Page 107 of When the Storm Breaks
“Yeah. But I didn’t want to let on how much it had freaked me out.” She set down her wineglass and stood up from her chair then came to stand in front of me. She took both of my hands in hers and gave them a squeeze.
“Do you feel that?” she asked quietly.
I looked down at our joined hands. How could I not feel it? There was an electric current running between us. “What is it?”
“It’s me. And you. Just… don’t freak out when I tell you this, okay?”
I huffed out a laugh. “If you’re going to tell me you’re a witchy woman, I already know that.”
She let out a breath. “I can feel your vibrations, Brody. And I know… I know that something bad happened to you. I can feel it, but I can’t see it clearly… I…”
I yanked my hands away from hers. “Just fucking stop doing that.”
“I can’t help it.” She began crying again. I knew she was crying for me and I fucking hated that. I pulled her against me so she couldn’t see my face, and she wrapped her arms around my middle, resting her cheek against my shoulder. I held the back of her head, my hand sliding into her hair and rested my chin on the top of her head. We stayed like that for a few long moments, her hot tears soaking the cotton of my T-shirt.
“Don’t cry for me, baby. Please don’t.”
“I can’t help it. I love you, Brody.” She pulled back and lifted her face to mine. “I love you,” she whispered.
It seemed like a strange time to say those three little words. I loved her too, I knew I did. But I wasn’t ready to say it. Today I’d felt like I was still that same fucked-up kid I’d been all those years ago. I’d relived a memory that I thought I’d dealt with a long time ago. All because some asshole grabbed my ass. But this time I was bigger, and I was stronger, and I didn’t have to take shit from anyone. Nobody got to touch me without my fucking permission.
“Are you in love with me?” she asked.
“What do you think? You’re the mind reader.”
She laughed a little. “Will you fight for me, Brody? Will you still be here when the going gets tough?”
“I’m right here.”
“But you walked away from me earlier. I wanted to be with you.”
“I came back. And I’m right here.”
Too many people in Shiloh’s life had let her down, and I didn’t want to be another one of those people. I didn’t want to fail her.
“What happened to you, Brody?” she pressed. She wasn’t about to give up on this.
“Nothing. I just went for a drive…”
“Not tonight. What happened to you when you were young?” I tried to pull away, but she grabbed my hand. “Brody. Please. I need to know.”
“No, you don’t.”
“I trusted you with my secrets.”
“This is different.”
“How?”
I hung my head and rubbed the back of my neck. “I don’t want you to look at me differently. I don’t want you to…” Pity me. Cry for me. Think of me as weak or a victim. None of which I had ever wanted to be.
“Treat you like a victim? Feel sorry for you because you had a shitty childhood?”
There she went, reading my fucking mind again.
“I want to know you. I want to know everything about you. You’re the one, Brody. My Maw Maw did a reading for me on my thirteenth birthday. And I asked her if I’d find my one true love. She said our paths would cross many times… You saved me in that bar when I was sixteen. You did that for me before we’d even met. And you rescued me again when I hit that deer and felt so lost. You were there. Let me in, Brody. Let me be the one you confide in and share your secrets and dreams with.”
“You think I’m your one true love?”
