Page 118 of Blood & Lace
Lucero looked down like he’d just realized he was still holding on for the first time. “Normally, I would listen, bella. ButI know you have more needles, and I’m not trying to be dead husband number four. Not unless you’re fucking me to death or something.”
“Fucking idiot,” I reiterated. “You’re bruising me up.”
“I’ll make it up later,” he said before he dragged me closer again. Slowly, he dropped to his knees. I watched as he gazed into my eyes. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have pried into your secrets. I knew you wanted it private, but I didn’t know why.” He shook his head when I tried to talk. “No, my turn,” he said. Lucero sucked in a deep breath. “You mean everything to me. I wanted you to love me so much that I ran over you. More than once. It wasn’t love, it was desperation. I was stupid and selfish.” He frowned. “I swear to you that if we keep going I will try not to do it again. I can’t promise I won’t, because I love you and it makes me want to protect you. I can respect your boundaries, though. As long as it’s really important.”
I stared at this giant of a man on his knees for me. “What kinda half-assed apology…” I muttered, my heart throbbing in my chest. “You can’t say ‘I’m sorry’ and ‘I’d probably do it again’ at the same time!”
He groaned. “I can’t help it, bella. My heart beats for you. When you’re upset, I die.” He whimpered. “But I’ll try so hard for you. I’ll make myself remember not to be selfish. That’s why I said if it’s important, I’ll restrain myself no matter what it takes. Okay?”
This was a trap. That was the first thing my brain screamed at me. If I went back to Lucero, he would just break my trust again. Break my heart again. I couldn’t afford to be sensitive, to be so open when I had to protect my brother.
“Lucero, I understand.” I sighed finally. “You don’t get it, though. Adam is everything to me, and I have to focus on him?—”
“Stop using him as an excuse,” Lucero snapped, a growl in his throat. “He hates it too. He told me so. That’s why he won’tlive at your place, because he knows you’ll make your entire life about him, and he doesn’t want that for you. Onyx, you have to stop. What Régis did to him has nothing to do with you.”
My eyes watered. “I know…”
“Do you?” he asked. “Because you still hate yourself when you think no one’s looking. Especially when it’s about Adam.”
My heart all but stopped in my chest. Fuck. No one was supposed to see through me. And here was Lucero who saw me in ways no one else had ever been able to. I’d never let them. My fingers shook in his grasp.
What Régis did to him has nothing to do with you.
“Then why does it always feel like it’s my fault?” I whispered. “My father never touched me. Just Adam. How is that fair? How is it okay that I’m related to that monster who left me perfectly happy and thriving while he sapped the life out of my brother? My hero?” My eyes watered. “I’ve always looked up to him, and I didn’t see. I never saw it.”
“He didn’t want you to see,” Lucero said quietly.
I shook my head. “I’m still related to that monster,” I hissed. “What if deep down, I’m like him? We have the same fucking blood, Lucero. I can’t stop thinking I’ll end up like him one day. It gives me nightmares. And then I feel guilty because nothing happened to me. Why do I deserve to feel anything about it?”
Before I knew it, Lucero had yanked me into his arms. He wrapped me up so tightly, I could barely breathe. I didn’t even want to. I shoved my face against his chest and sobbed as I clung to him. His hand went up, his fingers gripped the nape of my neck, and he shoved me into him even more. Grounding me.
I had never told anyone all of that. Cara knew a bit, but other than that? Lucero was the only person who knew how I truly felt. How badly it hurt. Why I had to keep killing. Not just for Adam, but for me too. For kids like me who weren’t part of the horror, but drowned in it anyway.
We stood there for what felt like ages, but I didn’t have it in me to push him away. Lucero rocked me gently, the swaying soothing to my shattered nerves. Finally, after I’d stopped crying for a while, he stepped back. Carefully, he wiped tears from my cheeks and tilted my head up.
“Seriously, how are you beautiful even when you cry and you’re covered in snot?”
I burst out laughing and punched him in the chest. It was like hitting a brick wall. Lucero didn’t even flinch, just smiled down at me before he tugged off his shirt and wiped my face clean. He tossed it aside.
For some reason, I felt better than I had in years. I held his hand.
“I’m sorry I was so mean to you,” I mumbled. “Yeah, I was hurt, but I really was trying to hurt you back.”
“I deserved it,” Lucero said. “You know me. If you had said it gently I never would have believed you.” He tilted my head up again. “I love you, bella. More than anything in this world. Nothing will ever change that.” He walked away and came back with papers. I took them. They were signed. “If you hadn’t changed your mind tonight, I was going to give those to you,” he whispered. “I love you enough to let you go. Even if it would have killed me.”
Staring at the papers, his signature on them bearing my last name, I started crying all over again. I smacked him with them.
“You’re such a fucking idiot!”
He gave me a lopsided smile. “Of course,” he said softly. “Anything for you.”
I turned the papers and ripped them in half. I never wanted to see them again. Lucero, for all his flaws, was my future.
And I was his.
31
ONYX
