Safe at Last (Slow Burn #3)

He slid to the floor in front of her, getting on his knees, taking both her hands in his.

“I am so sorry, Gracie,” he said, tears glimmering in his eyes. “I left you unprotected. I allowed this to happen to you. I should have taken you with me or just stayed with you and not gone away to college. I don’t know that you’ll ever be able to forgive me. God, I can’t forgive myself. But I’ve never stopped loving you. I’ve never stopped looking for you. I’ve never stopped hoping that one day we’d be together again.”

Tears slipped hotly down Anna-Grace’s cheeks. Oh God. So much time wasted. So many years. If only . . . There were so many if-onlys. And no way to take back the past. No way to undo it all and start all over again.

Or could they?

“How do you not hate me?” she said in a stricken voice. “I didn’t trust in you. I’ve hated you for twelve years. I said horrible, horrible things to you. Oh God.”

She yanked her hands from Zack’s and covered her face as sobs welled from her throat.

Zack was there in an instant, enfolding her in his strong embrace. He simply held her, rocking her and brushing kisses over the top of her head.

Then he gently pried her hands away from her face and slowly lowered his mouth until it hovered just over hers. And he pressed his lips so very gently to hers.

It was a sense of homecoming so powerful, so overwhelming that it very nearly shattered her composure. Nothing had ever been so sweet. Not before. His lips moved with exquisite tenderness until her lips parted and his tongue brushed against hers.

She inhaled deeply, taking in his scent, oh so familiar and haunting. And she kissed him back, allowing all her grief, sorrow, regret and . . . love . . . to bleed into that kiss.

“I could never hate you, Gracie,” Zack said against her lips. “Never. I’ve always loved you. I always will. Can you forgive the past? Will you give me another chance to make things right between us? I swear to you I’ll spend the rest of my life making you happy. Protecting you. Loving you. And our children.”

She leaned forward, pressing her forehead to his as more tears slid down her cheeks. “I have nothing to give you, Zack. They took it. I had nothing. I was nothing. All I had that was precious to me was my virginity. That was all I could give you when you gave so much to me. And they took that. How could you want me after what they did?”

“Oh baby, no,” Zack said in an aching voice.

He pulled her away so he could look her in the eye, but she couldn’t meet his gaze. He tipped her chin upward with his finger until she was forced to look at him.

“Read my mind right now, Gracie. See inside the heart of me. And then you tell me that I don’t love you. That I don’t want you with every breath in my body.”

She hesitated, a little afraid to hope. But his gaze was steady and sure and his eyes so very warm and loving.

She released the tight constraints she’d put in place and allowed herself into his mind and she was immediately flooded by a wave of love so strong that she swayed. There was so much he was thinking. About their future. Their wedding. The children they’d one day have. And how he looked forward to waking up every single day with her next to him.

It was simply too much.

She leaned into him again, grasping him tightly as though she feared he’d simply disappear. Her sobs were raw and horrible sounding. Guttural, coming from the very depths of her soul.

“I’m sorry,” she said in a terrible voice. “I’m so sorry, Zack. Oh God, I’m sorry. You should hate me. I didn’t trust you. I wasted so many years hating you for something you never did. And yet you ask me for forgiveness.”

Zack stroked her hair and then buried his face in the strands and she felt the warmth of his own tears against her head.

“There is nothing to forgive, Gracie. We were set up. Of course you believed that I orchestrated it. That’s what they wanted. They are to blame. Not you. Not me.”

She lifted her head, her vision watery as she stared back at him.

“I love you,” she whispered. “I never stopped loving you. Even when I hated you, a part of me knew I’d always love you and mourn the loss of what we had.”

Zack seemed to crumble before her very eyes. Profound relief and for the first time . . . hope . . . shone in his eyes.

He cupped her face in his hands and his expression became very serious.

“You didn’t give them your virginity, Gracie. They took it. They took something very precious, but you know what? Virginity is more than a thin barrier that proclaims a woman’s innocence. And on our wedding night, when you give yourself to me, you will have given me a gift more precious than any other. Because it will be our first time. Together. And just as we were going to wait before, I want to wait now. Until you’re my wife. I want our first time together to be as man and wife.”

She stared at him in wonderment. “Are you asking me to marry you?”