Lexie didn’t give him the chance to do what he intended to do and that was put his lips to them. She did a face plant in his chest and he felt her body rear and her breath catch on more tears.
He let her hand go and wrapped both of his arms around her as she slid her face up and pressed it into his neck.
Then he waited. This jag didn’t last as long, she got a handle on it and he listened to her pull in steadying breaths. Then she lifted a hand and swiped at her face. Then she settled cheek to his shoulder. That was when he lifted a hand and slid her hair away from her face and off her neck, feeling its softness fall and glide down his shoulder and arm.
He missed that. He knew he missed it but having it back he realized he missed it.
Then he wrapped his arm around her again.
“Now, baby, tell me what you wanna take,” he said gently and heard her pull in another breath.
Then she asked, “Are you okay?”
His answer was immediate and he tightened his arms on her when he gave it. “Fuck yeah.”
He felt her smile against his skin before she lifted up and gave the smile to him visibly.
Then it faded slowly and she said, “I don’t mean now, honey, I mean with everything that’s going on.”
His head tilted slightly on the pillows. “Everything that’s going on?”
She bit her lip, hesitant, unsure and, f**k him, scared.
Fuck.
He gave her another squeeze and asked, “Baby, what the f**k?”
“With Tate,” she stated quickly and he got it. She was bringing up what bought her his anger and caused him to act like one serious dumb f**k, breaking her and nearly destroying them.
“Do not hesitate with that shit, mama,” he told her. “With me, do not hesitate with any shit.”
“Ty –” she said quietly, still unsure.
“Lex, do you think, six weeks without you, I didn’t learn my f**kin’ lesson?”
She blinked.
He kept going. “I learned, baby. Lived raw for six f**kin’ weeks, wasting my own goddamned life and yours. Downloading on-line divorce papers…” He shook his head, not going back there, not f**king there, doing that shit cost him too much, he couldn’t go back there. So he finished, “Fuck yeah, I learned.”
“Lived raw?” she whispered and he felt his brows draw together.
“Yeah, lived raw, the way a man lives when he f**ks up his own life and does it by hurting the woman he loves in a way he cannot fix. A man like that lives raw and I was a man like that.”
When he was done speaking he saw her lips were parted again but she just stared at him, silent.
“What?” he asked.
Lexie kept staring at him so he gave her a gentle shake.
“What?” he prompted.
“The woman he loves?” she breathed and it was his turn to blink.
Then he confirmed, “Yeah.”
“You love me?” she asked like it was a concept she’d never believe and her response shocked the shit out of him.
“Uh… yeah,” he answered. “Babe, a man like me who got f**ked like me doesn’t share, at all, unless he trusts who he’s sharin’ with, unless their opinion matters, unless they matter and the way I got f**ked, no way a man got f**ked that way would share with pu**y, any pu**y and you know that. But with you, I shared. You played me to distract me but I wasn’t hard to distract because I wanted your distraction. Spent five years with ninety-nine percent of my headspace taken up with my grand plan o’ vengeance, I get out, ready to take that on and a few days later I’m tourin’ fucking Vegas then headin’ to Moab and then at the f**kin’ garden center. I f**k up and lose you, I risk it all to go to Dallas to track you down and see to the errand of makin’ sure Shift gets where I’m at, will always be and I do it in a way he won’t forget and I do that by further breaking my parole, committing a crime and beatin’ the shit outta him and two of his crew. Two weeks later, I find out where you are and I pick up a phone and call a man who does not like me because, years ago, I took a f**kload of his money at a table but I know he’s got more money, lots of it. I also know he lives two hours away in Aspen and I know he’s got a private jet, the only hope I got of flyin’ cross country without getting tagged and sent back to California. Luck shines because this man may not like me but I lay it out for him, all of it, mama, and I find this f**kin’ guy is a f**kin’ romantic. He fuels up his jet, lies on flight logs sayin’ Tate Jackson is his passenger and flies me to f**kin’ Florida. This guy is so much of a f**kin’ romantic, I come back to the airstrip without you, swear to f**kin’ God, he looks near as devastated as me. Now, no man does all that for a woman he doesn’t love and definitely not a man like me.”