Page 142 of Sins of the Hidden

But there wasn't one. This was surrender. Complete. Final. The kind that left you bleeding on the floor, hoping the person you'd destroyed might find something worth saving in the ruins.

I wanted her to love me. Not fear me, not submit to me, not stay because she had no choice—but actually love me. The way she'd touched my face last night, gentle as forgiveness I hadn'tearned. I wanted her to do that because she wanted to, not because I was broken and pathetic on the floor.

The obsession was evolving into something I'd never felt before. Something that hurt worse than suffocation, crushed deeper than broken ribs. Something that made me want to be worthy of her instead of just taking what I craved.

"We should go home," she said finally.

Home. She said it like it still meant something. Like it still included me. Like the space we shared hadn't been irreparably poisoned by what I'd done in the name of love.

"Are you coming?" she asked.

"If you want me to."

"... You can." She hesitated at first, and I could see her weighing those words, measuring the distance between honesty and safety.

Her hand kept going to the ring, twisting it. Three times in the first block. She was testing the weight of what I'd offered, rolling it around in her mind like a pill she wasn't sure she could swallow.

I didn't try to close the gap between us. Didn't step up beside her like I used to. This was her pace. Her choice. Her rules.

The setting sun painted everything gold—her hair, her skin, the careful space she maintained between us. I memorized every detail, filed it away in the obsessive catalog I kept of moments that mattered.

At our front door, she stopped. Turned to look at me with something I couldn't name. Not forgiveness. Not trust. But maybe the beginning of something that could grow into choice.

Her fingers moved to the ring one last time. Hesitated. Then her hand dropped to her side.

The ring stayed on. But something had shifted. She'd given herself permission to consider what I'd offered. That was more than I deserved.

She'd touched my face last night. And for the first time in my life, I'd felt something other than the constant screaming in my skull.

I didn't have a name for it. But the voices had gone quiet.

She walked ahead. I didn't try to catch up.

I used to make choices for her.

Today, I followed hers.

The clubhouse was chaotic when I stepped inside—Knight and Tyrant were locked in a near-shouting match over whatever the fuck they fought about. Tyrant raised a deliberate middle finger as Knight leaned forward, jaw tight.

"Touch that finger to my face again and I'll take it off," Knight warned, but Tyrant kept his finger up and pushed it closer to his best friend's face.

Husk stood behind the bar, pouring whiskey with theatrical slowness, amber liquid catching the light. He kept his eyes fixed on the stream, deliberately ignoring my entrance.

"Look who crawled out of Oakley's shadow." Husk lifted his glass in a sarcastic toast, finally looking up with eyes glittering with the hope I'd give him reason to bleed.

I clenched my jaw, counting silently to five. Forgiveness, motherfucker. Forgiveness—defined as not punching people even when they fucking deserved it.

Knight straightened, pulling back from Tyrant's finger. "How's Oakley doing?" His tone shifted, genuine concern replacing the irritation.

Not responding, I moved toward an empty chair and dropped into it, ignoring how the weathered leather creaked beneath my weight. Oakley, Law, and Claudia were having a "family day." I was family—I was Oakley's fucking husband and their son-in-law, for Christ's sake. But apparently that didn't mean shit. Since Oakley asked for peace, I decided to come to the only other place I was mildly tolerated.

Usually, I would've crushed Knight's windpipe for saying my wife's name, but this was what Oakley would call a "pissy mood." Like being excluded from your own fucking family was something to get over with deep breathing.

Husk snorted, deliberately swirling his glass. "Didn't think you could breathe without her in the room."

If Husk didn't shut the fuck up in the next five seconds, I'd rearrange his face into something even his mother wouldn't recognize. My fingers tightened around the armrest instead of his throat, wood cracking beneath my grip. Progress.

Did Oakley have any fucking clue how difficult restraint was? The beast inside clawed at my ribs, desperate to break free, and I'd been here less than a minute. I wanted her to let me back in, not stay distant and closed off, pretending things were normal when nothing was. But if that meant trying this bullshit compromise thing, I'd do it. For her. My thumb pressed into the silicone wedding band. The only tether keeping me human in a world that begged for monsters.

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