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“Someone hurt you in that house. Maybe more than one person, and just talking about that triggered you. You want sex because it’ll distract you. Make you feel better—”

Bennett watches my face intensely, and I see the slow realization overtake him. His eyes flare.

“No—fuck, Paloma.” His voice breaks over my name. “Y-you . . . you want sex because it makes you feel worse?” Bennett’s knees give out and he falls onto the edge of the bed. His breath shudders faster, eyes shining like he might cry. “All this time . . . You thought that . . . that you deserve that? To feel bad?”

I slam my hands over my ears, tears flowing.

“Stop.” I want to scream, but I sound like a whimpering child. No, no, no —I grip hands into my hair and pull slightly. “Please, I—”

“Shhh,” Bennett tries to soothe me, reaching out to hold me up, and I realize I’ve stumbled toward him. His arms wrap around me, hands gently finding mine and pulling them from my scalp. He tucks them into his, our fingers interlocking. “Please, love. Just breathe.”

I do. He pulls me slowly, like coaxing a dog whose been beaten and chained, into his lap. Desperate to save it, as Bennett’s always been desperate to save me.

I press myself into his chest, ear to his heart, and breathe.

He’s crying, I realize, sobs wracking his body. It makes my hands go numb.

“Bennett?” I ask, pulling back. But he only holds on tighter.

“Paloma,” he breathes into my hair, hands pressing like he’s memorizing my body, inch by inch. “God—I didn’t know. I thought . . .” he stalls, but I hear him anyway.

He thought when we were apart I used sex as an outlet, a distraction. But I wielded it like a razor, crawling deeper into that dark pit every time. And Bennett stood there and watched it happen, thinking he wasn’t enough. Thinking I wanted a release, just trying to feel good—and was looking for something he couldn’t give. Something I wouldn’t take from him.

I know he blames himself entirely, as if he stood back and forced me to go upstairs and into dark hallways and further down the rabbit hole of my self-hatred.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper into his skin, pressing so I can feel his neck against my lips. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I just want you, just you. Just this. I’m sorry.”

There are broken pieces of us scattered on the floor. Raw. Vulnerable. And for a second, the thought of running and hiding feels like a comfort. I want to—

But then he kisses me. And it makes everything right, even just for a moment.

We stay there for a long time before Bennett stands and carries me to the bathroom. He turns on the bathtub and pulls open the drawer of all my favorite soaps and hair products he keeps around.

It feels silly, to be so comforted by the idea of a bubble bath at the hands of Bennett Reiner, but as soon as the overly warm water conceals my naked body there’s a loosening in my chest.

Bennett stands for a moment, easily taking up too much space in the small room, still in his suit pants and button-down, sleeves rolled up, hands tucked deep into his pockets.

“I should . . .” He trails off, eyes downcast.

My hand reaches out, wet against the dark fabric of his pants. “Stay?”

Bennett nods, eyes finding mine as he kneels by the lip of the tub, his palm touching my cheek. I nuzzle into it with a soft, contented sigh. And then it’s nothing but the sound of water moving as I shift beneath the sudsy curtain.

“I was an only child,” I suddenly confess. My eyes shoot down, watching my own fingers play and swirl. “I don’t really talk about my mom—and I don’t want to. She didn’t care about me, never protected me. My childhood wasn’t . . . it was bad, Bennett.”

Bad is an understatement. But telling him this is hard enough.

“My mom was in trouble a lot—drugs, violent boyfriends, anything you can think of. And sometimes the cops that came were . . . ‘friends’ of my mother. Sometimes they were worse than the assholes she brought home. And . . .” I shake my head, words trailing away. But the pain-soaked intensity of them hangs behind.

Bennett’s hand reaches out, grasping mine with a gentle, reassuring squeeze.

“Don’t. Not if it hurts.”

He seems to wince at his own words, shaking his head like he knows. It all hurts.

“There was someone, though, who was kind to me when we met.” I want to tell him. I want to let the name spill from my lips, but I can’t. “He was older than me. He knew I’d been sleeping in a house with no power in the dead of winter or sneaking into the school to sleep.”

“You slept . . . at the school?”