

“My first instinct would tell me they were lying. My second, that there was a trap.”

“Exactly. Ignoring my family cost me dearly, but you paid the price too. I wouldn’t have… you shouldn’t have been alone.” A muscle worked in his cheek. “My job as your Dom is to take care of you, Tabby. My job as the man who loves you is to love you, support you, be there for you. I didn’t do any of that. You’ve been alone all this time when I should have been by your side.”

Trust him to take the blame, she thought, in a situation where blame was redundant. Cocking her head, she gave him an easy smile. “I wasn’t alone, Grit.”

“I’m sure Jasper was an attentive nurse,” he said sarcastically.

“Jasper was a paranoid asshole,” she confirmed. “I lived through it. I’ve been through worse, Grit, and look where it brought me. Straight to you. This was just a bump in the road, right?” She waited until his eyes found hers. “Why haven’t you touched me yet?”

The darkness around them couldn’t hide his sorrow. The only comfort he’d offered her was the cup of his hand on her cheek; she got the impression that was just to prove she was real.

“This isn’t the first time I’ve had a conversation with you in the last four months, Tabitha. The dialogue is completely different,” he admitted, “but I’ve seen you, talked to you, lost myself in you, and every time, you fluttered away and left me alone again. Part of me knows you’re real; your skin is warm and tangible, your voice is clearer. But I’m afraid that if I touch you, if I touch you the way I desperately want to, you’ll flutter away again and leave me broken.”

Broken could be fixed, she told herself as her heart cracked. Look how damaged she’d been when she thrust herself into his life, compelled by her obsession to be near him. He hadn’t stuck Band-Aids on her boo-boos and expected her to be a fully functioning, normal woman; he’d taken the time to clean and stitch each nick and gaping slice Dominic left in her soul, healing her from the inside out.

It was her turn to discover how deep her patience, her compassion, her love for him ran, and repair the damage she’d caused—however inadvertently—by her actions.

She held her arms out to the sides. “I’m right here, Rory. I’m all yours.”

His breath shuddered out. Warily, as though afraid they might pass through her like a ghost, he raised his hands and set them on her bare shoulders. A moan rippled on the air when skin met skin, growing fervent as they trailed down her arms.

He was trembling, she realized. Her big, strong, unshakeable Dom was trembling for her.

One moment, he was stroking her arms.

The next, she was yanked against his chest, his arms banded like steel cables around her back. Instinct made her freeze, her internal system switching to flight or fight mode before she made a conscious effort to recognize him as her lover, not a threat.

Grit hugged her tightly, his face pressed to her hair. The raggedness of his breath told her he was on the edge, so it wasn’t a surprise when she felt a sob heave through his lungs. “God.”

The wealth of emotion in that single word was powerful enough to make her knees weak. If she ever doubted how much he loved her, if his feelings for her were real, that one word dispelled every doubt past, present, and future.

“Grit. Grit, look at me.” She waited until he found the strength to lift his head, then cradled his bearded face in her hands. This was the man who’d once been the enemy, then a toy, then the obsession who became not only her world, but the sun and the stars and the universe they existed in. “Am I real now?”

“Yes. Fuck, yes.”

Tabitha blew out a quiet breath and pressed her lips to his. She struggled to balance her unease with the need to please; four months without Grit’s patient touching and desensitizing had given her phobias a tiny foothold to regain purchase.

Grit groaned low in his throat. When his control snapped, she didn’t blame him. If she’d been the one left behind, the one trapped in a seemingly endless nightmare of grief and pain, she’d bite off the hand that offered comfort in her haste to accept.

He kissed her as though she might disappear. Like he might die if he didn’t claim her all over again.

When he finally broke away, they were both breathing hard.

“Are you cold?” he asked, reverently stroking her shoulders. “I should’ve asked before. It’s—”

“I’m fine. Crazy ninja, remember? Impervious to pain, cold, allergies.”

He laughed and, while the sound didn’t reflect his normal self, it was a relief to see a glimmer of him shining through the shroud of darkness he wore. “I missed that sassy wit of yours, little tiger.”

Because she could clearly see the weight of regret and guilt anchoring him down, refusing to let him move on, she decided to cut the chain the only way she knew how. “I need to tell you something, but there’s a point to it, okay? Can you just listen until I’m done?”

His brow furrowed. “That’s one way to change the subject.”

“It is, and not in a good way. Hopefully when I finish, you’ll understand why I’m telling you. When I’m finished,” she added nervously, “maybe you’ll see me in a different light.”

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