“I’m trying to decide if I have really good luck or absolute shit luck.”
“Oh, it’s good. Mario was going to stab you in the back, but that seems to be his thing.” Tyler slid a hand over to rub between my shoulder blades, and I thought perhaps that was the place where I’d almost taken a knife. “It was poetic that the dumb fuck stabbed himself.”
“We didn’t call an ambulance. It’s still our fault if he’s dead.”
He shrugged, bottom lip jutting. “There’s no law saying you have to help someone.”
I rolled my eyes. “That isn’t true. Is it?”
He chuckled, and some of the tension bled from my body; although, the adrenaline remained. Every brush of his fingers against mine was magnified times one hundred.
“Tyler, I love you. The idea that you had anything to do with a man who apparently had no problem killing me really freaks me out.” I dropped kisses along the peaks of his knuckles.
He rested his cheek on my hand. “Mario wasn’t a great guy. He wasn’t even a mediocre one. He ripped out my heart and stomped on it. Made it hard to trust people when I most needed to do it. I’m getting that part of myself back again.”
He stared into my eyes, and my breath caught. “I’m sorry.”
Tyler shrugged. “There are a lot of predators in the world. I learned that lesson.”
“After I left.” A gaping pit replaced my stomach.
He nodded. “Yeah.”
A gust of wind from the lake hit the car so hard it rocked. We smiled at each other as we turned to watch an impressive spray kick up. In the amount of time we’d sat here, it had started freezing that way and a shiny arch was forming at the edge of the ice.
Tyler chuckled.
“What?”
“So, all the others, they were really like Mario?” He raised his eyebrows at me.
Groaning, I nodded, then spilled all the gory details. He was laughing and wiping his eyes by the time I was done. I didn’t think he would be this entertained by random death, but these were all men who had personally hurt him.
“I’m sorry I didn’t kill anyone for you.” I brushed my fingers through his soft blond hair and over the apple of his left cheek. “I’m so sorry. I would’ve! I mean, Andrews came close, I guess. But I let you believe it, and I’m sorry I lied to you.”
He bit his lip and stared out the windshield. “I was worried about you, honestly. I thought you were all torn up because you’d killed people, but I actually think it’s sweeter that you were worried I’d be mad at you for not killing people.”
“Really?” I held my breath.
“I won’t lie. It was pretty incredible thinking you were willing to kill for me, but you’ve done so much for me. And, more importantly, you’re planning to stick around for the long haul, right?”
I kissed his soft cheek. “Yeah.”
“And I think, after all this, I can finally let go of the fact that you left me here in New Gothenburg.”
My heart twisted. “I’m sorry. I was selfish. I couldn’t stand things with my dad.”
“Yeah, and now that I love you the way I do, I wouldn’t have wanted you to stick around and take more abuse. There were no good solutions. You got out. Then, I got out.”
My stomach wobbled. “I wish it had been before you got hurt.”
“Yeah,” he whispered. “Me too.”
Our lips brushed softly, and I felt the pool of acidic guilt that had been eating at me drain away. There was still a small puddle sloshing around in my gut that might never vanish when I thought about how Tyler had gotten hurt, but if he could forgive me, then what good would it do to continue beating myself up over it?
“I love you.”
“Love you, too.” His smile finished healing a few cracks in my heart I hadn’t realized he’d made better until just now, when I’d been afraid he might leave after all.
