He glared at me and I pressed my lips into a thin line to indicate I’d stay quiet.
“I figured I’d give you two days to sort out whatever the fuck you needed to sort out, but then you disappeared. Off the fuckin’ grid. It took Rabbit six days to find you. Six, Olivia. Do you know what that did to me?”
“I texted Jazz—”
“I swear to Christ, woman, I’m holdin’ on by a thread here,” he warned.
He pushed away from the island and closed the distance between us. I fisted my hands at my side, forcing myself not to touch him.
“I even called Hayes.”
“Wow,” I breathed out. “You must have been desperate.”
“Obviously. So,” he said. “This is it, sweetness. Last chance. I walk out that door, we’re done. Forever.”
“And if you stay?” I whispered, unable to keep the sound of hope from my voice.
“Then you never pull anything like this again. You marry me and we make this permanent.”
“Marriage?”
“Yep. All the way, Liv.”
“You realize there’s something seriously wrong with you, right?” I asked.
“And that shit stops.”
I met his eyes. “What shit?”
“The shit talk. You putting yourself down. You saying you’re less than. The shit your mother has drilled into you.”
I burst into tears and dropped my head to his chest. “I’m so sorry,” I cried, wrapping my arms around his waist. “I love you. I was just so scared. I don’t know why.”
His hands slid into my hair. “Baby, I know why, you just didn’t stick around long enough to hash it out with me.”
I nodded into his T-shirt. “Why didn’t you just call Clem?”
“Because I knew she wouldn’t tell me where you were,” he said. “And the last time I did that, she turned off her phone so I couldn’t track it.”
I grimaced. “You wouldn’t have been able to track her phone anyway.”
“Yeah, I fuckin’ know, Olivia,” he snapped. “Rabbit figured out she was using a burner to communicate with you, so he tracked that. It’s why it took me six days to find you.”
“I can’t believe you came for me.”
“I told you I would.”
“I know,” I whispered. “I think I just forget how much you love me sometimes.”
“No you don’t.”
“You’re right.” I sighed. “I don’t. I just have this innate need to sabotage our relationship.”
“So. You gonna marry me?”
“You really want to saddle yourself with all this crazy for the rest of your life?”
“Jesus Christ, Olivia,” he hissed. “You wanna rephrase that?”
