Page 121 of One Bossy Date

“Yeah. No worries.” She snapped out of the daze she was in. “There was a small outlet fire, but it’s under control.”

“What? Are you okay?” I moved forward, ready to check out the issue and rescue her, but Zoe surprised me when she stepped back.

“Don’t worry about it, the fireman was here. I’m just waiting for the electrician.” Her expression was cool—she was closing me off. “What do you want, Anders?”

I swallowed, considering my next words carefully. “I know you don’t want to talk to me, but I’m begging you to just hear me out. Okay?”

She watched me, waiting for my next words.

“Zoe,” I rumbled, “I love you.” I didn’t know how else to put it.

She ripped her eyes from mine and looked away, hurt flashing over her face.

“You’re my heart. You’re my everything.”

She didn’t look at me.

“I’m so sorry for expecting you to sacrifice your whole life for me. It was wrong. I see that now. On the plane, I realized I wasn’t just leaving you behind, I was leaving my heart behind with you. And my heart belongs to you.”

She lifted her eyes to me again, and I saw that she was tearing up.

“I was an idiot. I wanted to go home. I didn’t understand that home is where the heart is. And that’s wherever you are. I never quite figured that out before, but I know that now. No matter where I go, I could never be happy, because you’re here. My heart is here. My family is here. Dax, my mother—we’ve grown so close over the last few months. My dogs are here.”

A small smile appeared on her face, however reluctantly.

“When I realized that I was the one leaving everyone else behind, and it hurt not only them but me as well, I knew I was doing the wrong thing. Please, Zoe, give me another chance. Let me love you. You don’t have to worry—I’m not going anywhere.”

Her lip wobbled slightly, and she wiped away a tear that breached her lashes and fell onto her cheek. “Anders, I…”

Seeing her resolve weaken, I took my chance and moved toward her, not able to stay back when she was crying. I put the roses on the counter behind her and caressed the tears away, then held her upper arms tightly.

“I love you, Zoe,” I murmured, staring down into her pained eyes. “Desperately,” I added, pulling a grin from her.

“I love you, too.” I heard her say softly.

What?

Thank God.

“Desperately?” I asked, pulling another grin from her.

“Yes, desperately,” she whispered, but then her eyes became sad again. “But I can’t let you take all the blame.”

“What do you mean?” I frowned, shaking my head. I was about to disagree and tell her it was all my fault for being a fool.

But she held up a hand to stop me. “I’ve had time to think, and I need to come clean. I haven’t been honest with you.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“I mean…” She sighed. “You’ve helped me so much. More than you know. Not only with my date situation, but with listening, taking care of me and,” she made quote fingers, “mystress management—no, my whole life really. I knew I should’ve told you all about it, but I didn’t want you to see me in a bad light. When you were gone, I realized that meant absolutely nothing compared to you not seeing me at all.”

“I don’t understand,” I said, feeling confused but having no doubt that whatever it was, it could never change the way I saw her.

“My debt wasn’t only to my gran.” She shook her head and broke eye contact with me. “I had a backlog of rent to pay, but I couldn’t. So, when you offered to have me move in for free, while paying me to look after Ares and Hades, I agreed, kinda under false pretenses.”

“Zoe, this doesn’t change a thing. You were surviving. I could never see you badly for that.”

“It’s just, if I’d learned to ask for help earlier, I wouldn’t have been sleeping in the back room here, and I wouldn’t have been so high-strung over all my debt. I could’ve spoken rationally to my gran about Brody and none of this insanity would’ve happened.”

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