Page 51 of After Our Kiss

“Thank you.” I looked at the ceiling, then at my own hands. “Really, thank you for telling me all of this. I feel... I don't know. Better, in a way. Lighter.”

Conway approached me warily. “You shouldn't feel better. I just showed you that I'm willing to ruin you in order to get something I want.”

My smile was bittersweet. “This was the last piece of the puzzle. I finally understandwhyyou're doing this to me. You can't imagine how hard not knowing has been.” Warmth flushed my face—I was crying again. Fuck, I cried so much lately. “You saved me nine years ago, and then, the first time I see you again, you knock me out and take me here. You've wanted me to think of you as my enemy—”

“Because I am,” he cut in.

“You're not. You never were.” Grabbing his hands, I squeezed. “You're as much of a victim of your father as anyone. And now that I know that, now that I get it, I want to help you.”

He was judging me, trying to grasp my new serenity. “How can you help?”

I'd told him I wasn't the girl he used to know. But that wasn't entirely true. I'd grown, I'd changed, but right now, I needed what teenage me had after she'd been stolen from her own bedroom.

The courage to lose.

“Tell me how to keep us all alive. And I'll do it.”

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