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I get a small, warm smile. “I know. You have no idea how much I want that.”
“Then—”
“I want to stay. Forever. But I’m scared …”
“I will never let him near you again. Ever.” I reach for him, but Sasha pulls away. A stray thought hits me. “Are you scared of me?”
“No.” His eyes widen like my question shocked him. “You’re amazing. I’ve never felt safer than when I’m with you, but that’s part of the problem. I want you to feel the same way, and I’m scared that if I’m here, you’ll never feel safe again.”
“Being with you is the only thing that makes me feel settled. I need you.”
“I know … and that’s a lot of responsibility to put on one person. I can’t be all of that for you, and it scares me that if something happens, with everything you’ve already been through, you’ll never recover.”
I hear what he’s saying, but this is all I know how to feel. It’s like my whole heart is tied to Sasha, and if anything happened to him, it would be destroyed. “So … what do we do? I’ll do anything.”
His lips flatten for a second. “I want you to talk to someone. A professional.”
Anything except that. “Therapy?” It feels like my entire face contorts.
“I know that you’re scared. I get it, I do. But I don’t want to trigger you every time you can’t find me. I don’t want to be worried about going somewhere in case you freak out.” He takes a step closer. “I want to be with you so much it hurts. I’m going to go as well, because we both had a lot of shit done to us that we didn’t deserve, and I want you to know what it actually feels like to be happy. That’s what you deserve.”
This close, I can see how red and puffy his eyes are. I want to promise him everything will be okay, just to get rid of his sadness. But therapy? He wants me to talk to an outsider? “I … I can’t.”
“You can. You’re the strongest person I know. And I’ll be here, the whole time. I’ll help you through it.”
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed this,” I say through my teeth, “but Wilde’s End isn’t exactly flooded with psychologists.”
“No, but there’s a good one in Wayward. I used to see her. I called her before I came back here, and she’ll take remote appointments. You won’t have to leave. You won’t have to bring outsiders here.”
For the first time, my protests stall. Do I want to talk to someone? No fucking way. I don’t care how well trained they are, they’ll never understand. All they’ll do is judge me like everyone else.
Well, everyone except Sasha. He knows who I am, and he encourages it. It’s why I can’t let him go, ever, but can I do it?
“I’m broken,” I tell him. “And I’ll always be broken.”
He takes another step closer. “Maybe that’s true, but you can’t say that if you won’t even try.” Gentle fingers reach for my good hand. “You’re the strongest person I know, Lynx. You can do anything you set your mind to.”
Anything. I don’t believe that for a second. But my heart is beating harder with how close he is, and for one wild moment, I think I can do it. “And you’ll stay?”
“I’m back. That’s proof that I couldn’t leave in the first place.”
It’s hard to swallow. It’s hard to even say the words. There isn’t a single part of me that wants to do this except for the steadily growing louder part that needs Sasha. Talking about feelings is useless and pointless, but if it means he’ll stop being scared about hurting me? “Okay.”
“You will?” Just seeing him light up makes it worth it.
“It’s not going to work.”
“It might.”
I let him hope, and maybe I do a tiny bit too. “Maybe it might.”
Like those words were all that was holding him back, he launches himself at me. His body colliding with mine makes my shoulder twinge, but I barely notice as relief rushes through the rest of me.
Our lips meet, his soft and like coming home, and I cup his head as I kiss him back. My heart is still struggling to believe he’s here, and all of me hurts like I don’t trust Sasha not to give me this and then slip away again.
And he’s kissing me in the same way, clinging to my shirt, body pressed to mine, tongue sweeping into my mouth like he’s missed my taste as much as I’ve missed his.
I almost lost this.
