“You broke something, alright.” He hunts me down, one slow step at a time. “You broke the image of what you thought we were. Inlike. Inlust. You trusted me to take care of you, to not hurt you, to feed you and to be a good, decent guy. But that was before, when this was just affection. Now you love me, and you’re scared I can’t love you back the way you think I should.”
“I didn’t say—I’m not—”Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.I stumble back another three steps. “Ollie, stop?—”
“Say it, Rose.” His eyes are alight with a kind of madness. Elation. Taunting. “Say you love me.”
“No!” I crash against the small side table, my hip colliding with the corner and my breath racing out on a hiss. “I won’t. You’re delirious.”
“You love me,” he teases. “But you think if I think it back—if I feel it too—it’s not real. It’s just the product of trauma and proximity and me being too kind to burst your bubble with the cold, hard truth.”
My heart throbs in my chest. My stomach whirls. My vision is damn near blurry because I’m too hard to love. I desperately latch on to the door frame leading into the hall. If I turn and run and lock my bedroom door, I could maybe climb out the window and go find Barbara before he catches me. “Ollie?—”
“Say it, Rose!”
“No!”
He whips his arm across and hooks his finger in my shirt. Then he slowly pulls me in, like a fisherman reeling in his catch. “You want to move out and have a job and be your own, independent woman, so when I say I love you, too, you’ll feel like you deserve it. You’ll feel like it’s true, and not something I say because I’m trapped in a situation I never wanted.”
“Please let me go.” Humiliation tickles the backs of my eyes. Scratching my throat. Tossing the contents of my stomach. “I didn’t mean to say anything about?—”
“I’ve been counting down the minutes until I could keep you.” He presses his palm to my chest and pushes me back until I hit the wall, my breath exploding from my lungs and a whimper crawling along my throat. “I’ve felt guilty, every fucking day that you’ve been here, because I want you exactly how you are. If you don’t remember your past, then you won’tfeel the need to go back to it. If you don’t remember the people you used to know, then I won’t have to share you with them.” He follows me in, crushing me against the wall and sliding his hand under my shirt. Cupping my back. His palm, warming the exact spot that once had stitchesheput in my skin. “I’ve throttled every single fucking thing I’ve ever said to you, Rose. Put a lid on every conversation we’ve ever had. Slowed every single thing down. Because I don’t want you to think I’m rushing you into something whenyouare the vulnerable one.”
“Ollie—”
“You want to be independent and badass, because you think you’re taking advantage of me? Meanwhile, I feel like an asshole every time I look at you, wanting you, dragging you to my bed, because I feel like I’m taking advantage ofyou.”
“A relationship built on trauma,” I groan. “Unstable and destined to fail.”
He laughs, inching closer and latching on to my bottom lip. “I wasn’t gonna say shit, because I was terrified that if I told you I’ve been in love with you since the moment you woke in the hospital, trustingmeover literally anyone else, that it would be a gross manipulation and a power imbalance between a doctor and his patient.” He slides his tongue across mine. “I was in love with you when you turned around that day at the hospital and agreed to stay here instead of The Wallflower. Which, let’s be honest, was probably the better choice for you. It’s clinical. It’s professional. Social. They focus on building your skills and helping you regain your independence. Meanwhile, I leave you home alone twelve hours a day, adopt you a cat, and pray you’ll still be here when I get back.”
He presses his hips to mine, sliding his hand down and dipping his fingers into the waistband of my sweats.
“I was in love with you when you lectured me about my olive tree. And finished my deck. And came to the gym with me, even when it scared the shit out of you. I was in love when you told me about that brother-fucking Hatshepsut, and when you got drunk with my sisters and argued with a literal fucking child, because he knowsdid you knowsand you knowdid you knows,and neither of you wanted to admit defeat.”
“That’s because I wasn’t defeated,” I grumble. “Just because he knowsdid you knowsdoesn’t mean he beat me.”
Ollie chuckles, bending his neck and burying his lips in the curtain of my hair. “I’ve loved you from day one, but I would have gone the rest of my life not saying so. Not until you were ready. But now you are.” He nips at the shell of my ear. “Say it.”
“Oh God.” I drop my head back—thunk—against the wall. “I’ve made it weird now.”
“You have until the count of three to say it.” With a pained groan, he pulls away, dragging his hands from my body and backing away to place five feet of space between us. “If you run and hide, I’m coming for you.”
I can’t breathe. Can’t speak. Can’t fucking think.
“If I have to fuck it out of you, I will.” His lips quirk up on the side. “If I have to chew on your ass to secure those words, then that’s what’s gonna happen. One.”
I gasp. “Ollie?—”
“If I have to eat, and eat…” His eyes stray hungrily to my crotch. “And eat until you’re so fucking exhausted you can’t argue anymore, then that’s what I’ll do.”
“Ollie!”
“Two.” He licks his lips, feral and fierce. “You could make this so much easier on yourself if you just say it, Rosaline. We both know you love me, too. You already screwed up and said it.”
“Fine!” My breath comes out in an explosive exhale. My heart thunders wildly against my diaphragm. Swallowing to lubricate my throat, I wait for his greedy eyes to swing back to mine. “But it doesn’t have to make things different. And it doesn’t mean you’re obligated to keep me here. Or to?—”
“Rose!”
“I love you!” I choke it out, loud and rasping and panicked enough to make my palms sweat. “I love you, Ollie. And dammit, I just want to deserve your love in return.”
