understanding as though he simply wanted to know everything there was to know about her. Her secrets, things she’d shared with no one. Things he wanted her to share—and trust—with him.
“Just one,” she choked out. “And it took me years to work up the courage. Years to stop feeling guilt that I was in some way betraying a man who in no way deserved my loyalty or fidelity and also because after him, I didn’t trust myself, my instincts, my choice in men. Because obviously my instincts had been all wrong. God, I was so stupid.”
“Stop,” he said harshly. “Just stop it, Eliza. Stop beating yourself up over the past. You can’t change it. It’s done and over with. But you can change the future. It’s not written in stone, no matter that you refuse to believe that and you believe that you’ve already set the course for your destiny and have no choice but to see it through to the bitter end. Your end. And I will not allow that. Not now. Not ever.”
“Why do you ask?” she asked defensively. “Why does it matter how many men I’ve slept with?”
“It matters because if you’ve only ever had sex with one other man, then I’d like to know why me. It’s obvious sex is not casual to you. Was I just someone you wanted to fuck you to make you forget? Was I a convenient dick? Would any man in the right place at the right time have done? Would he have satisfied you?”
She looked at him in horror, mortified by having her crass words thrown back at her, much the way she’d thrown them at him. It was no less than she deserved after the way she’d treated him. Like he had been a convenient dick and that she’d been using him as some sort of emotional crutch, but it hadn’t been that way. Not with Wade and she was at a loss as to explain why it had been different. Why he made her feel different. The way he made her feel scared her and made her feel vulnerable and open, as though he was the first person she’d ever let past her carefully constructed barriers. He was the first.
Seeming to sense her hesitation, Wade spoke. “You mean something to me, Eliza. I’m merely trying to ascertain whether I’m flying solo here or if maybe, just maybe, you aren’t as immune to me as you’d like me to think. That maybe you have feelings for me buried under all that animosity we both use as a shield, protecting ourselves from the truth of just how much we mean to one another.”
She froze, shoving her hands beneath the covers so he wouldn’t see how badly shaken she was. How his words gave her a ridiculous thrill, and worse, allowed her the forbidden comfort of hope. But he wasn’t fooled. He wasn’t a man to ever be easily fooled. His eyes softened with so much tenderness and understanding that it was all she could do not to dive into his arms and burrow as deeply beneath him as possible and hide from the world. Lean on him. Borrow his strength and invincibility because Eliza felt anything but invincible right now.
“Is it so hard to admit you feel something—anything—for me?” he asked with gentle patience she hadn’t thought him capable of.
She could swear she heard hurt and uncertainty in his voice, but that was impossible. Wade was made of stone. Impenetrable and at times so icy that he could make her shiver with one look. And he was nothing if not ultimately confident. He wore arrogance like others wore clothing. Why would he care how she felt about him? Why was he acting like it mattered and why did she feel as though so much hinged on her answering him honestly and that if she chose wrong, she stood to lose more than she ever imagined?
Because he cared for her.
She was still shaken by his admission, because he wasn’t a man to ever express his feelings and open himself up to rejection. How could she reject him when he’d put everything on the line for her?
He’d laid bare his soul and she’d given him nothing in return. Nothing at all. Not even her trust. He’d risked everything to come after her. Risked his life by refusing to back down and leave before Thomas discovered his presence. And Wade was not a man to ever put himself in a position of vulnerability.