Page 39 of Bride for Keeps

He’d been worse than an idiot, worse than blind, but the only way to fix that, to make up for it, to learn and heal and grow from that horrible mistake was to show her the opposite of what he’d shown her then.

No silences, no keeping himself apart because he’d felt less and worthless from the knowledge of his parentage. No withdrawing until he connected all the dots by himself.

Marriage and love weren’t about only giving the best to each other, something he still had trouble really wrapping his head around. But the truth of it existed in her tears, in thispain. Making a relationship work was about turning to each other, even when it was hard, even when it didn’t make sense, even when the thing you most wanted to do in the world was turn away and protect your already bruised heart.

“I’ve made such a mess of things,” he murmured against her mouth, and then her temple. “We’ve made such a mess of things,” he corrected, because silences went two ways. They’d each been silent for similar reasons, both been too afraid to reach out for the other.

“Yes,” she agreed, tilting her head so his mouth could trail down her neck. “It’s not the kind of mess you can clean up.”

He stopped, though he kept his hands in her hair as he pulled his head away to look down at her. Misery, exhaustion, and yet she didn’t push him away. She didn’t tell him to stop.

He dropped his forehead to hers, looking into her wary eyes. He couldn’t cure her wariness. Couldn’t convince her it was a mess theywouldclean up. Not in all the ways he was used to or understood. Reason and talking wouldn’t solve this problem.

He vowed to solve it anyway. To talk through it. To keep showing up. To ask Cole for a million pieces of advice. To never turn away from Sierra again no matter how much he wanted to keep his hurt to himself where it felt like it belonged.

But a vow he made to himself didn’t count, did it? Wasn’t that the point of all this? It didn’t matter if she believed him, if she thought he was weak or wrong. The vow, his intention—telling it to her was the thing that mattered.

“I don’t believe that. We can fix this,” he said roughly, holding her tight when she tried to look away. “I love you. Iwantyou. The whole of who you are, the whole of what I love, is not the mistakes we made, Sierra.”

“I need you to let me go.”

He knew she didn’t just mean physically. Because she could certainly pull his hands off her face. She could move out of his grasp.

But she didn’t. She didn’t.

“I’m not ever letting you go,” he said. “You need me to hold on.”

“Don’t tell me what I ne—”

He covered her mouth with his, pouring everything he was into that kiss. Everything she meant. Words were important, and so were actions. The whole of it was important, not just one thing or the other. Not just being perfect or being imperfect.

It was theallof himself that he needed to give her, and maybe if he could do that, she’d trust him enough to give it back. Even if she didn’t now, he’d keep doing it until she could.

“We did it all wrong there for a while,” he said, punctuating the words with kisses as he moved her back toward the bed. “But we can fix that. We canchangethat. I believe that.”

“I don’t,” she whispered, but her eyes were wide and open instead of hard. When he laid her out on the bed, she went easily, stretching out on the soft blankets and big mattress. “I don’t believe it at all.”

Now,he told himself.She doesn’t believe it now, but you can change that.He had to change it. “Let me,” he murmured.

“Let you what?” she asked, new tears forming in her eyes. But she lay there, and he had to believe this was a start. An opening.

This was what Cole had talked about when he’d said hard work and trying hard weren’t the same. Trying hard meant hurting and failing and going on anyway. It meant things took time even when you didn’t want them to.

It meant giving yourself even when you weren’t guaranteed anything back.

He slowly lifted the hem of her sweatshirt up. She didn’t stop him. In fact, she moved so he could lift it off of her completely, and then she lay back down. He tugged down the stretchy pants she wore, until she was lying underneath him in nothing but her underwear.

His gorgeous wife, pale skin and the colorful smattering of tattoos on one arm. Freckles on her shoulder and nose like gold dust. She looked impossibly vulnerable when he’d always seen her as a force of nature.

She was both, of course, and it was a revelation to realize she, and he, could be both. Weak and strong. Right and wrong. Insecure and sure.

“Let me show you.”

Chapter Eleven

Sierra was allmixed up. She’d decided to let him, to have this again just this once—she waspregnantafter all. Then she’d leave. She would. She had to.

But who was this man kissing down her body like she was something not just precious or important but actuallynecessary, elemental to his survival?

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