I picked up my fork and knife, slicing into the meat again.
Before graduation night, I couldn’t remember a time when Joshua wasn’t a part of my life. I knew, logically, that there were seven years before that were empty. Seven years when I was alone with my parents and the succession of nannies they hired, always seeking that one nanny that would manage to allow them to forget they’d sired offspring at all. I knew there’d been loneliness and boredom. But I couldn’t really remember it.
Joshua was outgoing and free spirited. He was the complete opposite of me those first few years. However, there was something about being in his presence that helped me become something more than the scared little boy who went out of his way to avoid his parents’ displeasure even though it was often impossible. I pissed my parents off by simply existing. Being Joshua’s friend showed me that it wasn’t my fault, that I didn’t have to define myself by my parents’ narcissism.
She was right. He had the right to know.
“Do you regret it?” I asked. “What happened between us in high school?”
Her fork stilled on the plate. “I thought I did,” she said softly. “For a long time, I was so angry at you that I thought I did. But now…I’m not sure I do.”
“For what it’s worth, I don’t.”
She looked at me, her eyes shimmering with tears.
“It’s worth a lot.”
We stared at each other for a long moment, and I got lost in those eyes, in her eyes. I remembered that she once asked me why it was that I liked to look at her so much. I told her it was because she was beautiful. But it was more than that. Looking at her made me feel like I’d found the home I’d been searching for almost since birth. Looking at her made me feel safe. The expression in her eyes when she looked at me, when she stared at me with this sort of adoration, finished whatever it was Joshua’s friendship began. She was my future, and as long as she was by my side I knew it was a good future.
For the first time since then, I felt that way again.
Chapter 23
Kate
I couldn’t stand the way he was looking at me. I didn’t deserve the naked affection I saw in his eyes. I didn’t deserve to be loved that way.
I dropped my utensils and stood, grabbing my wine glass as I made my way inside the house.
“Kate,” he called, as I disappeared from sight.
I didn’t know where I was going. There was nowhere to go. I paced in front of the massive fireplace, my thoughts so wild and unorganized that I found myself wondering why someone would need a fireplace so large. What do you burn in something like that? You could probably fit a dozen people and an entire tree trunk. What do you need with that?
“Kate,” he said again, coming into the room but staying back, not even trying to touch me. If he had, I would have lost it. I would have become a blubbering fool.
“Why are you here with me? Why are you putting yourself at risk for me?”
“It’s my job.”
I glared at him because I could hear the laughter in his voice. I drank the last of the wine in my glass—and, oh, my God! It was so good!—and thought about tossing the glass at the stone of the fireplace. But it didn’t belong to me, and I couldn’t intentionally bring myself to break something that looked so expensive, especially when it wasn’t mine. So I set it down, carefully, on the mantelpiece.
“You shouldn’t be here. After the things I said…such awful things!”
“You’ve never said anything that bad.”
I shot another glance at him, only growing more agitated when I saw the twinkle dancing in those clear sea blue eyes.
“You know what I’m talking about. I told you to disappear.”
“You were hurting.”
“We were both hurting.” I shook my head, the memory of the scar on his back haunting me. “You went to war, and you could have been killed!”
“A little dramatic, don’t you think?”
I spun around, gesturing at my own back. “I’m not blind. I’ve seen the scar.”
He crossed his arms over his chest, looking so formidable that it was almost hard to believe someone so strong could be wounded. And that wall that he wore when I touched a sore spot, when I asked a question he wasn’t ready to answer, came over his eyes.
“You were wounded.”
“Lots of soldiers were wounded over there.”
“But if you had died, I never would have known. No one would have come knocking on my door.”
“Would you have wanted them to?”
I groaned, that question wounding me more than anything else he could have asked me in that moment. I turned, again not sure where I was headed. I couldn’t even see where I was going for the tears that were blinding me. He caught me before I’d gone very far, grabbing my upper arm and yanking me around at the same time he pushed me backward, and shoved me up against the wall.
“Tell me what this is about.”
I tried to turn my head, but he grabbed my jaw and forced me to look at him.
“Tell me,” he said, almost begging.