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But with her, it was easy to tell himself that maybe he didn’t need that anymore.

That leash.

Short and sharp, keeping him contained.

So he would just turn Bix into his compass? That wasn’t fair.

She had already been dragged down by too many terrible men.

“Yeah,” he said.

“You know, you could set me up in another house.”

“I could,” he said.

“You like having me around.” It wasn’t a question. It wasn’t even an accusation, just more of an observation.

“I do,” he said.

She was the only new, lovely thing he’d had in his life for a very long time.

She had become the focus of everything. Over the last two months, there was very little in his life that didn’t orient around Bix.

He was obsessed with her. That was the truth of it. He couldn’t pretend it wasn’t, not anymore. He had tried.

He had tried to keep the truth of his feelings for her held at bay. And now they were here, laid bare in front of him. He wasn’t sure that he liked it. Hell, he knew he didn’t.

Because it would be a mistake. He didn’t make mistakes anymore. But the truth was, he hadn’t wanted to make one in a long damned time. He hadn’t felt anything for a long damned time. Everything had been dampened down. Everything had been muted. Not with her.

That riot of color shone through.

It colored all that black-and-white in brilliant, glorious prisms. And it made it hard to tell what was right and what was wrong.

He couldn’t afford that.

But he wanted her close.

Because being near her, being near her like this, it reminded him...

The truth was, he hadn’t been truly happy in years. He hadn’t been truly angry. Truly sad. Not really much of anything.

But he had been righteous. And didn’t that count for something?

Being near her was like being close to happiness. It reminded him of all the things that could be.

Of the capacity he had to feel.

But he had made the decision to stop feeling very intentionally.

That she was a temptation was ample evidence that he needed to stay the hell away.

“I spent all my life being untethered. And in many ways, it kept me from freedom. But I don’t know that that’s any different than anyone else. I mean, we are all essentially what our parents want us to be. At least right at first, right?”

“I suppose that’s true,” he said.

“And then we grow up, and we have to decide what we are going to be. And some people get to start out with... you know. All those bricks. And some of the bricks are very fancy. And they help you build something really nice really fast. But at the end of the day, we all have to decide who we want to be. I feel like I finally get to decide that.”

“Good,” he said.