Page 292 of Caelum

He sighed. “You’re right.”

“And yet, you’re the worst. I know things happened to Stefan, the things that happened to Nestor, too, were beyond reprehensible, and Eren as well… but they don’t treat me the way you do.

“You hurt me, Dre. You really hurt me. You seem to wield the sharpest knife and are capable of making the most precise cuts that get to me the worst.”

I heard him gulp. “I’m sorry, Eve.”

That had me shaking my head. “No. I don’t accept it. Sorries are too easy. Sorry is just a word. I need you to mean it, to live by it, or it’s just another statement without intent.”

“You’re right,” he rasped. “And even though you think it’s just a word, I genuinely mean it. I-I have been a shit these past few months, but that’s because you changed everything. I know it’s no excuse, but you did. You came into my world, a world that had order, that made sense, and suddenly, nothing did.

“Years ahead of schedule, I was turning into my beast, I was having to leave my cacti behind, having to forge a new life with men who’d been enemies until you came along…” He grunted. “It’s been hard. For someone who can’t stand change, who doesn’t trust easily, you can’t even begin to understand how hard it was for me, Eve.”

“No, I can’t, but I can understand how hard it was for me too. Stop being selfish, Dre,” I ground out, calling him on his nonsense. “You weren’t the only one dealing with stuff. I came into a crazy new world, one where I knew no one, but was embraced by three guys who made me feel safe. Secure. Wanted, even. You came along and wrecked that. Any stability I thought I’d found, you destroyed.” I released a shaky breath as I remembered how terrible I’d felt in those days after he’d awoken from the deep sleep he’d been in after he’d been knocked unconscious by Reed. “You made things so much harder on me, Dre.”

“I know I did,” he whispered. “And if I could kick myself, I would. I swear I would, but it wasn’t…” He cursed under his breath. “Okay, it was intentional at the time.”

“I know it was,” I grumbled.

“I just mean that the Dre of before isn’t the Dre standing here today.”

If there was anything that could have made me listen, it was that statement.

Why?

Because hadn’t I just been thinking the exact same thing in the bathroom?

Hadn’t I looked in the mirror, stared at my reflection, seen the same girl looking back at me, and yet also seen the infinitesimal changes that made me feel like a completely different Eve?

One so overwhelmed with knowledge and experience that she felt like Eve 2.0?

I could have carried on railing at him, demanded more apologies, made him promise never to treat me so badly again, but I didn’t.

He was right.

He wasn’t the same Dre, but that didn’t mean the Dre of old wasn’t still inside.

“The next time you speak to me the way you did today, I won’t talk to you again.” I didn’t put a time frame on it because I didn’t know how long it would take for me to ram the lesson home.

“I deserve that.”

“You’re not a child. I’m not punishing you by not speaking to you. What I’m saying is that I will have no desire to speak to you because if you treat me like a turd, then we have nothing to say to one another, do we?”

He grunted. “No. And I won’t do it again.”

He would.

It was in his nature.

He might be a different Dre, but that didn’t mean hispersonality had made a complete reversal. He wasn’t suddenly nice and friendly. That would, in all honesty, never be Dre.

And I was okay with that.

Each of my men had weaknesses and strengths, and that was what made them unique. That was what made them a joy to be around.

“Good,” I told him in a quiet voice. Then, I reached out and grabbed his hand and entwined my fingers with his.

“How are you feeling? You took quite a fall today,” he inquired, changing the subject.

---