Chapter 32
brOKEN HONESTY
“I’m coming,” she shouted and yanked the door open to her apartment.
She didn’t expect Spencer to show up the next morning. Didn’t think he’d be pounding on her door either.
She’d barely stepped a foot into her kitchen from her shower when the knocking started.
Spencer stood there in running clothes. His chest was heaving as if he was trying to catch his breath, but she didn’t know if it was from exercise or the conversation they were about to have.
“Can we talk?”
“I don’t know,” she said, crossing her arms. “Are we going to talk or are you going to yell? Paris is still sleeping.”
He looked down at his watch, then back up. “Sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I tried to wait.”
There he was, being considerate and she was ready to ride his ass.
Maybe some of his words were right last night.
Maybe all those things people had said to her before were still a problem.
That she spoke before she thought.
She wanted others to see what she was feeling even if it would be better to keep it in.
But she wasn’t wrong with what she’d said back to him.
That he let no one see what he was feeling.
Not even the woman she thought he loved.
Could be she was wrong though. Could be he didn’t care for her like she did him.
Or maybe he didn’t have the ability to do it and that was what scared her all along.
That she felt so much more than he was capable of.
He still stood there in the doorway though, his eyes looking wrecked, patiently waiting for her to give him permission.
She wouldn’t have asked. She would have just marched in.
It was what she wanted to do this morning, but he beat her to it.
She stepped back. “Come in.”
He stepped in, then moved past the door to Paris’s room the furthest away he could get to not wake her sister.
Being considerate as always.
“I was wrong last night. About…everything.”
She’d expected defensiveness, half-apologies, excuses. Maybe even a line of reasoning on why he was right and she wasn’t.
Not this quiet, broken honesty.
And that beat through her defenses.
He stepped closer. Just enough so she could see how red his eyes were. “Have you been crying?”
“Looks like you’ve been doing it,” he said, his hand reaching for her cheek. She stepped back, not ready to let him avoid again.
“You didn’t answer me.”
It was as if he couldn’t. Or didn’t want her to know even when the evidence was there for all to see.
He held her stare, then said, “I was. I hate fighting. I hate feeling as if I don’t have control.”
“You rarely lose it.”
“Because of the way it makes me feel. But you weren’t wrong,” he said.
“What was I not wrong about?”
She noticed he didn’t say she was right. She wouldn’t harp on that.
“You were trying to protect me. And instead of appreciating that, I made you feel you were the problem.”
She blinked. Slowly. Carefully. “Yes, that’s what you made me feel.”
“I know,” he whispered. “And I hate myself for it.”
The crack in his voice made her stomach twist. She’d never heard him sound like this. He always had control. This confidence in the height of it. Always kept himself restrained, steady and composed.
But now?
Now, he looked unraveled.
He looked human. Not the perfect crafted calm responses that always came out of his mouth.
He looked like someone who was finally willing to let her see the feelings he’d always kept hidden deep down.
“What you said was hurtful. I opened up to you and it’s like you shoved it down my throat.”
“I’m not good at being called out,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “Especially not about things I already know I’m failing at.”
Her chest softened despite herself. “You’re not failing. Not at your career.”
He let out a broken laugh. “I’m not talking about my career. Not right now.”
“Then what are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about us. What you said was true.
I’m scared. Ryker didn’t bother me. Not in the least. But when you started speaking, instead of feeling pride that I had you in my corner, I had a flashback of all the things that are different about us.
All the reasons I tried to tell myself it might not work. ”
“Anything can work if you try,” she said. “Don’t use that excuse.”
“That’s what it was. Or what it is. Excuses.
I’m scared of losing you because I…feel more for you than I’ve felt for anyone in my entire life.
And when Ryker brought you up, when he tried to twist it like our relationship made me weaker?
I panicked. Because he found the one thing that could wreck me. You.”
Her heart slammed against her ribs.
“You’re joking.”
“No. I wouldn’t joke about something like this. He tried to push my buttons that I did something with you I’d never do before. That I broke a moral code I gave myself.”
“It sounds about right. You having that code.”
“I put a lot of pressure on myself,” he said.
“Unnecessary pressure,” she said.
“You’re right.” He stepped in closer, his voice low and almost ragged sounding. “And I took that fear out on you. I hurt you. I said unforgivable things.”
A tear slipped down her cheek before she could stop it. “I hate to cry.” She wiped it away frantically.
“Because you think it makes you weak. That’s why you yell. That’s why you shout. You push people away before they can see this side of you. But even when you’re pushing me, you’re still pulling me in. I see that now. Do you?”
She nodded her head. “I didn’t mean to say what I did last night. I should respect your boundaries. That’s on me. You know Ryker. I don’t. I should have taken what you said and stood back. I just get so fierce when it comes to people in my life that I care for and I lose all rational thought.”
“Oh, yes, you meant to say everything. Maybe I needed it shoved down my throat like that. But you’re right and you do need to respect my boundaries, the same as I do yours.
That’s what we do. That’s what partners do.
We can’t be the other person, we can’t ask that person to be someone they aren’t either. ”
More tears flowed down, her bottom lip trembled and she swallowed hard.
“You hate losing control because of the way it makes you feel. That’s me now.
I can handle anger. I can’t handle this.
I hate being wrong and I know I was. One hundred percent it was on me.
Me stepping in, then me throwing it in your face and not letting you say what you needed to. ”
His face crumpled when she turned to get tissues. Just another sign of how real this all was. How he must feel what she did. He must feel something.
“London…” His voice broke. “Please don’t cry. I can’t stand that I’m the reason you’re hurting. I don’t want to be the reason you throttle back either. Maybe I like that about you. That you’re so fearless at times and I’m not.”
She wiped her cheek, but more tears kept falling. “You made me feel like I was too much. Like the way I love is wrong. I don’t think you understand that. Or you can’t understand me. I’m fierce about things like you said. It’s just who I am. Can I refrain it some? Sure.”
“But you shouldn’t always have to and I have to accept that also.
Nothing about how you love is wrong.” He reached for her hand—slowly, giving her the chance to pull away.
She didn’t. “You feel big. You fight big. You care like it’s your superpower.
I’ve never had anyone fight for me the way you did.
And instead of thanking you, I punished you for it.
I reacted rather than stood back feeling some pride that I had someone in my corner for once. ”
“No. You punished yourself, because you don’t want to open up to what I can give you. I get it. I know. I’m a lot.”
“You are. And I love that about you.”
“You do?” she asked.
He squeezed her hand gently. “You deserve someone who meets you where you are. Someone who steps up instead of shutting down. You deserve for me to be honest with you. You said your words in anger. You flung them at me. And in thinking about it more, it’s probably the way I expected it from you.
But sometimes in life, your way is right. Sometimes mine is.”
She laughed. “Well, when you put it that way, maybe in thinking, this is the way I thought I’d hear it from you. Calm, controlled and spoken like a diplomatic pro.”
“I’m not sure I’m a pro, but I am a man who will open up. Maybe I just needed the right woman to get me there. Or push me there.” He brushed a thumb under her eye catching another tear. “If you’ll let me…I’d like to try again. Better this time. And with a hell of a lot more honesty.”
She stared at him for a long moment.
Really stared.
He wasn’t hiding. He wasn’t deflecting.
He was exhausted, hurting, and offering her his fears like they were something fragile he trusted her to hold.
She stepped closer until their foreheads touched.
“I’m scared too,” she whispered. “Scared of pissing you off again.”
“It’s going to happen.”
“Yep, it will. But now that I know you love me, I know you’ll make sure we work it out.”
He laughed, framed her cheeks with his hands, his lips landing on hers. “You’re the pro at fixing problems. It’s not about me making sure we work it out.”
“It’s about us,” she corrected.
She turned when she heard clapping. “Thank God,” Paris said. “If I’m going to get woken up this early after a long flight, at least it’s a make-up scene. Just go back to Spencer’s if you’re taking it into the bedroom.”
“You heard her,” she said. “Let’s go back to your place.”
“So I can shower and change,” he said. “Then we’ll come back and I can take you both to lunch. Maybe I need to let your sister know I’m not going to send London back here wound up again so that you keep her up with our problems.”
“I’d appreciate that,” Paris said. “Not that I won’t be here for my sister.”
Paris turned and went back to her room, shutting the door. “Thanks,” she said.
“I know she’s there for you. And I hope you know I’ll be there too.”
“I do know that. And I hope you let me be there for you now too.”
He pulled her close, his lips landing on hers. “I do.”