I still barely do.
“I’m sorry. That I just did that. Ran out.” His voice breaks as he says it. Through all of it, he hasn’t stopped shaking.
“Don’t apologize. Please,” I murmur, stroking his jaw. “You’re a human, not a statue.”
“Let me take you home. You’re drenched and covered in mud.”
I shake my head. “I don’t care about the rain or the mud. I want you totalkto me, Wilder. What happened in there? Please.”
His throat works, and I feel it. The walls he’s already attempting to reconstruct. The thoughts rushing through his head. “I just couldn’t handle it, Maisie. It was not?—”
“Don’t youdaresay it was nothing,” I cry, cutting him off. God, as crazy as I am about him, he infuriates me. Reaching up, I swipe the water out of my eyes and shake my head. “Don’t do this. Don’t push me away because you’re scared to let me get any closer.”
The muscle in his jaw jumps, and he looks away, the eye contact too much for someone who wants to run. He’s like a wounded animal who’s been hurt so many times before that the thought of letting anyone get close again cripples him.
I might not know the history of what he’s been through or the pain that he’s had to endure, but I know that it’s haunting him still today.
I can see the way that he’s trying to hold it together, trying to stitch the pieces back together each time they start to come loose. Like now, his posture rigid, muscles tight as if he might flee in the next breath.
I’m done letting him run. Done letting him face the storm that’s tearing him apart inside alone.
I grab his face, my fingers tight as I force his gaze back to mine. “Let me in, Wilder. Stop giving me pieces but never something whole. Whatever you’re going through, you don’thave to do it alone. Letmedo it with you. Letmecarry some of the weight. God, just let me.”
He shakes his head, over and over, his dark eyes holding mine. “I can’t. No, Maisie…” The words are cut short when emotion catches in his throat. “I won’t. You’re to goo?—”
“Letmelove you.”
He freezes, every muscle in his body stiffening as I say the words.
It makes my stomach dip, saying it to him for the very first time, unexpectedly, and the fact that he might still push me away almost enough to make me lose the nerve, but I have to be brave enough to face the storm.
To face a reality that he might not feel the same, but it’s worth the risk to my heart if it means that he’ll know he’s loved. That he’ll understand how much he means to me.
“Maisie…” he starts, but his mouth snaps shut, and I exhale shakily.
“Il?—”
Suddenly, his hand flies to my lips, curving over them. “Please don’t fucking say it, baby, please. I’mbeggingyou.”
Tears spill from my eyes, mixing with the rain streaming down my face, and it feels like he’s just stomped on what’s left of my heart.
“You can’t, Maisie. I can’t let you.” The words sound as shattered as the man saying them.
Reaching up, I wrench his hand away from my mouth. “You don’t get to decide for me, Wilder. You can’t control everything. You can’t stop someone from fucking loving you!”
We’re both breathing heavily now, our chests rising and falling as the storm continues its assault.
“I am not worthy of your love, and I never will be.”
Each word pierces my skin like he’s carving them with the sharpest blade.
CHAPTER 50
WILDER
I’ve never hatedmyself more than I do right now.
Watching Maisie’s heart break in front of my eyes is a pain unlike anything I’ve ever known.
