Page 124 of A Lethal Game of Trust

“Fucking hell,” I rasped, palm to my head as I turned fromhim. “Jesus, Dom.”

He gripped my arms, trying to pull me to look at him, but I tore back. We were away from the masses, but we could hear the party getting lively.

“Don’t!” I shouted. “Don’t touch me, please.”

That night he had held me as my dad lay there dying, as my mum tried to splatter her brains over my dad’s last moments.

That night I lost my father, my mother and then the Dom I knew disappeared, too.

Replaced by a cruel shell that had avoided me and ignored me for years. When, really, I should have been the cruel one. I should have hated him, not the other way around.

“It was an accident,” he urged. “I swear to you, I didn’t know. I hated myself for it, Leo. I never hated you, but I…”

He let go to come and stand before me. I only looked down at his shoes. The ones I had worn in his wardrobe only three weeks ago.

“You what?” I mumbled. “Wanted to hurt me more? I fuckingneeded you.” My voice broke with that last declaration.

“If I… if I got close to you, I would tell you and I would break your heart. I couldn’t live with what I’d done to you. It hurt to see you and—and…If you could hate me for being a dick, that was okay. But I couldn’t have you hate me because I hurt you.” His face twisted in pain, tears shining in his eyes. “Leonie, I swear, I had nothing to do with it. It was a mistake. I’m so, so sorry. It was—”

“Issy and I were taken four months before! That security was up for a reason! Did you want to endanger my life to come and see me? Did you want to confess your love to my dead body? Oh no, you just wanted to say it over my dead father’s!”

“I will never forgive myself, Leo,” he cried, tears drippingdown his cheek. “I will never. I will spend my whole life regretting that night. It is all my fault. Everything. Your mum, your addiction, your—”

“Shut up!” I screamed, walking further through the art gallery. We were too close to other people for this. “You want me to relive it all? No? Thenshut up!”

“I’m sorry,” he cried, a step behind me. “I will spend the rest of my days begging you to believe me.”

I whipped around. “Swear it. Swear on my life.”

“I swear. I swear I had no involvement, Leo. I will kill whoever was involved. That’s a promise. Firdman gets out and I will kill him.”

Even before he said it, I knew it was true. He was capable of many things, but I didn’t actually think he would do this to me or my dad.

“It wasn’t your fault,” I whispered more to myself than anything. “You were a kid.”

His eyes widened and he put his hands on my shoulders. “No, you have to blame me. I deserve it. I need you to hate me so we can move past this. I need—”

“It’s not about what you need!” I cried, jolting back. My breaths were erratic. I pursed my lips to concentrate on them, looking down at my feet. “You didn’t order my dad’s execution. It’s a coincidence. It’s…”

What was it? Abominable. I should hate him. I should want to run away.

I could have screamed, bawled my eyes out. But the only one I wanted comfort from would have been him.

His arms snaked around me and his head fell to my shoulder. I didn’t hold him, but I let him touch me.

“You couldn’t love me until you knew,” he whispered. “Itwould have wrecked me if you said it without knowing. But I wanted you all the same. I wanted you to love me back.”

I did love him. Though I hadn’t said it, it wasn’t a secret. It wasn’t words out in the air but clear in everything we did, in the way we moved together, in our gentle fucks, our aggressive caresses. The way we spoke, the easy silences, the looks we gave each other.

What happened then didn’t change how I felt now.

Firdman had been sent to kill my father and he probably would have found a way whether the security was working or not. Whoever wanted my dad dead would have sent another person after him and maybe he would have lived, but…

Dad knew it as well.

That family meeting we had where he put us essentially on a lockdown, removing all the staff because he was paranoid of what they would hear and who they were loyal to… he had known.

“Now you won’t ever,” he said and swallowed hard. “Now you can’t. I don’t expect you to.”