whole, Cami.”
I bite my lip to stop the wobble in my chin, my eyes squeezing shut as I nod quickly.
“My heart is screaming for you,” I confess. “But my mind won’t let me forget all the things you’ve done. The damage you tried to inflict. Every time I think I’ve quelled the power in its voice, it rears its ugly head, making me believe I should hate you still.”
He watches me in understanding.
“Tell me you regret it. Tell me it was all a mistake, Rocco. Make me believe you,” I beg, pulling my arm free of his grasp to cup his face.
His nostrils flare, panic painted openly across his features. “I can’t,” he insists. “I can’t do that.”
The wet line of my lashes brush my sockets as my tears fall in heartache.
“I can tell you I’m sorry that I had so much hate inside me, I welcomed it spreadin’ like a cancer. I can tell you I’m sorry that so many people were hurt by my stupidity. I can tell you that losing Mira sliced away a piece of my heart that I ain’t ever getting back. I can tell you I’m sorry,” he declares. “But regret it… no. I can’t do that.”
My eyebrows, pulled together in confusion ease with the touch of his thumb brushing down my forehead.
My hands fall away from his face and I see the hurt that causes him.
“I don’t regret Marcus dying,” he argues, more to himself than to me. “I don’t regret Codi and Parker findin’ love in the hopelessness of the situation I created.”
He watches me quietly for a beat, shifting closer so that when he breathes in, his chest touches mine. “I don’t regret finding the best friend I’ve ever had,” he admits, his words a quiet promise. “I don’t regret loving her harder than I’ve ever loved anything or anyone in my whole entire life.”
He pauses, choosing his next words carefully. “Which is saying a lot considering I was ready to kill for my mom. There’s no limit to what I’d do to protect you, beauty. No fucking limit. It scares the shit outta me.”
My nose stings and my eyes ache as I attempt to hold back my tears.
“How can I regret the reasoning behind finding myself in someone else? Something I never thought would happen to me. Tell me, beauty, how the fuck do I regret that?”
I lean forward, wanting to feel his lips against mine. Wanting my lips to determine if I’ve forgiven him because I no longer trust how I feel.
He grabs my jaw though, stopping me just before our lips connect. “Are we doin’ this? Because I ain’t interested in just a taste.”
I hesitate. “You love me?” I test, both shocked and elated and confused that someone with a heart as dark as Rocco’s could find itself able beat for another. More, that my cold, splintered heart could do the same.
He laughs. “Baby, love ain’t a strong enough word for what I feel for you. I love Parker. I fucking bleed for you. My heart only started beatin’ again when you saved it from givin’ out.”
Warm, fresh tears fall from my eyes, dropping along my cheeks in a river of emotions I don’t know how to articulate.
Barely a breath from my eager lips and he whispers, “And I think you feel the same for me, too. I just need to know if your love for me is loud enough to drown out those doubts that are keeping you just outta my reach.”
I answer him with a kiss. A push of my salty lips against his. He kisses me back without hesitation. His large palm fisting into my hair to deepen our touch.
There’s a desperation in the way his mouth moves over mine. In the way his tongue swipes into my mouth, dragging against mine in thick, wet caresses.
It’s not a pretty kiss. No soft moans of pleasure or teasing flicks of a tongue. It’s messy and chaotic and altogether frantic. Longing exploding in our faces in our need to be as close as possible.
Ass sliding to the edge of the couch, my thighs press against his obliques. I swallow his rough groan, drinking it down like it’s only ever been mine. Like no one else has ever heard the ragged sound of need breaking from his eager lips.
Palm pressed into my spine, he lifts me from the couch, sliding backward. His ass to the carpet, my legs remain stuck to his sides, letting us feel his potent