Page 93 of The Vow

My jaw clenched and released. “When you signed with your brothers to buy the garage property. I had nets set up to pick up any mention of either of your names: Robyn Foster or Robyn Dubois.”

“That was…” Her eyes grew round. “Years.”

My jaw twitched. “Four years after that night.” And I’d counted every damn day.

“Damon…” Her head sank, her gaze dissolving on my chest.

“I drank a whole bottle of Pat’s good Jameson that night. I don’t know what pissed him off more, that I downed the whole bottle or that I allegedly attempted to put his puzzle together by using a knife to cut the pieces and force them to fit.” It was the lightest part of my darkest night, and I told it to her because I wanted her to smile. Even just a little. But her eyes hardly even lifted.

“Why didn’t you come back when you learned about thegarage? When you realized Sinclair never had me?” Her whisper prickled with pain.

“I’d already turned myself into a villain to find you, Robber,” I said and slid my fingers to her chin, lifting her head up to mine. “For four years, I built my reputation into something formidable. Something to be feared. It was easy since I had nothing else to lose. I’d become the man everyone went to for information. For connections. I could be trusted because I had no allegiances except to my reputation.”

“I don’t understand.” Her eyes lit with the challenge.

I gripped her chin, imprisoning her gaze. “By the time I realized you were alive, I’d become something—someone I couldn’t escape, not without endangering you. Even if I could make it into the States without being caught by the feds, if I came for you, and somehow Sinclair found out…” I let out a heavy sigh. “By that point, he and I were on opposites sides of a chessboard, Robber, both willing to do anything to find the other and make him pay. The only difference was Sinclair never cared about who became a casualty, but for me…everything I did was for you, and he would stop at nothing to use you, to hurt you to get to me.”

For four years, I’d had nightmares about what Sinclair was doing to her. When I realized Robyn had been safe the entire time, I thought the nightmares would stop. God, was I wrong. They weren’t nightmares then, but nightly warnings. Threats of what could happen to her if I was selfish enough to expose her to my world again.

“Knowing you were safe was the only thing that could matter—the only thing that did matter. The only fucking thing that sustained me until I finally found him.”

“That was almost two years ago, Damon.” It wasn’t framed as a question, but it was one.What kept you away for another two years?

“When you live for so long telling yourself the woman you love is better off—is safer without you, it’s hard to shake the belief that the biggest danger to you was me,” I said, my voice cracking.

I pushed her back until her knees hit the edge of the bed, forcing her to sit.

“Damon—” Her protest died as my knees hit the floor in front of her, the front slit of her dress falling open as my body wedged between her thighs.

“By then it had been thirteen years, Robber,” I said roughly, my gaze level with hers. “Thirteen years that you’d hated me. Thirteen years that you’d gone believing lies. Thirteen years that I’d spent becoming the very kind of man you and your brothers worked to take down. I couldn’t just hand over Sinclair to the FBI with a note and expect you to welcome me back with open arms. I needed to come to you with penance—with proof of the lengths I would go to protect you.”

My hands tightened on her thighs, and my head dropped for a moment. The weight of redemption hung like a yoke around my neck.

“I needed you to know there was nothing I wouldn’t do for you because it was the only way for you to understand the things I’d done.”

I felt her fingers on the side of my face, soft but intent as they lifted my head.

“Damon…”

“I’m sorry, Robber.” I turned and pressed my lips to her palm, closing my eyes as the sweetness of her skin invaded my nostrils. “I’m sorry for everything, but none so much as you spending all these years thinking I could ever love someone else. God, no wonder you hated me…”

There were many reasons to hate me, many reasons to assume I’d been unfaithful, and I’d been prepared for therepercussions of those. But to hear she’d believed my heart to be untrue…it gutted me.

“I didn’t know you knew about her letter, but even if I had…” Every muscle I possessed quaked with my ragged breath. “Even if I had, I could live with being responsible for your heartbreak; I couldn’t live knowing I was responsible for your death.”

“I want to hate you for it,” she muttered, her eyes shimmering. “I want to hate you for it so much.”

“Then hate me, Robber, because I will never stop doing everything in my power to keep you safe.” I pulled her face to mine until our unmetered breaths stoked fire into the air. “It was only ever you,” I murmured. “For better or for worse, it was only ever you.”

She filled her hands with fistfuls of my hair, her grip taut with uncertainty about whether she wanted to pull me closer or push me away.

“Fuck you, Damon,” she breathed out, a cry letting loose from her throat.

I’d been cursed innumerable times over the course of my life, but never had one come as close to an invitation as this.

“I know, Robber. I know,” I said, an unholy growl breaking from my lips as I crushed my mouth to hers.

She was my wife.

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