44. CHAPTER 41 #2
I sat there, staring at the words, the paper trembling in my grip.
Every sentence carried the weight of an ending I wasn't ready to face.
I pressed the heel of my hand to my eyes, but it did nothing to stop the surge.
The tears came anyway, silently, violently, and utterly humiliating.
I bent forward in my chair, my elbows braced on my knees, and the last of my composure finally gave way.
I care more deeply than I dare admit.
It was the truth I’d tried to hide under legal terms I could control and a distance I convinced myself was necessary.
I'd built walls to keep her out, calculated every move, all while caring only about the little things. Like how she looks at me even while we’re standing worlds apart, without speaking to eachother for days.
The pencil tucked in her hair while she contemplated a sketch, as I watched her mindlessly.
Her lips pressed together when she was unsure of how to solve a problem.
I cared about every tiny detail when it came to her, and I knew she saw me too…down to the deepest parts.
A hollow laugh broke through my tears. To think I’d almost lost the only person who could see the tenderness my father had just described. The only person who wasn’t afraid to reach into the darkest parts of me and touch what everyone else feared.
I cared deeply about my Léa. Her alone.
And I was losing her because I’d spent too long pretending I didn't feel anything at all. The room suddenly constricted around me, pulling the air from my lungs until I was nothing but a hollow chest and a recklessly broken heart.
I didn’t hear footsteps, or even the door open, but I felt her—as though her presence pulled a cord tied directly to my sternum. I looked up.
My Léa stood there in the doorway, her hair loose over her shoulders. Whatever she'd come here intending to say vanished the instant our eyes met.
Her lips parted. “Oh—”
It was barely a whisper.
I wasn't expecting her to be here... to find me stripped of every defense I possessed.
I dragged in a shaky breath, trying to school my voice and failing. “Léa—”
It came out rough. Unsteady. Broken. It felt wrong. She shouldn't see me like this. I’d rather have faced a death sentence than let her see the cracks in my foundation.
Her eyes moved to the letter in my hand, then back to my red-eyed, wrecked face. She stepped inside.
“Orion?” Her voice was a sober plea.
I looked away, my jaw clenched, but my throat burned with the effort of holding back another sob.
“This wasn’t how you were supposed to see me.”
She moved closer. One step. Then another, as if she were walking through a minefield and learning the only thing likely to explode was my heart.
“Why not?” she whispered. “You’re human. I know that.”
I shook my head. “Not to you. I never wanted to be weak to you.” It was true.
To her, I wanted to be a protector, an immovable force. I wanted her to believe nothing could ever break me, except the thought of her walking away.
She stopped in front of my desk, so close that I could smell her—the soft vanilla note that had held me hostage since the last time I’d held her, mixed with that floral scent that had haunted me for ten weeks and made missing her unbearable.
“That’s from your father?” she asked, signaling to the letter.
I nodded. “He wrote it before the sickness took hold. Even then, he knew that I'd be standing in these ruins one day, searching for a way out.”
“He always knew,” I whispered mostly to myself.
He had seen my cowardice coming and prepared for it.
It was one of the things that made me doubt I could ever measure up to him, that I could ever fit into the shoes of a man so wise.
Most of all, he knew I would need this not just for comfort, but for permission to be the man she deserved.
She touched the corner of the paper gently with her fingertips, then she looked back at me, and the look in her eyes brought me to my knees without me moving a muscle.
“Orion… you’ve done so much,” she said, her voice soft and comforting. “The lawyers, the clause, the board, my family… you fought everyone. For me.”
“For us,” I said, my voice cracking. “For our marriage. For what I should have protected from the start. It wasn’t just about fixing a contract, Léa. I wanted to fix the world to make space for you in it.”
Her breath caught, the smallest sound escaping her.
I stood slowly, afraid one wrong move would make her bolt.
“I’ve hurt you,” I said. “I know that. I can’t undo it, Léa. I can only tell you the truth now.”
She swallowed, looking me straight in the eyes. “Then tell me.”
I stepped closer. Close enough to touch her, but I didn’t.
I couldn’t risk her flinching, now that I had her attention.
“You think I used you. But the truth is… the night I had you, everything fell apart. Everything I thought I was, everything I thought I wanted.” I dragged a hand down my face.
“I felt something I didn’t have the language for.
So I ran like a coward, and I let you think the worst because it was easier than admitting you held my life in your hands. ”
She blinked fast, her breath trembling. I could feel the hurt radiating from her still, but there was no edge to it now.
“And the clause?” she whispered.
“I changed it because I’d rather be a king of ruins than lose you.”
She bit down on her lower lip, her eyes shimmered with unshed tears.
“I’m in love with you,” I confessed. It was the first time I’d said it to her face, and the admission broke me wide open.
It was a confession that tasted sweet and sour at the same time.
“It terrifies me. It makes me unhinged, reckless and weak in every way my father warned me not to be. But I—” my voice faltered, the ache in my chest becoming unbearable.
“I haven’t gone a single day without wanting you.
Missing you. Needing you. It’s an ache worse than death, Léa. ”
Her breath snagged, and she moved her hand to her chest as if to steady her heart.
“Orion,” she whispered, her voice splintering. “You idiot… you think weakness is loving someone? No. Weakness is pretending you don’t.”
I took another step. “Léa—” Her name was a prayer on my tongue at this point.
She reached up and wiped a tear from my cheek with her thumb. The contact sent electricity racing through my pulse.
“I forgive you,” she whispered, her voice trembling.
“Not because you deserve it, but because I’m tired of living like I don’t miss you.
” Her eyes flooded. “And because I love you too. Even if I didn’t want to.
And no matter how much I’ve tried to hate you, I only ended up loving the man you were trying so hard to hide. ”