Chapter Twenty-Five #2
I let go of her hand. “I'm trying to punish myself?” I turn from her.
I should stop. But reality has the comforting blurry quality I need right now.
"I think you've spent three years trying to be better than your father, and the second you slip, you want to destroy yourself to prove you're not him." She rests a palm on my back. "But you're not him, Thorne. Even at your worst, you're not him."
The conviction in her voice nearly breaks me. I don't deserve her faith, her certainty, the way she's still standing here after everything I've confessed. She should be running. Should be calling her boss to get herself off this case, off this family, away from me.
Instead, her hand is on my back, and the touch is so goddamn kind it makes my chest ache.
I laugh. It’s sharp and ugly. "You’re wrong. I'm exactly like my father.”
She shakes her head.
"How do you know? You don’t know him."
"Because I know of him. And people like him. He takes. You're trying to protect."
"Or because I'm like my father—trying to control them."
Ivy narrows the distance between us, close enough that I can see the mix of concern and frustration in her warm eyes—eyes that should have turned cold on me by now. "You went to Williams to protect Sebastian. You're doing all of this to protect your family."
"And what about everything I've done in the past? I've tried to leave it behind, but I can't. It's who I am."
"I don't know who you were," she says quietly. “But I know who you are now. I've seen who you are when you're not trying to play the villain."
"It's not a part I'm playing." I take another drink.
My hand is steadier than it should be, muscle memory from all those years before I imposed the one-drink rule.
"You've seen the version of me that makes you breakfast and races you in the pool and fucks you until you can't remember your own name. But that's not all of me."
"Then show me the rest." She reaches out, her hand gentle on my wrist. "Stop hiding behind this act and show me who you really are."
"This isn't an act." I pull away from her warmth and certainty. I don't deserve it. "This is me. The real me. The one who destroys everything he touches."
"I don't believe that," she says quietly.
"Then you're not paying attention." I reach for the bottle again, but she's faster. There's a slight tremor in her fingers as she sets it down firmly on the bar cart.
Ivy's eyes are wet, but she doesn't look away. "Do you actually believe that, or is that just the easiest thing to be?"
Her question breaks me. There is nothing easy about this. Yet, I study her face, looking for the lie, the doubt, the moment when she'll realize what everyone else already knows—that I'm not worth believing in.
But she just stands there, looking at me like I'm someone worth defending.
I should keep my mouth shut. Let her believe whatever she wants. But the bourbon's loosening my tongue, and she needs to understand who I really am. What I've done.
"You and Rosalia seem to get along," I say.
She blinks at the apparent subject change. "Rose? Yes, we do. She's wonderful. And I know, Thorne, you told me. There was a bet and you extorted them."
“And you’re fine with that?” My laugh is harsh.
“Of course not, but I see you trying to make amends.”
“Did you know Rosalia is his second wife?”
“I did.” Her shoulders tense and she takes a small step back. Like she's bracing herself. Smart woman.
“I’m the reason they divorced.”
“Oh, Thorne, what did you do?”
My words are starting to blur together, the sharp edges softening. The room has that pleasant tilt to it now, everything just slightly off-balance. The bourbon's doing its work now
“If he hadn’t walked in on us, I’d have fucked her,” I say bluntly. I’d been drunker than I am now, but that’s an excuse for the inexcusable.
Ivy jerks back like I slapped her. “Why would you do that to anyone, let alone your brother?”
“She liked the attention. To play me against him. She’d done when I dated her. And later, when Sebastian married her. I warned him, but he wouldn’t listen…so I’d shown him.” I laugh without humor.
She looks at me.
"You're right," she finally says. "You've done terrible things."
Her gaze goes somewhere past me, like she can't look at me now that she finally sees me for the man I am. Weighing what I am against what she thought I was. I have no defense and wait for her verdict.
"But I also see you trying not to be that person anymore." She moves to the couch, sits down like the weight of tonight has finally caught up with her.
I exhale, not realizing I was holding my breath. There’s no way she could believe what she said.
Yet hope follows me as I take the seat next to her.
The rain still drumming against the windows is the only sound. I'm acutely aware of how close she is, how she hasn't pulled away despite everything I've told her tonight.
"You matter, Thorne," she says suddenly, her voice quiet but certain.
The words hit me like a shot to the chest. "Why?" The question comes out broken, raw. "Why do I matter, Ivy? Give me one good reason why anyone should give a shit about what happens to me. After everything I've done. Everything."
"Because you're not your mistakes." Her voice cracks slightly on the last word, and she blinks hard before meeting my gaze again.
"Because you're trying, even when it's hard.
Even when it would be easier to run. Because beneath all this self-loathing is a man who stayed when he could have left.
A man who took in his half-sister when he could have pushed her away. A man who's fighting for his family."
I want to push her away. Want to say something that will make her hate me. Because if she hates me, I can't hurt her worse later.
And that's inevitable. It's what I always do.
But I’ve bared the worst of my shame and she’s still here. Her hand in mine.
"I'm scared," I blurt.
After an eternity, she asks, "Of what?"
"Of this. Of you. Of fucking it up." I look at her, have to focus to keep her face clear. "Like I fuck everything up. I always... it's what I do. Fuck things up."
It's the most honest thing I've said in three years. Hell, probably ever.
And instead of using it against me, instead of running like any sane person would, the cushion shifts as Ivy moves closer. She leans her head on my shoulder. The rest of the fight drains out of me.
"I won't let them take what Sebastian built," My words are thick, slurred slightly at the edges. "Whatever it takes. Even if he hates me for it."
"He doesn't hate you. He's scared. There's a difference."
I set down my empty glass. "He wasn't wrong about the optics. About what this looks like. About what it could do to you."
"This is between you and me, no one else.”
"Still, I shouldn’t have pushed. I should have kept my dist—"
"No. You don't get to take away my agency here. I knew what I was doing. What we were doing."
The thing is, I want to believe her. I want to be the man she sees when she looks at me.
But wanting it doesn't make it true.
"I'm not good at this.” I stop. Forming coherent thoughts is like nailing bourbon to a wall—impossible when everything's this liquid. "At letting people in. At trusting anyone to see the real me, my life, and not run."
"I'm not running." She shifts closer, and I lift my arm in invitation. She tucks herself against my side. I wrap my arm around her waist, pulling her in.
She should run. She should get as far away from me as possible. But I don't say it. Instead, I just hold her against me, her head on my shoulder, my arm around her waist. She fits here, against me. Like she belongs.
The thought terrifies me. Because I've spent my life keeping everyone at a careful distance. But there's no distance with her. No strategy. Just this overwhelming need to keep her close while knowing we’ll never work.
"What are you thinking?" she murmurs against my shoulder.
The question is so simple, so gentle, it nearly undoes me. “About us,” I admit.
The bourbon makes my thoughts slow, heavy, thick. But even through the haze, one truth cuts clear: I don't want her to leave. And I don't know which scares me more—losing her or keeping her.
"Thank you," I murmur against her hair. "For staying."
The words feel inadequate for what I'm trying to say.
"I'm not going anywhere," she whispers, her fingers tracing absent patterns on my chest, against the cotton of my T-shirt.
The words settle something in me I didn't know was restless. "Promise?"
"I—"
Her phone rings, a sharp, businesslike tone that's different from her usual ringtone. She stiffens in my arms.
"That's Bill," she says, already twisting to look over her shoulder at the screen on the pool table's ledge. "My boss. He never calls this late. Why would he be calling at this hour?"
Shit. I agree, nothing good comes from calls this late.
I want to tell her to ignore it. I have a gut feeling that whatever Bill has to say, it's going to make everything worse.