His gaze was stark and confused on my face. “I hurt you? How?”
“You lied to me. You shut me out.” I cupped his face, needing him to understand this one thing without question. “Your past doesn’t have the power to push me away. Only you can do that, and you did.”
“I didn’t know what to do,” he rasped. “I never wanted you to see me like that…”
“That’s the problem, Gideon. I want to know who you are, the good and the bad, and you want to keep parts of yourself hidden from me. If you don’t open up, we’re going to lose each other down the road and I won’t be able to take it. I’m barely surviving it now. I’ve crawled through the last four days of my life. Another week, a month…It’ll break me to give you up.”
“I can let you in, Eva. I’m trying. But your first response when I screw up is to run away. You do it every time and I can’t stand feeling like any moment I’m going to do or say something wrong and you’re going to bolt.”
His mouth was tender again as he brushed his lips back and forth over mine. I didn’t argue with him. How could I, when he was right?
“I hoped you’d come back on your own,” he murmured, “but I can’t stay away anymore. I’ll carry you out of here if I have to. Whatever it takes to get you back in the same room with me, talking this out.”
My heart stuttered. “You were hoping I’d come back? I thought…You gave me back my keys. I thought we were over.”
He pulled back, his face set in fierce lines. “We’ll never be over, Eva.”
I looked at him, my heart aching like an open wound at how beautiful he was, how broken and in pain he was—pain I’d caused to some degree.
On tiptoes, I kissed the reddened handprint I’d left on his cheek, clutching his thick silky hair in my hands.
Gideon bent his knees to align our bodies, his breathing harsh and erratic. “I’ll do whatever you want, whatever you need. Anything. Just take me back.”
Maybe I should have been scared by the depth of his need, but I felt the same passionate insanity for him.
Running my hands down his chest in an effort to soothe his trembling, I gave him the hard truth. “We can’t seem to stop making each other miserable. I can’t keep doing this to you and I can’t keep going through these crazy highs and lows. We need help, Gideon. We’re seriously dysfunctional.”
“I saw Dr. Petersen on Friday. He’s going to take me on as a patient, and—if you agree—he’ll take us both on as a couple. I figured if you can trust him, I can try.”
“Dr. Petersen?” I remembered the brief jolt I’d felt at seeing a black Bentley SUV when Clancy pulled away from the doctor’s office. At the time, I’d told myself it was wishful thinking. After all, there were countless black SUVs in New York. “You had me followed.”
His chest expanded on a deep breath. He didn’t deny it.
I bit back my anger. I could only imagine how terrible it must be for him to be so dependent on something—someone—he couldn’t control. What mattered most at that moment were his willingness to try and the fact that it wasn’t just talk. He’d actually taken steps. “It’s going to be a lot of work, Gideon,” I warned him.
“I’m not afraid of work.” He was touching me restlessly, his hands sliding over my thighs and buttocks as if caressing my bare skin was as necessary to him as breathing. “I’m only afraid of losing you.”
I pressed my cheek to his. We completed each other. Even now, as his hands roamed possessively over me, I felt a thawing in my soul, the desperate relief of being held—finally—by the man who understood and satisfied my deepest, most intimate desires.
“I need you.” His mouth was sliding over my cheek and down my throat. “I need to be inside you…”
“No. My God. Not here.” But my protest sounded weak even to my own ears. I wanted him anywhere, anytime, any way…