Page 145 of Down & Dirty

“I have something to show you too,” I told him when a scowl darkened his face.

“If it’s a house in California, I vote we keep both,” he said, his voice rough and low, and lacking the humor he was trying for.

I wiped the tears from my cheeks. “Not exactly.”

Tugging the piece of paper from my pocket, I felt Cory’s eyes on me, tracing my features like it might be the last time he’d get the chance.

“This isn’t exactly a house, but I’m hoping it’s a foundation of sorts.”

“You’re talking in riddles,” he muttered, sounding a little on edge.

“Sorry, I saw all of this going a little differently.”

He sighed, skimming the backs of his fingers across my cheek, a sweetness spreading across his face. “Don’t apologize, beautiful. I’m just glad you’re here.”

So was I. Booking the flight without telling him had been terrifying. After the hospital, he’d left me alone, without so much as a text or a call. Elle and Ronnie had both assured me he was just trying to do what I’d asked, but dread had started to grow. That I’d pushed him too far, that I should have given him a chance to speak, or told him what was going on with me. But to see what he’d been doing with that time, now...it was like color had come back into the world. Light returned and in its glow was the man I loved, refusing to give up on us. On me.

My shaking fingers made it hard to pull the folded edges apart, but finally, I got it free and handed it to him.

Cory eyed me for a second before he looked down. He scanned it quickly, swallowing as he shifted on his feet.

“Does this mean?”

I nodded. “It means I’m finally going back for my degree.”

His smile lit the room. “Here?”

I looked around, at the bedroom he’d made beautiful for us, at the wall of photos behind him, fresh tears springing to my eyes.

“Here.”

The email from the University of Southern Maine had come in the day before, letting me know that they’d take my transfer credits from years ago, and that I could enroll in classes for the fall semester.

He bolted forward, wrapping his arms around me and swinging me in a circle. But then he froze, setting me back on my feet with a creased brow.

“This does mean that...” he looked between my eyes, his jaw working. “Are we okay?”

The joy in me deflated a little, his sorrowful expression bringing everything that had happened back to the surface.

“I want us to be.” I’d thought of all the ways this conversation could go, but in every version, there was something holding me back from simply forgiving him. “I need to know why you called Cass.” Me not liking modeling wasn’t a good enough reason for betraying me like that. “And don’t say it’s ‘cause I would have hated it. I didn’t like managing Ronnie either, and you didn’t interfere.”

Cory’s hold on me eased, but he didn’t let go. He dropped his head, sighing a hard breath before he looked back at me with guilt in his eyes. “At first, I did it because if anything had happened to you at one of those shoots, I never would have forgiven myself. I’d heard too many horror stories, and thinking that any one of them could have been you...it drove me a little mad.” His fingers flexed where they gripped my waist, like he was testing to make sure I was still there. “I’d dragged you into that part of my life. Hell, I’m the reason you knew Cass.” He licked his lips, the corners turning down. “But I know how strong and capable you are. I should have trusted you’d be okay.”

I waited a second, watching him steady himself to go on. “And then?”

His expression got even darker. “It was my fault. You were only doing any of that because of me. I couldn’t see that for a while, how my choice to lie to you, to push aside how you felt about me riding...It was my fault you felt so alone you had to go to Cass. And it would be my fault if in doing that you got hurt.” He traced the edge of my jaw, his eyes fixed on his fingers, the sadness in them squeezing my lungs. “You wanted to do something important with your life Sky, and you were going to put that off again because of me.”

In the time I’d spent with Cory I’d gone from seeing him as a flat, cut-out of a man, self-obsessed and offering nothing to the people around him, to relishing in the gradient of color he shined on those he loved. He was protective and loyal, like it was his duty to be, and I didn’t have to wonder where or when he might have learned to shoulder that sense of responsibility.

“I’m sorry Sky, for all of it,” he whispered, a plea in his eyes I was finally ready to answer.

I rubbed his chest reassuringly, the spot above his big, beautiful heart. “I know, baby. I forgive you.” Wrapping my arms around his neck, he hauled me back against him so tight I could feel both our hearts racing. “I should have tried harder to explain what was going on with me,” I admitted, as he pulled back to look in my eyes. “We’d started all this on paper, for money, and some part of me needed to be independent enough so that I could trust that it wouldn’t be those contracts keeping us together. That it really was us.”

“Jesus, Skylar.”

My parents and Ronnie loved me because they had to. They gave me a job, and helped with Micah because we were family. But beyond them, no one had ever made me the focus of their world. And it scared me. Cory had started to make me feel likeIwas who he wanted most. But I couldn’t trust that so long as our arrangement was still in place, as long as I needed his help to pay the bills.

He held me, his chin resting on my head as he rubbed my back. “Stay here.” He let me go and darted for the door.

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