The word again lands heavy between us.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“Don’t,” he snaps, but not unkindly.“Don’t say you’re sorry for livin’.Don’t say you’re sorry for survivin’.Don’t say sorry for anything that happened tonight.You saved my life.”
I swallow hard.“I reacted.That’s all.”
“That’s not all,” he growls.“You stepped out from behind cover.Shot a man to protect me.You got between me and my end.”
“Because I love—” I slap my mouth shut.But it’s too late.The words slipped.
His eyes darken, not with fear, not with panic, but with something that looks almost like he is committing this very second to memory.
“You remember that too?”he whispers.
“I,” I inhale slowly.“It feels true.Even if the full memories aren’t there.When I said it just now, I meant it.I feel it even if I can’t explain it.”
Riot steps closer.One slow movement.Another.Another.Until he’s standing directly in front of me.He takes my hand.Brings it to his chest.Presses my palm flat against the heat of his heart.
“That’s where it stays,” he murmurs.“Memory or no memory.I’m not foolish enough to lose this again.”
My throat tightens.He cups my face, gentle, devastating.“I need you to know somethin’.”
“Okay,” I breathe.
His thumb strokes my cheek, slow and soft and grounding.“I would’ve told you before the accident.If I wasn’t such a coward.If I didn’t think you deserved more than a man with a life lived in the dark.”
“Tell me now,” I whisper.
His voice cracks.Just barely.
“I loved you too.”He inhales, “I loved you then and I love you now, Kelly.”
A sob punches out of me before I can stop it.He catches me instantly, arms wrapping around me, pulling me tight against his chest.
I bury my face in his shirt, gripping him like he’s the only solid thing in a collapsing world.
“You can’t lose it again,” he whispers into my hair.“You can’t forget this again.I can’t.I can’t do that twice, sunshine.”
“I won’t,” I whisper.“I promise.”
He pulls back just enough to look into my eyes.Searching.Needing.Breaking and rebuilding all at once.
“I wanted to fix it,” he whispers, voice raw.“I wanted you to know I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“And now?”I ask softly.
“I’m gonna fix all of it,” he murmurs.“Every piece.Every memory.Every bruise.Every broken thing I left behind.”
I don’t know who moves first.It might be him.It might be me.
But suddenly we’re closer.His forehead against mine.His hands sliding into my hair.My fingers curling into his shirt.
It’s not the kiss from the safehouse, the desperate one, the remembered one.
This is quieter.Softer.A breath shared.A promise remade.
I tilt forward slightly, he stops me with a soft groan, fingers tightening in my hair.
