Love In Slow Motion (Love Beyond Measure #2) - E.M. Lindsey Page 0,32

avoiding him,” Ilan said when Fredric had no answer. “And he knows you’re fine, but he hasn’t ever been this far from you before. You’ve got to take pity on him.”

Fredric chuckled as he polished off the first taco, then sat back with a sigh. “I’ll send him a text, at least.”

“Oh my god, listen to you. Send him a text.” Ilan kicked him under the table. “What the hell has gotten into you.”

Fredric grinned widely. “I’m also on an app.”

“…a what now?”

“This dating app. My sweet little neighbor and her boyfriend set me up. You post a profile, and you send messages and…”

“I know what a fucking dating app is,” Ilan snapped. “Jesus, are they trying to get you date raped? Give me your phone.”

“Excuse me, Dad,” Fredric snapped, and he heard Ilan recoil. “I do, in fact, know what I’m doing.”

“I…fuck,” Ilan breathed. “I’m sorry, god. It’s just, there are some really shitty people on these things.”

Fredric shook his head. “Tonight was proof of that.”

“Yes, but worse, okay? Worse than some asshole making dick sucking pantomimes at a stranger across the restaurant.”

Fredric nearly choked on his beer, wiping his mouth before he could speak again. “Is that what he was doing?”

“Well…no. But it was just as bad. And I know you can do this, but Fredric…”

“Don’t,” he warned.

“This isn’t about you being blind, or even old, okay? This is about how the world is garbage, and you just got out of an abusive marriage.”

Fredric stilled. “What does that have to do with anything?”

Ilan was quiet for a very long moment—long enough that Fredric started to fear he was about to get very, very angry. “I don’t pretend to know what dating is like. You and I both know that I was…not made for love.”

“Ilan,” Fredric whispered, but he felt a soft touch on the back of his hand, and he stopped.

“Since I was a kid, I watched her strip you down and make you unsure if you were even capable of living without her, let alone existing as a person who deserved to be loved. And I admire the hell out of you for getting there on your own. I wish…” He heard Ilan swallow thickly. “I wish I could be half the man you are. But anyone you date after this is going to seem like a god, Fredric. Because she set the bar so fucking low, it was six feet beneath the earth.”

“You think I won’t see it,” Fredric rasped, and Ilan’s hand tightened on his.

“You’ll see it, but it won’t seem so bad. Not compared to her. And you deserve the world. You deserve someone to lasso the moon and pull down the stars so you can run your hands over them and have more than just rain drops on a tin roof. You deserve someone who isn’t just willing, but wants to drop to their knees and make sure you know that every day with you is precious.”

Fredric’s throat was tight, and he didn’t trust himself to speak, because he wanted love—to be loved, to give it—but he was still too terrified to voice aloud that yes, this was what he was looking for. Every word Ilan had just given, like a gift, was everything he was too petrified to ask for. Because for all that those words wrapped around him and treated him like a thing worthy of being called precious, he wasn’t sure he’d ever deserve it.

He knew he was abused. He knew that Jacqueline had spent their marriage gaslighting and insulting and isolating him until he didn’t know up from down. And he knew that it had taken years for him to trust himself as a person, a spouse, a father. But in the process, his son had gotten hurt, and how could he forgive himself for that?

How could he allow himself to have something that good? How could he make up for those past mistakes and actually deserve it?

“I’m not here to tell you what to do,” Ilan said. “I’m not going to hold your hand and pretend like you’re not capable of finding someone. I just don’t want you to do this alone.”

Fredric breathed, then he turned his palm and took Ilan’s hand. Touching, for him, was looking, feeling the subtle way Ilan’s fingers shook, and his palm sweat. He could tell that it had taken every ounce of pride and love Ilan had to say all of that.

“I’m not alone,” Fredric said. “I promise. Tonight would have ended