Page 115 of Say You Will

I join her on the rug, leaning against her and trying to catch my breath. When I wrap my arm around her shoulders, Oliver,tail wagging in delight, climbs onto my lap, one paw dangerously close to unmanning me. I shift him slightly and stroke his back as he cuddles against me. “Does this mean he forgives me?”

Her giggles turn to sobs, and I want to rip my heart out of my chest and give it to her, so she understands she is everything. I would do anything for her. I move Oliver to the floor and pull her tighter against me, rubbing her back and rocking us both.

“I love you.” My voice sounds like gravel in a rock tumbler.

Breath catching, she lifts her head, but I can’t look into her eyes and see her rejection of my words.

I tighten my hold. “I’m in love with you. Wholly. Entirely. There’s no end to it, and there never will be. I know I’m not technically supposed to say it yet, but it’s true.” I clear my throat. “Sorry about that.”

“You’re sorry?”

“Not sorry that I love you. I’m sorry I haven’t done it right, so that no part of you ever has any reason to doubt who you are to me. There’s nothing I’ll ever put ahead of you. Not my own life. Not my family. And certainly not some damn company.”

She doesn’t move or say anything. It barely feels as though she’s breathing, and I rush forward before she shuts down again and pushes me away. “I wanted to give you everything you ever needed. I wasn’t trying to trick you. The first night we made love, I held you afterward, and I had to force myself not to tell you I loved you because I thought I’d smother you or you wouldn’t believe me.”

She shifts subtly closer.

“Do you remember the first night I proposed to you?” I ask.

Brows knitted, she nods, and I continue, “I’d lost faith that there was anything worth the pain of allowing myself to feel. Every moment of my life was filled with acquisition and working hundred-hour weeks. I was busy enough that I didn’t have time to think about how empty my life was.”

I lean away slightly and take her hand, running my thumb over my favorite freckle on her pinkie. I don’t lift my head. “I hadn’t seen you in four years, nine months, and twelve days. And every minute of it had hollowed me out a piece at a time. I’d numbed myself so effectively that when you woke me up, I didn’t even know what was happening to me. I tried to talk to you in your hotel room, and I was freaking the fuck out. My heart was racing. I couldn’t think straight. I thought there was something wrong with me. I was so closed off from my emotions that I didn’t even recognize them.”

“Henry,” she says quietly.

I shake my head. “You’re the reason I see a future that means anything at all. I can’t go back. Franki, I can’t live without you again. I’ll turn into the biggest asshole on the planet. I’ll be some lonely old cartoonish villain hoarding money and never giving Spencer a vacation in his life—”

“Look at me.” She turns her hand over and squeezes.

I meet her gaze at last.

With a watery smile, she presses her hand against my jaw. I layer my own over hers, holding her to me.

I swallow hard. “When you wanted me to call my grandmother and tell her to give Lawrence those shares, I should have dialed her number right then and there. I’m doing it today. I don’t want any part of anything that hurts you.”

Her brows knit. “You said you were worried about the people your cousin would hurt.”

“I am, but I’m not weighing what you need against anything or anyone else and having you come up short. Not ever. I’m not a hero. I’ve told you that before and you persist in believing I’m a better person than I am. If you were thirsty, I would step over three people who were on fire to give you a glass of water.”

She shakes her head with a smile and lifts my other hand to kiss my scarred knuckles.

“That’s terrible,” she says gently.

I nod. “I know.”

She burrows against me, and I haul her onto my lap.

“I love you too,” she says.

I speak against her hair. “That’s because you’re the kindest, most forgiving, wonderful woman on the planet. I’m going to treat you like the queen you are, every day of your life.”

“I’m sorry I made us both wallow in misery last night.”

“I deserved it. There’s nothing like a good, hard wallow to put things into perspective. When you offered me a business arrangement, it hurt like hell.”

She rests her forehead against mine. “I kept telling myself that you were like my parents.”

How could she not? It’s what she knows, and I tried to bribe her into matrimony.

---