Chapter 29
Twenty-Nine
Thorn
Weddings. Christ.
We spent the morning watching Brooks and Briar exchange vows to make their marriage official, and now the true festivities are just getting underway inside their house.
Luckily, all of our digging into Angela’s files, uncovering Lyon shell company after shell company, along with the pressure from the FBI meant that the ceremony went off without a hitch.
It helps that Brooks and Briar kept it small, just us.
And that Pascal and his team beefed up security even further beforehand.
Music drifts through the room. Laughter is loud and abundant. Champagne glasses clink and toasts are made. Briar and Brooks are surrounded by the people who love them, and for the first time in months, nobody is talking about the Lyons or security or shell companies or blackmail networks.
They deserve that.
But their wedding being small means that I’ve seen River more in a few hours than I’ve seen her over the last couple of weeks.
River.
Who’s barely looked at me.
Whose words still drift through my mind.
I can’t do this with you until you trust me enough to tell me the truth.
River.
Who I want. I need.
And I know I can’t keep doing this.
Barely sleeping, barely eating, barely living.
So…I have to tell her.
And maybe I’ll still barely be living when she walks away.
But at least I’ll have tried instead of standing on the sidelines like a fucking coward.
I glance up from my beer, expecting to find her celebrating beside Briar and Brooks, finally ready to cut my heart out and present it to her on a silver platter, but she isn’t smiling and toasting the happy couple.
Instead, she’s slipping from the room and disappearing outside.
Into the darkness beyond the house.
Away from everyone.
Away from me.
Again.
I follow her, watch her push through a set of French doors and vanish onto the balcony.
My stomach tightens.
For three weeks I’ve tried convincing myself I don’t need her.
That I can exist without her so long as she’s safe.
That eventually it won’t hurt to be in the same room, that she’ll stop pushing me away and we can find something…peaceful.
Or at least, she’ll look at me without that quiet hurt sitting behind her eyes.
But it’s been three weeks.
And somehow she’s further away now than she was the night I got that picture of her tied to a chair from Sergio.
Worse? This distance…I built it myself.
No more.
I set down my untouched champagne and follow her outside.
The evening air is cool from the storm that rolled through earlier. River stands at the railing overlooking the gardens below, staring out into the darkness. And for a moment, she doesn’t move.
Then her shoulders sag.
As though the rigid control she’s held all evening slips.
Only slightly.
But enough.
Enough for me to see how exhausted she is.
Enough for me to see how badly she’s hurting too.
Enough for me to know this has to end now.
“River,” I murmur.
She straightens immediately, her armor snapping back into place.
Damn it.
“What are you doing out here?” I snap.
Christ. I’m an idiot. I’m a fucking idiot.
Her lips flatten. “Getting some air.” She turns away from me, deliberately giving me her back. Fucking ignoring me.
Again.
My chest tightens. “It’s not safe,” I say—another wrong thing.
Because she already knows how dangerous the world can be.
Intimately.
She laughs—a short, humorless sound. “I’m as safe here as I am anywhere.”
That’s true, and it means that I’m left wondering what to say.
Fuck, I’m always left wondering what to say when I’m with this woman.
“It’s cold,” I blurt.
“I have a jacket.”
I snort. “That can hardly be considered a jacket.”
She scowls. “Seriously?”
“It’s thin and doesn’t even fully cover your arms.”
“It’s the middle of summer. It was almost ninety degrees today.”
“It also rained.”
A roll of her eyes before she looks back into the darkness. “Thanks for breaking down the weather for me.”
Sighing, I lean back against the railing, ask softly, “Can we to talk about it, little hen?”
Her shoulders go stiff. “I don’t know. Can we?”
I rub a hand across my jaw, unsure where to start, and as I struggle, the silence stretches and grows heavy.
Eventually, River turns away from me, staring out over the dark gardens again.
And I…just stare at her.
She must feel the weight of my gaze because she turns back, brows dragging together. “What?” she asks sharply.
I hesitate. Then decide honesty has to start somewhere. “I miss you.”
River shakes her head and laughs in disbelief. “You miss me?”
“Yes, little hen.”
“Great,” she snaps. “Now go away and leave me alone.”
“But…you love me.”
A sigh before she turns back, her eyes sad. “Yes,” she murmurs. “Yes, I do.” Her voice drops even further, so low I have to strain to hear it. “And you love me too.”
Every cell in my body goes tense.
Then I admit, “Yes.”
Her eyes shine briefly. Then harden. “And yet somehow we’re still standing here with the weight of your past between us.”
I move closer.
River doesn’t step back.
A small victory.
A dangerous victory.
“I don’t know how to do this.” The confession slips out before I can stop it.
She freezes, her expression gentling. “I know,” she whispers.
“I…” I sigh. “I keep trying to figure out the right way to tell you.”
Her laughter is soft…and sad. “Thorn, honey. I don’t need perfect.”
I close my eyes, my heart twisting in my chest.
Because suddenly I understand.
The right words aren’t the problem.
The truth is.
And I’m still scared of it.
Still scared she’ll hear everything and decide I’m exactly what I’ve always feared.
A monster who’s just wearing a better suit.
She looks away again. Back toward the gardens. Toward the darkness. Toward anywhere but me.
“I just need you to trust me.”
God, I hate that she sounds tired.
Not angry.
Not furious.
Tired.
“I do.” I step closer again.
Close enough to see the shimmer of tears she refuses to let fall.
Close enough to smell the perfume she wore tonight.
Close enough to remember exactly what it feels like to hold her.
Her breath catches.
Mine does too.
“Little hen,” I rasp, wrapping one arm around her waist.
“Thorn,” she whispers, her body melting against mine.
And then somehow…we’re kissing.
Just like that night.
Only this time I don’t stop.
Not because I’m trying to convince her to forget about my past.
Not because I think a kiss fixes anything between us.
But because I’ve spent three weeks pretending I can survive without touching her.
And now I’m finally admitting I can’t.
She makes a small sound against my lips, and for one terrible second, I think she’s going to push me away.
Instead, her hands fist in the front of my shirt.
And…she kisses me back.
It’s hard and hot, tinged with anger and heartbreak and pain. But beneath that all is…need. Because she’s missed me too. Because she loves me too.
Because she’s River—and she won’t turn away from me.
Relief crashes through me so violently it almost hurts, and I groan, holding her tighter, kissing her deeper, my hand pressing into the small of my back, those gorgeous curves of hers against me, her lips and tongue tangling with mine.
Until she pushes at my chest, abruptly pulls away.
She’s flushed, her lungs working, her eyes bright, so damned beautiful it takes my breath away.
And furious.
She glares at me. “This changes nothing.”
“I know.”
“You can’t kiss me every time things get hard.”
“I know,” I say softly.
“I need you to trust me with all the parts of you,” she says.
“Because I can’t be in another relationship where I’m not an equal, where I’m shoved into a box, relegated to the surface parts you’re willing to share.
I need more. I need everything.” Her throat works.
“Not today. Not right now. But, honey”—she exhales—“we can’t be an us if you’ve got one hand up keeping me at a distance. ”
I close my eyes, rasp out, “I know.”
But still I can’t make the fucking words come, and the silence that settles between us is stifling, sitting heavy on my lungs as I just. Fucking. Stare. At. Her.
She steps back and fuck that hurts.
“I’m here,” she whispers. “When you’re ready…” A soft sigh. “Just…when you’re ready.” She turns, starts walking toward the house.
Walking away from me.
I should let her go—the terror that has my insides in knots is screaming at me to do exactly that.
Instead—just as she reaches for the door handle—I say what I should’ve said weeks ago, “You’re right.”
She stops and slowly turns to face me.
I force myself to hold her gaze, even as the shame eats at me.
“I’m right about what?”
“All of it.”