“I’m sorry,” he repeats. “I fucked up. I fucked up worse than I ever have. I broke your trust. I crossed lines I never should’ve crossed. And I don’t deserve even a second of your forgiveness.” He breathes hard, uneven. “But I am begging for it anyway.”
Tears sting my eyes. “Zane?—”
“No,” he chokes. “Let me say it. I need to say it.”
Mama Draven murmurs something soft and I hear her walking away, giving him space.
“You’re the only good thing I’ve ever had,” he says. “The only person who ever made me want to be better. You calmed my mind. You made the noise stop. You made me feel human. And I ruined it because I was scared.”
His voice breaks.
“You want to know why I did it? Why I replaced your pills? Why I kept track of your cycle? Why I—why I let myself imagine you carrying my child?”
I hear a thump, like his forehead dropped against the door. “Because I was terrified you’d realize you deserve someone normal. Someone stable. Someone who doesn’t fight darkness every day before getting out of bed.”
My chest aches so violently I press a hand to it.
“I never wanted to trap you,” he whispers. “I wanted a future with you so badly I twisted it into something…really bad. And I hate myself for it.”
There’s noise behind him—security maybe or Freddie, the band.
“Zane, maybe let’s give her space?” It’s Freddie.
“Don’t,” Zane snarls. “Don’t even try. I’m not leaving until she tells me to.”
I whisper, shattered, “I told you.”
The hallway falls silent. Then his breath shakes, guttural.
“If you walk away,” he says softly, “I won’t stop you. I swear it. I’ll die inside, but I’ll let you go. I won’t keep you here. I won’t touch you. I won’t even look at you unless you ask me to.”
I close my eyes.
“But please,” he whispers, voice breaking. “Please don’t walk away.”
My hands tremble. My pulse stutters. And my heart cracks on the fault line between fury and love. “Why didn’t you trust me?” I whisper.
“I did,” he says softly. “I trusted you more than anyone. I just didn’t trust myself not to lose you.”
A sob escapes me. “Zane,” I say weakly. “I don’t know what to do.”
“Let me see you,” he whispers. “Just that. I…I won’t touch you. I just… want to see you.”
My fingers hover over the lock. I’m terrified. Angry and beyond shattered. But God help me—I turn the bolt.
The door swings open immediately.
Zane stands there, his eyes red, chest heaving and beautiful hands trembling.
A man completely undone.
And then the part I never imagined…the rabid sincerity in his eyes.
“You’d really do that?” I whisper. “You’d let me go?”
I watch him fight for a full minute, the battle visible in every tense line of his body. I watch him, eyes slammed shut again as he works through the undeniable, manicI’d-rather-set-the-world-on-fire-than-let-you-out-of-my-sightemotion ripping through him.
And then a single tear slides down his cheek. Then another.
