Page 14 of Reign of Light
A tear falls down my cheek, and I swipe it away quickly. “Maybe he didn’t while she wrote it, but he knew about it after. He hid it from me. I didn’t even know it existed.”
His jaw tightens as he shakes his head. “I don’t know what the fuck got into him after I left.”
I consider it for a moment. If Weston remembers my father so differently, why did he change? Was it simply losing my mother? Was their love truly that strong? The father I know doesn’t seem capable of a love like I fantasized about for years, or like Weston describes was between his parents. So what changed?
“I can imagine,” I say, then pause, trying to swallow down the feelings of inadequacy that are threatening to bubble to the surface. “Maybe losing your wife and your best friend would be hard, and maybe that is why he changed so much. What I can’t understand is that he may have lost a great deal, but he had me. Why wasn’t I enough?”
My voice wavers with the question, and I barely have time to react before Weston’s fingers wrap around my chin, pressing firmly and turning my face so I am forced to meet his gaze.
“Listen to me,” he says firmly, his voice the low grumble that normally makes my stomach flutter, but this time I’m too wrapped up in years worth of hurt to feel it. “Youareenough.”
A half-hearted huff escapes me, and before I can speak he’s turning my body in his lap, shifting me so I’m straddling him. His face is stern, and there’s an edge to his voice when he speaks again.
“I’m tired of you talking down to yourself like that.”
“I didn’t say anyth?—”
“I know you, Lennox. You were thinking it. The way his neglect affected you, and how the years of terrible decisions and isolation made you feel is inexcusable. He’s going to have to live with how he hurt you for the rest of his life. A father should never do that to his daughter. I hopethe man I knew is still in there somewhere and can see what he’s done, and maybe because you never returned home, it will help him grasp the severity of it. But if he couldn’t see what I see, what all the members of this crew saw when you became one of us, then he’s a fucking fool.”
My body feels like it is caving in on itself, and with every word I want to shrink away farther. For years I’ve wanted my father to see me, to think I was worth his time, his love. That I was fit to be queen. I’m used to being ignored, never praised, and for someone like Weston to say such things, to actuallyseeme, my mind can’t handle the way my body physically reacts to the words.
My eyes fall to his chin as I try to fight the war of emotions and feelings of inadequacy that always seem to overcome any desire and determination I have to prove myself, but he doesn’t let me shy away.
“Eyes on me, Lennox.”
I raise them slowly, and his stern face from moments ago has disappeared, replaced instead with an intense focus filled with kindness and understanding. Weston knows the basics of my relationship with my father, and while he may not have witnessed it, he knows how hard all of this is for me to hear.
He waits a moment, making sure he has my attention and I will not shy away again before speaking. His tone is warm and slow, letting me soak up each statement like the sunlight on my skin.
“You are smart. Methodical. Determined. You pay attention and learn so quickly, and you adjust to everything around you. You have listened to every person on this island, so much so that they know you care for them, and you know it too. Enough that you would physically sacrifice yourself for them, people you barely knew, at least in the scheme of all of us being here.”
Tears well in my eyes as I stare into his, as all of his endearments tear me down and build me back up again a little stronger. I wish I had back in Blackwood, like the strength I only truly felt I had once I decided to leave.
Eyes bouncing between mine, he notes the tears, and his thumb gently strokes my skin, but he continues on.
“You put the feelings and wellbeing of others above your own, and do everything possible to make them feel encouraged and supported. You’ve taught them skills that you had, even if they had nothing to offer you in return.”
A wet chuckle escapes my lips as I think about Fin and Roley grappling with the bows that are too big for them, the way their faces light up when they hit a target.
He catches my attention when he rolls his eyes obnoxiously and lets out a gruff breath.
“You’re loyal, almost to a fucking fault because it took way too much effort to pull you out of his clutches, but now that you know the truth, I know that loyalty is just as strong for all of us.” He lowers his voice, and a tear falls silently down my cheek. “If Remington can’t see all of that, thenhe’sthe one who isn’t enough. If who you are doesn’t convince him you would be the best queen Blackwood has ever seen, then I don’t know what does.” The corner of his lips turns up in a smirk as his hands fall from my face to rest back on the tops of my thighs. “Plus, Jorn says you’re the only one who can put up with my shit, and he’s right.”
A half sob, half laugh erupts from my chest, and I reach up to wipe the tears off my cheeks and take in his relaxed energy. It’s almost as if he’s waiting for me to argue, to tell him he’s wrong, but I’m too stunned by everything he said, and the vortex of affection toward him it stirred inside me to do anything more than contradict his last statement.
“Sig can too,” I sniff, “arguably she does better than me. You don’t even have to say anything, and you understand each other. I just yell at you.”
He shakes his head with a smile. “It’s not the same. Sig had twenty years to get used to me. She watched me almost die. Our friendship was built on survival and a common purpose. You challenged me and refused to let me control you, even though I was the one in charge. Youfought me, and called me out when I was being overbearing, even if I had reasons. It only took you about ten seconds of knowing me before you started fighting me.”
“I see your point.”
“You had my attention from the very beginning, anyway.”
“Because I’m the princess,” I say, a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach reminding me why Weston even cared about me in the first place, why he followed me and protected me.
“You are, yes.” He leans in a little closer, our faces drawing together until we’re sharing a breath. “But you’re also the most stunning woman I have ever laid eyes on, and the more I got to know you, the more I understood that beauty goes much deeper than you believe.”
The pit that was there a moment ago flickers, the flame matching the one in his eyes.
