Page 25 of The Beast's Captive Bride
"That was before." She's close enough now that I can see the tears swimming in her eyes, threatening to fall. "Before us. Before this." Her hand touches her heart, then reaches toward mine. "Please don't do this. Please don't make me lose you both."
"Amber, get away from him!" Richard shouts, straining against his bonds. "He's dangerous—he's insane?—"
"Be quiet, Daddy," she says without looking at him, her eyes never leaving mine. "This is between my husband and me."
My wife. My salvation. Standing before me with tears on her cheeks and steel in her spine.
"He deserves this," I say, but the words lack conviction. "After what he did?—"
"Maybe he does," she concedes, taking another step. We're almost touching now. "But you don't deserve what it would do to you. To us." Her hand comes up to rest on my chest, directly over my thundering heart. "I love you, Cullen. Please don't make me watch you become the monster you think you are."
Love.The word hits me like a physical blow. She's said it before, in a hundred small ways—in touches and smiles and the way she curls against me at night—but never in words. Never so plainly, so irrefutably.
"You can't love me," I whisper, gun still pointed at her father but my resolve fracturing. "Not after this. Not knowing what I'm capable of."
"I've always known what you're capable of," she says, her voice steady despite the tears on her cheeks. "I've known since the night you took me. You could have hurt me a hundred times, but you didn't. You never would."
"This is different." I gesture with the gun toward her father, who watches our exchange with calculating eyes. "This is fifteen years of hate. This is justice."
"Is it justice?" Her hand slides up to cup my face, thumb stroking my jaw where tension has locked it rigid. "Or is it just more pain? More destruction? When does it end, Cullen?"
My hands are numb, but I feel a warmth in my chest, an uncomfortable heat that I recognize as guilt. Not for what I've done to Richard—never that—but for what I'm doing to Amber. For forcing her to witness this ugly part of me I've tried to shield her from.
"He ruined me," I say, the words scraping my throat raw. "Left me for dead. Stole everything."
"And now you have me." Her eyes hold mine, endless blue depths I could drown in. "Is that not enough? Am I not enough to balance the scales?"
Her question pierces something vital in me, deflating the rage that's sustained me for so long. Is she enough? This woman who walked into my darkness and somehow brought light with her? This impossible creature who saw past the monster to the man beneath?
"Amber, get away from him," Richard interrupts, his voice sharp with fear. "He's dangerous—he's using you?—"
"Shut up." I don't raise my voice, but the cold command silences him instantly. I turn my attention back to Amber, to the tears tracking silently down her cheeks. "You are enough," I tell her, the truth of it settling into my bones. "More than I deserve."
"Then choose me," she pleads, both hands on my face now. "Choose us. Let this go."
"You don't know what you're asking." But I do. She's asking me to surrender the purpose that's defined me for fifteen years. To become something else, someone else.
"I'm asking you to be the man I know you can be." She rises on tiptoe, pressing her forehead to mine. "The man I love. The man who feeds chickens and grows tomatoes and holds me like I'm precious."
A sound escapes me—half laugh, half sob—at her simple, devastating description. Is that who I am now? Can I be that man and still hold onto this hatred?
"Please," she whispers against my lips. "For me. For us."
Behind us, Richard clears his throat. "If I could interject?—"
"You can't," I growl, not looking away from Amber.
She smiles slightly at that, recognizing the first crack in my resolve. Her hands move down to cover mine on the gun, gentle but insistent.
"Let it go," she says again, and I know she means more than just the weapon.
Slowly, finger by finger, I release the gun into her keeping. She sets it carefully on a shelf, then returns to me, winding her arms around my waist and resting her head against my chest. I hold her, breathing in the scent of her hair, feeling the steady beat of her heart against mine.
"Thank you," she murmurs into my shirt.
Over her head, I meet Richard's gaze. There's confusion there, and fear, but also a dawning realization as he watches his daughter in my arms. He sees what I see—the strength in her, the determination, the capacity for love that somehow extends even to a scarred, broken man like me.
"Untie him," Amber says, still holding me close.
