Chapter 66
PAIGE
When Rafe disappeared upstairs, I do the only thing I can think of to quell the anxiety threatening to swallow me whole.
I get to work.
I’m so tired of all of this. I’m tired of being beholden to my uncle, to my lawyers, to Rafe, even. I know he’s handling it. I know he’s capable. But Ben is my uncle.
The journalist asked me a very simple question. Simple and terrifying. What would my parents think about what I did?
I sit down and write a long response to her question. Every damning little detail. How Ben was in my parents’ shadow and their death set his excesses free. How I tried to stave them off forever. How I’m heartbroken he never let me work with him.
I don’t send it. But it feels like a release, to lay it all out so clearly.
Ben unleashed me when he did this.
I have no loyalty left to him. Not even the tiniest sliver of it.
And I don’t want anyone dictating what I have to do in the future. Who I have to be with, how I have to pretend. I’m done with that kind of life. I’m not going to pretend in front of a journalist ever again.
Rafe doesn’t come out of his office.
I end up calling both Amber and Nora, actually, and they’re wonderful to talk to.
I call Amy, too, my best friend from home, and hearing her familiar voice is a balm.
Rafe’s mother even texts me with support and a picture of her ocean view.
The message is oddly punctuated and is only half about me, but I’m very grateful for the support.
I don’t tell any of them about my true fear.
That my mistake has made Rafe think less of me.
I eventually go to bed, lying awake in the space we share, and wait for him to come. Embarrassment burns bright inside me. I still haven’t apologized for not logging out of that email server. It’s my fault all of this is even an issue today.
But he doesn’t come.
I toss and turn and keep looking at the time. When it’s past one, I get up to look around. The guest rooms are all empty. He’s not sleeping in any of them.
So I look outside and see one of the cars missing.
Everything inside me sinks.
He’s left. I sink down onto the landing of the steps, and hot tears start tracking down my cheeks. It’s been a long time since I cried outside of a panic attack. But I do it now, thinking about all of it.
My failure. My mistake. My uncle.
And Rafe. His soft hands and compliments and how much I’ve come to crave them. The burgeoning emotions between us that I’ve been afraid to put a name on.
I don’t want it to be gone.
And I cry for him, too, because he seems to feel so guilty, and I don’t know how to help him with it. I didn’t deserve to survive, he told me, and maybe I understand more of that now.
He holds himself to exacting standards because it feels unsafe to be anything but excellent. And he punishes himself for failure.
He doesn’t fight because it’s fun.
He fights because he thinks he deserves pain.
I sit there until the tears have dried. I sit there and wait, in the quiet and dark of this villa I’ve come to love, until a pair of headlights shine on the driveway.
The front door opens.
His face is half lit by the sconces, all sharp lines and hard angles. There’s a cut in his lip. He’s never come back with that before.
Rafe drops his bag on the marble floor and leans back against the closed front door, his eyes finding me right away.
Like he knew I’d be waiting.
“You went out fighting again?” I ask.
“I had to,” he says simply.
“I’ve asked you not to.” My voice is a little shaky, and I wonder if he can see the dried tears on my face. It feels like my heart is being torn out of my chest.
“I know you did. But I was careful. No one saw.”
“That’s not why I asked you to stop. It wasn’t for… for… potential PR reasons.”
There are dark circles beneath his eyes, his hair the color of ink. “Then why?”
“You know why. I don’t like seeing you hurt yourself.
Tonight… was it because of what happened?
With my uncle? Because I’m sorry about that.
I didn’t tell you earlier, but I’m so sorry.
” I press my hands against the edge of the worn wooden step I’m sitting on, as if it can ground me.
“I know I embarrassed you. You care about your image, and then you were so… so cold about it all.”
“Paige, what are you talking about?”
“You were focused on fixing it. It was obviously a huge problem, and you needed to fix it right away.”
“For you,” he says. “For you.”
“I know it was my fault. Not logging out of that email server, and now everyone knows, the whole world knows—”
“No.” He reaches out to brace himself against the wall. “Don’t, Paige. Stop apologizing to me. Please.”
I start to rise. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not. Come upstairs.”
He shakes his head again, just once. “I’m fine. It was just more intense than usual.”
I find his hand and pull him up the stairs. He follows at a slow pace. Fear wars with the myriad of other competing emotions inside me. Is he really hurt?
I get him into the bathroom and he sits down on the edge of the bathtub. He’s in nothing but a black t-shirt and a pair of slacks.
“I’m fine,” he says again, but his eyes are locked on me like he’s drinking me in. Like he can’t look away. There’s a haunted look in them.
“Take your shirt off,” I say in a low voice. He hesitates, but then he pulls it off so I can get a look at the other marks on him. There’s more blood along his forearm. Not a lot. Just streaks of it, like he’s wiped his arm across his lip a few times.
“Why can’t I apologize?” I ask him, and shove one of the villa’s towels under the lukewarm water of the tap. “It is my fault. And I know… I know how much your reputation matters to you.”
“It doesn’t. It doesn’t matter at all.” His voice sounds almost angry. “I thought it did, once. But it doesn’t.”
“My uncle… I’m going to handle him.”
“I’ve handled him,” Rafe says simply.
I pause, standing in front of him, towel half lifted toward his temple. “What?”
“I threatened him earlier tonight on the phone. Made sure he knows I have proof, too. Because reputation does matter to him, and if he so much as breathes at us again, I’m going to burn his to the fucking ground.
” Rafe’s eyes are locked with mine. “He’s never going to come after you again. I promise you, Paige. I promise.”
The fervor in his voice makes my eyes glassy. “You did?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you,” I whisper, and dab at the wound by his lip. No one has taken care of me in so long. No one but him, no one until him. Maybe I should have been the one to handle my uncle. But I’m so, so grateful that I don’t have to.
And yet… Rafe was so cold earlier. So laser-focused.
“I should have logged out of that email account,” I say, just one more time. “Thank you for helping me.”
His lips tug in the tiniest, most humorless smile I’ve ever seen. It disappears a second later as he winces at the gash in his lower lip. “Don’t thank me. Don’t apologize to me. You did nothing wrong, and you owe me nothing.”
“What do you mean?”
“Your uncle wouldn’t have done this if it wasn’t for me.
You wouldn’t have married me if I hadn’t made myself your only way out.
” He sounds like a man condemned, the words spoken to my throat, not my face.
“The lawsuit against you wouldn’t have happened.
I’m the one who painted the target on your back. ”
“Rafe…”
“Your panic attacks have gotten worse since I entered your life.”
“You’re not the reason. I told you that.”
He talks as if he doesn’t hear me, lost to the fire of his own conviction.
“And what’s worse, what’s driving me insane, is that there’s no way for me to undo any of it.
I can solve it, I can keep you safe, but I can’t undo it.
I don’t deserve you, and that guilt is another weight to carry.
” He shakes his head slowly, his green eyes narrowing. “I haven’t earned you.”
“You don’t have to earn me.” I put a hand on his shoulder. He looks down, like it’s a surprise to him. His skin is warm and a little dry. “I was so worried that you resented me today, for my mistake, and for embarrassing you so publicly.”
“Resented,” he repeats, like the word is strange. “Resented?”
“I know I’m not what you wanted. I’ve pushed you, and annoyed you, and yeah, I did a lot of it on purpose…” It’s hard to keep going. Fear licks inside me like flames. For so long, I’ve run from my emotions. “I’m a lot. You like your life calm and ordered.”
“Resented,” he says again, and he takes my hand in both of his. He runs his finger over my engagement ring. “Yes, you have pushed me. You’ve annoyed me. You’ve turned my life upside down and inside out, and you’ve made me want to scream. And I never want you to stop. I never want you to leave.”
My throat closes. “Really?”
“Yes. Really.” His hands wrap around my waist, his thumbs against my ribs. “Ben was your family and he failed you. I want to be your family, Paige. I want so badly not to fail you.”
I stroke my hand over his anguished face. “What are you talking about? You’ve never failed me.”
He shakes his head slowly. I find the towel and start wiping at his forearm, removing the blood. This has to stop. He can’t do this to himself anymore.
“What are you punishing yourself for?” I ask him.
He leans forward, head to my abdomen, and breathes in deep gulps.
“Tell me,” I murmur. My hand finds the thick of his hair, and I gently thread through it, careful not to press too hard. He told me once he always tries to protect his head. So there won’t be any visible bruises. But just in case he didn’t, I don’t want to hurt him further. “Rafe… talk to me.”
“If I tell you,” he says, voice against the silk of my nightgown, “you’ll never look at me the same way again.”
“I doubt that.”
“I don’t.” There’s a bleakness in his voice.
“Tell me, Rafe. Trust me.”