“You told me to.”
“Of course I told you to leave,” she said with a wave of her hand. “You wouldn’t tell me if something was going on with you and Pennyagain. You wouldn’t even tell me whether or not you were engaged.”
He looked down at the floor and muttered, “I deserved your hatred.”
Reyna reeled back. “What?”
He gave her a look.
“I don’t hate you,” she gasped. “I could never hate you.”
“Oh, Little One,” he said, taking a silent step forward, “how do you still have such a heart?”
“When I was gone, the only thing that kept me going was you. Knowing you were on the outside, waiting for me. I’d put all our happy memories in one part of my brain and cornered it off so no one could ever damage them. But then I got out and it was as if I meant nothing to you.” Reyna choked out the words that had been haunting her since her release.
“I am a monster. I fed off you. When you realized my true nature, you fled my presence. You left with someone else, you were so desperate to get away from me.”
A tear slipped down her cheek as she realized the turmoil he must have been suffering all this time. The turmoil she had inflicted. “When we were together, when you bit me, it was the best moment of my life, Becks. I trusted you. I told you I trusted you, and then I spit it in your face. I was wrong. As soon as I woke up at Everett’s, I tried to come back to apologize to you and let you know I didn’t mean anything I said. But by then it was too late.”
Beckham stepped forward to where she stood before the bed, cupped her face in both his hands, and wiped the tears from her cheeks. “What did I ever do to deserve you?”
“You showed me the real you. The real Beckham underneath this facade.”
His obsidian eyes stared deeply into her own, and she was utterly lost. His hands were on her. His mouth mere inches away. This was the moment she had dreamed about.
“I knew you were at the ball,” he confided.
“You…what? How?”
He frowned and glanced away. “It sounds outrageous.”
“You looked at me.”
He dragged his eyes back to her. “I could sense you somehow. It was like something in my veins just knew that you were there.”
“My blood?” she asked in confusion.
“No. I don’t know. It was as if you were calling out to me and I was the only one who could hear your cries.”
“I thought it was impossible. When you looked right at me, I didn’t think you actually knew I was there. I thought I’d imagined the whole thing.”
“It made no sense to me at the time. Now it feels right. Also, if you saw me that night, then I understand more your frustration with Penelope.”
“Yeah,” she whispered. She didn’t want to talk about Penelope right now. She had just discovered their connection was so acute he could sense her across a crowded ballroom when he couldn’t even see her. Her heart lurched at the thought.
“It is complicated, but she does not hold my heart,” he said fervently.
“Are you together?” she asked carefully.
He breathed out. “In public. A cover, as we always were.”
“And in private?”
“No,” he said at once. He reached out and took her hand. “Penelope knows it is for the cameras. That it is our cover to be the Saint and the Martyr after her injuries, and now that she has become mayor.”
“Doesshe know that?”
Beckham’s eyes slipped over her distraught features. “I will remind her, if that will put your mind at ease.”
