Chapter Twelve #2
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, startling her because they were the last words she had expected to hear.
‘I’m so sorry, Serena. For pushing you away and for saying nothing when you told me you loved me.
I shouldn’t have let a single second go by without telling you the same, but instead I pushed you away even more, because I was scared.
Scared of how much I loved hearing you tell me that and scared of how much I felt for you.
’ He came a step closer, and she knew she should maintain a safe distance between them, but was too stunned to move.
‘Serena, for as long as I can remember, I’ve thought of love as something destructive, something that causes chaos and weakness and would weaken me if I let it.
I watched what loving my mother did to my father after she left, and even though I didn’t remember her, I know what it did to me.
There was this gaping hole that nothing could heal, and it made me yearn for something so badly that I thought I’d die from the force of it.
I never wanted to feel that again. That desperation and chaos inside me, so I pulled back from everyone, from wanting anything from them.
But then came you, and I don’t really know what happened.
Just that it happened easily, but when you asked me to name it, all I could think of was all that bad from my childhood.
But I do love you, Serena. I love your heart and strength and how hard you fight.
I love how much you love Kit and Alexis, and how much I know you will love and protect our child.
And, if there was no baby, I would still love you.
I would still want you at my side.’ Serena didn’t know when she’d started crying; only realised her face was wet as her pain and longing fought through her control.
Hearing him explain the effects of his childhood was heartbreaking.
It wasn’t hard to understand that boy—rejected and scared to love and ask for more, to accept more, in case it made him vulnerable again—still lived inside of him.
No wonder he’d been frightened of the love building between them, and been so unwilling to acknowledge it.
‘I know what I did was awful, but I wanted you to know the truth. To know that you are loved. And to tell you that if you could find it within you to forgive and let me back into your life, I would never make you doubt it again. I would never let you down again.’
The words were perfect, everything she’d wanted him to say to her all those days ago. But he hadn’t, and that silence had wounded her more than words could express, and as badly as she wanted to sink into him now, could she trust him?
‘You let me walk out of the door, Caleb. Out of your life and our marriage.’ Guilty colour slashed across his cheeks and his head bowed with the weight of his regret, but the weight of her pain was heavy too. ‘You didn’t even try to stop me.’
‘I wanted to. At least a part of me did. But I was too scared.’ His eyes pleaded with her.
‘I wasn’t ready to accept how I felt. I regret it, Serena.
More than anything I’ve ever done before.
I’ll regret it forever. But I want to fix it.
That’s why I’m here. To make it better. You deserve to have exactly the life you want, Serena.
A life full of love and passion and happiness, and I want to give you that life. ’
‘And what happens the next time you feel scared?’ she demanded, trembling with the force of her feeling. Her hope and her fear. ‘When you get overwhelmed by all your emotions? Are you going to push me away again?’
‘Never. Never again.’
‘Because it’s not just me, Caleb. It’s Kit and Alexis too. They have lost just as much as me, and in another few months there will be another little person, and I won’t do that to them. I won’t put them through it.’
‘It won’t happen, Serena.’ He stepped closer again, his eyes blazing.
‘I promise. I am here. I am in this. Every day, I will be here. With you. For you. In love with you. Trust me. Please trust me. I know I haven’t done much to deserve it, but trust me.
I won’t let you down. I love you. And I won’t ever let you go ever again. ’
‘Say that again.’
He took a breath. ‘I will never let you go…’
‘No. Not that part.’ Serena offered him a little smile. ‘The part about loving me.’
Taking her face in his hands, Caleb looked deep into her eyes with his own honest gaze, where she saw nothing but the truth.
Pain. But also love. ‘I love you, Serena. I love everything about you, with everything that I am. You, and this little one, were the last thing I thought I wanted, but you’re the best things that have ever happened to me. ’
It was impossible to last a moment more without throwing her arms around him and sinking into the heat and safety of his body. ‘I missed you, Caleb.’
‘Nowhere near as much as I’ve missed you,’ he breathed, pressing kisses to her mouth, her cheeks, her eyelids. ‘My life was empty without you, Serena. I never want to go back to that.’
‘You’ll never have to,’ she promised, holding tight and smiling. Because whilst she had no idea what life would throw at them, Serena trusted—no, she knew—it would be alright because she had him.
Because they had each other.