Page 49 of The Innocent Carrying His Legacy

It was a choice. Ivy hadn’t had to risk herself for him; she’d chosen to.

I would have chosen you if you’d let me.

And she had chosen him.

That pierced him to the core. She’d opened herself up and not to just anyone butto him.A man who hadn’t given her any sign that he felt anything for her but lust. Yet she’d opened her heart, her very soul, to him. She’d trusted him...

And you threw it away.

Nazir closed his eyes, the shame deepening inside him. She’d been open and trusting and honest, and he’d thrown it back in her face. He’d treated her as his father had treated him, as if her feelings meant nothing, as if they were worthless. And that was weak, cowardly.

But then perhaps that was what he’d always been. Weak. Afraid.

So? It’s a choice. She found courage and she found strength. Why can’t you?

In the darkness behind his closed lids, he could see the choice before him.

He could go on as he had done before, thinking he was strong and skulking in his iron fortress, doing everything in the shadows, still hiding, still ashamed. Still being his father, in essence.

Or he could choose a different path from the one his father had taught him. He could choose to step away from the shadow of shame. He could choose to be vulnerable, to be open. He could choose to give away that last piece of himself.

He could choose love.

He could choose Ivy.

Nazir’s eyes flicked open, a wave of the most intense longing flooding through him. Longing for her and her presence. Her warrior spirit. For the child they had created together even though they hadn’t known it at the time. For the family he’d always wanted that, deep in his heart, he’d never thought he deserved.

But this time he didn’t push it away, he let it fill him. Let it wash away the shame and the hurt. The betrayal and sorrow.

And he smiled, because she was right, his little fury. She’d always been right. Love wasn’t a weakness, it was a strength. He could move mountains with this feeling; he could conquer worlds.

Not that he wanted to. The only conquering he wanted to do involved the demons in his heart, and then maybe he’d give that heart to the woman he’d probably fallen for the moment he’d first seen her.

She might not want him any more. He might have hurt her too badly. But no one had ever chosen her, and so he wanted her to know that he would. That he would give her what he could, that he would give her every last piece of himself and if she trod every piece under her little foot, then that would be no less than he deserved.

Nazir pushed himself away from the table.

It was time he stopped skulking.

It was time to step out of the fortress in which he’d been hiding and into the light.

‘Miss Dean!’ One of the youngest of the current collection of teenagers in Ivy’s home suddenly charged into her office, his eyes very wide. ‘There’s a huge car out in the street. And it’s stopped just outside!’

Ivy looked up from the spreadsheet she’d been going over, rubbing at her temples. She had a headache and the past month of no sleep was catching up with her.

She wasn’t sure what was worse, not being able to sleep because she missed Nazir, or the way he filled her dreams when she finally managed to get to sleep. Either way, it was bad.

‘What is it, Gavin?’ She tried not to sound sharp. ‘What do you mean a big car?’

The boy rushed to the window that overlooked the street, stabbing an urgent finger at it. ‘Look!’

Ivy sighed and pushed herself out of her chair, moving over to the window, because it was clear Gavin wasn’t going to let this go.

Then she stopped, her heart nearly exploding in her chest.

A long black limousine had pulled up to the kerb and several people were getting out, including guards in smart black and gold uniforms. There were four of them, two standing on either side of the path up to the front door of the home, while a third stared up and down the street, obviously looking for danger. A fourth pulled open the door of the limo.

Several groups of kids that had been playing on the side of the road stopped and stared. A crowd of teenagers drinking RTDs, vaping and listening to tinny dance music on a stereo stopped shouting and gawped.

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