Page 101 of Into These Eyes
Staring at my hand resting on his thigh, I wonder why I can’t seem to remove it. I bite my lip and concentrate on his words. “But after watching those memories, knowing he had it in him to kill the very person he claimed to love … doesn’t that meaneverythingwas a lie?”
“Jamie …” He slides his hand from my shoulder and cups my neck, his thumb grazing my jaw. “After watching him, I can’t believe his love for you was a lie. And the pride in his eyes when he looked at you … there’s no faking that.”
“Then how could he do what he did to Mum, to me, to Anika … toyou?”
“You’ll probably never know. And that’s a tough fucking truth to swallow. But … what if he’d done the worst thing imaginable, then—as luck would have it—the opportunity to prevent the second worst thing from happening fell into his lap?”
“You?” I ask, trying my best to concentrate on his words instead of the gentle circling of his thumb behind my earlobe.
“Yeah.” The intensity in his eyes holds me captive. “Try and put yourself in his shoes. With me taking the fall, he was safe. And that meant you and your sister were safe.”
I frown. “Safe from what?”
“From the very real possibility of leaving you girls parentless, at the mercy of a foster care system that would’ve almost certainly separated you from your sister. The way he was in those videos, I think he’d have done anything to prevent that from happening. Like letting an innocent man go to prison in his place.”
His clear blue eyes gaze at me as I absorb his words. “You’re …defendinghim?” I ask in disbelief.
“No, not defending him.Understandinghim.”
The fact that Gavin has taken the time to unravel the motives behind the man who stole sixteen years of his life, overwhelms me.
And it makes perfect sense. The man I knew as my father would have done whatever it took to keep his family together. Well, apart from killing his wife. That’ll never make sense. My father must have experienced intense relief when the police revealed they’d caught the killer. He’d have latched onto that the way a drowning man clutches a flotation device. Gavin’s arrest had been his chance to make sure his crime didn’t make things worse for me and Anika.
The man I thought I knew would have been eaten up by guilt. A slow, hungry monster that destroys from the inside out. Was that what he meant when he told me he deserved the cancer? Had he held on until Anika had her life in order, then just let go, let the guilt consume him?
Images of a different life flash before my eyes. I see my father’s arrest. I see myself holding two-year-old Anika, trying to shield her from faceless people ripping her from my arms to take her away. The terror, the extra trauma on top of Mum’s death. Who knows what would have happened to us. I might not even know my sister today.
“You okay?” he asks, sliding his hand from my neck to my shoulder, his thumb resting on my bare collarbone.
“Yes … I … Why have I never thought about it like that?”
“Why would you? You’ve only just found out.”
“Butyoudid.”
“I’ve had a little longer to think about it. Lying in my cell, staring at the walls, I’d come up with every scenario under the sun. But actually seeing the way he was with you in those videos, that cemented it.”
I close my eyes, letting more tears flow. I don’t care. I know I’m safe with this man, and even more that, Iwanthis comfort.
He squeezes my shoulder before sinking his fingers into my hair at the nape of my neck, and then I feel the softest brush of his lips on my forehead.
“You’re strong, Jamie,” he murmurs, touching the underside of my chin until my eyes meet his. “You know that, right?”
The need to throw myself into his arms, to feel them around me again, is so damn tempting. But I resist. “When being strong or falling apart are your only choices … well, crumbling wasn’t an option when there was a little girl who needed me.” Swallowing over the lump in my throat, I release a long breath.
“What else are you thinking?” he asks gently, reading me far too easily.
I hesitate a moment. Even having this thought hurts my heart. “Is it wrong to be grateful that Anika and I didn’t end up in the system … when it was at your expense?”
To my amazement, he smiles, his blue eyes the warmth of a flame. “No, it’s not wrong. Don’t ever feel guilty about that.”
I shake my head. “How can I not?”
“That’s easy.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Jamie,” he says, his voice low and deep with emotion. “How can I regret a second of being locked away, when it meant you and your sister’s lives weren’t destroyed?”
