Came Back Haunted (Experiment in Terror #10) - Karina Halle Page 0,92
this from me? You’re supposed to tell me everything. After you were so fucking angry at me because I didn’t tell you about Samantha, now you expect to get away with this? That you’re allowed to keep this from me and it’s all fine? It’s not fine, Dex.”
He swallows audibly, his eyes watering, his hands still holding me in place with all his strength. I couldn’t move even if I wanted to.
“I did what I thought was best and I’m sorry that I was wrong,” he says, voice breaking. “I wanted to honor your father Perry. He’s my father now, too. He’s the closest thing I have to family, and he confided in me. He pulled me aside and confided in me over his own daughters. Like I really was his son.”
The rage inside is tempered, just a bit.
“I trusted you,” I whisper. “I trusted you to keep me safe.”
Now I’ve broken him. He seems to crumble before my eyes. “I’m really trying, baby,” he says, pleading. “I’m trying so hard to keep you safe.”
And that’s when I realize what a fucking burden I am.
No wonder the me in the bathtub did what she did.
One less person to worry about.
I close my eyes, my hate spreading from him to me, until I’m hating us both, and from such a deep, dark place, that I don’t think I’ll ever crawl out.
“Perry,” he whispers, putting his hands on my face. “Please. Please don’t go down this hole, don’t let it win.”
“Let what win?” I whisper.
“Your depression,” he says hoarsely. “I know what it looks like. I know what it feels like. I know that it’s not always the thing right in front of you, the thing that’s haunting you, but it’s something deeper.”
“You’re saying Samantha is all in my head?”
“No baby. No. She’s real. She’s very real. But so is this darkness within you. I feel it. I know it as intimately as I know my own. And I know we can get you out of it. Just, please, don’t turn away from me. Not now.”
I open my eyes, tears running down my face now. “You broke my trust, Dex.”
His chin trembles, his fingers pressing into my skin, eyes wild. “I know I did, baby. I know and I’m sorry. I was wrong. I should have told you from the start, I know I should have. I just didn’t know how to honor your father and you at the same time.”
“You’re supposed to honor your wife first,” I whisper. “Especially when it involves her life.”
He nods, licking his lips anxiously, still looking so pained. “I know. All your father wanted was for me to protect you. And I couldn’t even do that.”
There’s a sharp pinch in my chest, the kind that wants you to keel over.
This man loves me so fucking much. I can’t let anything cloud that. I have to find that again. I have to believe it.
“You’re doing all you can,” I whisper. “You’ve done so much for me, Dex. I’m sorry I said those things. I didn’t mean it. I don’t hate you.”
He gives me a sad smile. “I know you didn’t. But that doesn’t mean it didn’t kill me to hear it. Please don’t ever say that again.”
“I won’t.” I lift my head so it’s resting back against the tree, my eyes going to the branches above. “I’m just…so angry, Dex. It scares me. I’m angry and tired and I’m scared and…I’m just so tired of being scared all the time.” I try to swallow. “I felt like I was so close to getting everything I wanted and then…it was taken from me.”
Dex runs his hands over my hair, over my face, cupping my chin. “I’m still here.”
I lower my face and stare at him, overwhelmed by every emotion under the sun, my mind clearly not thinking straight. “Kiss me,” I tell him for the second time tonight. But this time I’m begging.
Flames run through his eyes.
Then he kisses me.
His lips bruising mine, the back of my head pressed against the tree, the bark in my hair. Whereas our kiss from earlier was soft and sensual, this one is rough, and raw, and panicked. As if there’s some hourglass somewhere that’s just been flipped over and we’re running out of time.
Maybe we are.
“I’m still mad at you,” I murmur as his mouth goes to my neck and he grabs my ass, lifting me up until I’m pressed against the tree.