Page 93

“He left me,” I tell him. “I broke this man that I cared for deeply. He told me I abused him, and I had no idea. After that I went to therapy. I avoided relationships. I managed my behavior; I monitored my controlling nature and I was so careful. Until you.”

“Me,” Henry whispers.

“Every need that I was able to curtail with other people, roared to life when I met you. I want to be your everything. I want to look after you, provide for you, dominate you both in and out of the bedroom. I want to become your north, your axis, and everything in between. I want your life to revolve around me, the way mine has around you since the first time I laid eyes on you. But I knew that was wrong. I knew that I couldn’t lay all my crazy, scary abusive needs on you and expect you not to be crushed beneath them. So, I tried to hold myself back. I tried to temper my desires to what I thought you could handle. I didn’t want to ruin you, Henry, and I knew I would if I let myself get too out of control.”

“But—”

Lifting my hand, I silence him. “Let me finish before you say anything. Let me get it all out. Please.”

Henry nods, and I swallow thickly before I start again.

“The morning that I woke up with you in my arms, I realized that I want to own you, and I don’t just mean your body. I want to literally own you. I want to take over your life and reconfigure every single aspect of it so that it’s under my control. I want you to follow my rules and play my game, and when I realized how out of control I was, I panicked.”

“You said goodbye.”

Inhaling sharply, I nod. “Yes, I did. I thought I was doing what was best for you.”

“What changed?” Henry asks, accusation and intrigue alternating through his wary gaze.

“I got drunk, and then angry, and then I went to talk to Knight.”

“You work with him?”

I nod. “I needed to talk to someone, so I went to him and I told him about you. I told him about the man in the past, and I told him all the things I’d done and that I didn’t want to destroy you.”

“What did he say?” Henry asks.

I chuckle softly. “He asked me who my ex was, then he found his cell number and called him.”

Henry blinks. “He called your ex. Why?”

“To speak to him, I guess, to ask him how bad I’d been. How big of a monster I am.”

“And what did he say?”

“He said that I hadn’t been a monster at all. He said that he’d needed a way to break up with me because he was an addict and he didn’t want me to forgive him for cheating on me and try to help him get clean. He told Knight that he’d said I was abusive because he thought I’d know he was lying.”

The indignant splutter that falls from Henry’s lips makes me smile.

“He lied. He said all those terrible things about you and made you question yourself for years and it was all a lie?” he growls angrily.

I nod.

“He ruined you,” Henry whispers.

I shrug. “He was messed up. He was taking drugs and drinking too much.”

“Are you defending him?” Henry gasps.

“No, I’m not defending him,” I say, then fall silent, because I don’t know what else to say. Gabe’s lies have affected myrelationships for the last ten years. I don’t know who I’d be if I hadn’t believed I had the capacity to abuse my partner. But I can’t change the past. All I can do now is look to the future and try to fix things with Henry.

Neither of us speaks, and the silence stretches until it feels all-encompassing.

“I’m sorry that happened to you,” Henry finally says. “I’m sorry that he lied, he shouldn’t have done that, it’s awful…but…but.” Swallowing, he looks down, then back up at me again. “But you hurt me. You told me I was yours and then you dropped me like I was nothing. I should be used to being rejected, but being rejected by you was different. It hurt.”

The look on his face makes me feel like I’ve been stabbed by a thousand knives. He looks broken. By trying to stop myself from smothering him, I’ve done what I’d been fighting not to. I’ve hurt him, and I don’t know how I make up for that, but I know that I have to.

“I love you,” I whisper.