stare. “You deserve the world,” he said, voice thick, then hurried to amend, “Everything. You deserve everything.”
His tone had acid rolling in my stomach and my arms falling heavily to my sides.
“And everyone knows I can’t give you that. That I’ll drag you down.”
“They’re wrong.”
“They aren’t,” he maintained. “And I can’t be the reason you don’t succeed. Thrive. Get everything you want out of life. I won’t.”
“What are you saying?” It was a breath. A denial. Because my heart was screaming that he wasn’t about to say what my mind knew was coming next.
His lips parted before forming a thin line. That jaw straining and his body trembling as one of his hands lifted to his chest before cradling my head in his big palm.
“Beau, what are you saying?” I begged when no words left him.
His eyes searched my face for a long while before he spoke. The words forced and pained. “Savannah, I gotta let you go.”
“No.”
“Savannah,” he pleaded when I smacked his hands away and staggered back.
“No,” I choked out. “This is because of my parents? Hunter told me what they said—what they told you to do.”
Beau’s stare flashed up to the thick, full branches of the tree before meeting me again, frustration wavering on his expression before it was replaced with a broken mixture of devastation and determination.
“They can’t do this.”
“They’re right,” Beau said, the admission leaving him on a pained wheeze.
“No, they aren’t. Why can’t you see you the way I do?” I cried out. “Why can’t you see how much I love you?”
“I do,” he said quickly, reaching for me again as if he couldn’t help it. Needing me as badly as I needed him. “Fuck, I do. But, Savannah, you shouldn’t. From the day I met you, your mom’s been telling you to stay away from me. You need to listen to her.”
“Like hell I do.”
He curled his hands around my cheeks, pulling me close as all that agony and self-hatred bled from him. “Staying with me will only ruin you, why can’t you see that?”
I gripped his wrists, my chest rising and falling unevenly as I struggled to catch my breath. “You . . . having you—being loved by you—is everything I want for my life.” His forehead lowered to mine as I continued. “But if you tell me right now that you don’t love me, that you want this to be over, then I will try to accept that.”
His fingers curled tighter, tangling in my hair.
I knew he would do this—do what my parents were demanding—because he believed them. Because he believed everyone. But he wouldn’t lie to me, even for the sake of giving me what he thought was a better life.
“I love you with every last breath in my body, and I will love you long after I die.” The declaration was soft but filled with an intensity I felt in my bones.
My heart took off, trying desperately to reach the boy it belonged to. But I forced myself to remain still. To repeat the question he hadn’t answered.
“You want this to be over?” I asked, my tongue darting out to wet my lips. “Us?”
“I want you to have—”
“You know that isn’t what I’m asking.”
His eyelids closed and he exhaled slowly. “Savannah, I want you for the rest of my life.”
I nodded, my nose brushing along his. “Then ask me what I want.”
His stare met mine, tense and pleading. “What do you want, angel?”
“I want you to understand that life without you doesn’t make sense—it hasn’t since the day I met an angry bear of a boy covered in mud. And I want you exactly the way you are.” I released one of his wrists to place my hand over his fiercely beating heart. “I’ve always loved you. Not some idea of what you might be if you were different. Just you.”
I let my other hand drift to his knuckles, rough and already scabbing over from where he must’ve split them open again that evening, and watched as shame flickered across his face.
“I want you to understand that my parents are wrong about you. They’re wrong for saying the things they do, and I’m so sorry that you’ve had to endure it for even a second. I want you to know I’m not going anywhere. That I’ll be here, with you, by your side, forever.” I lifted a shoulder in a weak shrug. “Or until you decide otherwise.”