We were on prison property, but this room was neutral ground.
I crossed my arms. “Nope.”
“Nope?”
“Just nope.”
He frowned. “What?”
“I’m not going to let you ruin this.”
Anger etched his face. “Let me ruin this?” He pointed at me. “You’re the one ruining it.”
I threw my hands up. “How exactly am I ruining this? We have an entire night together. We should be tangled almost at an orgasm by now, but you’re the one who pulled away and complicated things.”
He stood, raking fingers through his hair with a rage that sent my heart grabbing a white flag of surrender. “Don’t, Elle. Don’t start a fight you can’t win.”
“Oh, it’s a fight now?”
How had this veered off course so badly?
But maybe...maybe that was what we needed?
We’d never had a fight. We’d started under false pretenses and then been torn apart before we could reconcile them. I still had unresolved frustration at being lied to. He still had issues from the past. Everything I knew about Penn was obscure and given to me by third parties.
The more I searched inside—past the guilt at being the reason why he was locked up, beyond the drive to get him free, was anger.
I thought I’d let it go. That I’d forgiven him for treating me as if I was nothing. That I understood why he’d been a jerk.
But...I haven’t.
The anger still burned, bright and red and throbbing with explosives ready to spread shrapnel far and wide.
“It’s not a fight if you just leave. Go home where I know you’re safe.” He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I don’t want you here, Elle.”
I understood his pride. His desire for me not to see him caged like an animal. But at the same time, he had to get over that. This was our life—for however long the gods in power wanted to play with us mere mortals.
He couldn’t take the brief moments of happiness we might find and throw them in the gutter.
“What about what I want?”
His head whipped up. “What about it?”
My eyes burned with tears, but they were rage-filled tears. Tears I could hold back and swallow while I spoke the words clambering over one another to be spoken. “Don’t I get a say in any of this?”
“Any of what?” His jaw clenched. “You’re not the one locked up, so don’t—”
“You’re right. I’m not. But I am the one paying for what I failed to do three years ago.”
All the oxygen evaporated.
I couldn’t breathe.
Penn didn’t breathe.
We stood in solid gravity, waiting for life to return.
When it did, it smashed into us, and everything we’d held back—all the truths we daren’t speak and accusations we daren’t think ricocheted like bullets.
Penn shouted, “You want to go there, Elle? Fine, we’ll fucking go there.”
I shouted, “You still blame me for not finding you. That I wasn’t there when Larry helped earn your freedom.”
Penn snarled. “You pretended to be poor. You broke into Central Park with me, you fucking kissed me—you lied to me the entire time I fell for you.”
I snarled. “Larry told me you came to visit me the night you were released. That you left with my necklace and returned with my necklace. I never saw you that night. Where were you? What made you refuse to see me?”
Penn growled, “I did come find you, I admit. I wanted to return that damn sapphire you’d mentioned. I’d thought about you every day for nine months. You were my happy place, the reason I didn’t let Twig get to me. I let myself fall in love with a lie, and when I went to your house, and you were there with Greg and your father and a maid providing everything your hearts desired, I saw everything I thought I knew about you was false.”
I growled, “So you created my backstory on one voyeur through a window? You hated that I had money—”
“I hated that you were fucking rich and hadn’t used that power to find me. I didn’t expect you to. I never thought it would truly happen. But dreams are brutal friends, Elle. I lost count how many fucking times I dreamed of you in a tiny studio, cooking meals for one, pining for me like I was pining for you. Only to find out you were fucking loaded. A spoiled little brat.”
Oh, my God, he called me a brat!
After years of toiling and sweat equity for that company.
I yelled, “Is that why you were a jerk to me? You thought I was a spoiled rich bitch who deserved to be lied to? Deserved to have her virginity stolen by an egotistical, unfeeling bastard...to what? Teach me a lesson?”
He yelled, “Yes, all right? I wanted to hurt you. I wanted to take that privileged little ass and make it mine. I wanted to control you just like you’d controlled me for years without knowing.”
My heart literally broke in two, blood rivered in despair.
I shook my head. “So from the very beginning, you chased me, not because of attraction or because you felt something for me, but because of hate? A damn vendetta?”
He shook his head. “It started that way, but the entire time I was lying to you, I was lying to myself more.”
My anger spluttered; my heart grabbed a bandage. “What do you mean?”
He sighed. “I mean that I wanted to hurt you. I wanted to make you pay for things you didn’t have any reason to pay for. I was angry. I was an idiot. I thought I could fuck you and then walk away.” Coming toward me, he held out his hand. He knew better than to touch me, allowing me to make that choice to build a link.
I did so. Hesitantly.
The moment our fingers knotted together, he exhaled in a rush. “Dammit. I ruined this, didn’t I?” He rubbed his forehead as if all the tension of our fight appeared as a headache. “I’m...confused, Elle. I’m so fucking strung up over you, but at the same time, I’m just waiting for you to end it. You should end it. You should walk away, and a part of me wants you to walk away. I’ve been nothing but a bastard, and now, I’m locked in here. You can do so much better.”
His stoic frame shook violently. “You don’t see what I do, Elle. What I’m turning you into. You used to be so pure, and I’m...ruining you. I’ve trapped you in this life when really I should be cruel to you, so you’ll leave me to my own fuck ups.”
His honesty about hating me came full circle with his admission about why.
He was confused. I was confused. Just like every couple who ever had to climb over a few stumbling blocks was confused.
That was romance.
It wasn’t paint-by-numbers or color within the lines. It was messy and scribbly and up to us to draw it how we wanted.
I’d forgiven him the moment he admitted he was hurting.
Taking the argument and turning it into confession, I said, “Despite what you think, I did try to find you. Every day for months, I called police stations. I asked David to hire private investigators to learn your name. I even hired a sketch artist to draw a likeness of you, so people didn’t laugh me out of offices when I mentioned I had no idea who you were but had to help you.”
Penn’s face shattered. “You did?”
“Not a single day went by that I didn’t have guilt on my thoughts. I fell for you, too. I think that’s why I fought you so much when you came back. I couldn’t stomach the thought that I could be attracted to another when I was still hung up on Nameless.”
He swallowed, shaking his head slightly as if he wanted to take every nasty thing he’d done and destroy it.
I wished he could.
I wished we could go back to the night we’d met again at the Weeping Willow, and he’d pulled me into his arms to whisper about Central Park and chocolate kisses.
“You called me Nameless?”
I laughed under my breath. The angry tension snapped, leaving a calm rain-battered landscape in its wake. “What else could I call you?”
“I had no idea you tried to find me.”
He closed his eyes, tormented and full of regret. “Christ, I ruined everything.”
“No, you didn’t,” I murmured, staring into his haunted gaze. “You just complicated it a little.” Brushing my skirt with suddenly nerve-damp fingers, I added, “But you can’t tell me what to do, Penn. Just like you couldn’t pretend you were something you weren’t.”
I closed the distance between us. “I agree you screwed up. You should’ve given me a chance when you first came to find me. You should’ve trusted in what you felt that night and let me explain.”
His throat worked as he swallowed. “I’m an idiot.”
“You’re not. You’re just not used to trusting people.”
“If I trust you, Elle, I give you everything I have. I don’t—I don’t know if I can.”
I squeezed my fingers with his. He reluctantly squeezed me back, then almost crippled me with pressure-filled apology.
I brought our joined hands to my mouth and kissed his knuckles. “You have to. Because I’ve already given you everything I have. Even if we end up killing each other, you have every piece of me.”
Penn smiled sadly, utterly solitary and unreachable. “I don’t deserve that.”
He said it as if rejecting my gift.
I’d come here to be connected, yet at that moment, all I felt was loneliness. It wasn’t just physical distance this time but emotional. Penn successfully tugged on all my self-doubt and made me wish things could’ve been different.
That we’d clung to each other that first night.
That I’d been honest and he’d been honest, and we’d fought for each other.
But things weren’t different and could never be.
We had to fight for our future, not what went wrong in our past.
“I can’t have that responsibility,” he whispered. “I can’t let you give me what I’ve always wanted when I don’t fucking deserve it.”
“But you do—”
His lips twisted into a snarl. “I don’t. I was wrong, okay? You were never spoiled. I know how hard you work for your company. I see how much you dote on your father. I understand how Belle Elle and its staff wouldn’t exist without you. You’re so much better than any dream version I could’ve created of you, and that...well, it fucking terrifies me.”
He looked at the floor, severing our connection. “That night in the limo...I was going to break it off. Hell, I was supposed to break it off with you the first time I let you walk out of my apartment without me and almost got hurt by that asshole on the street. I told myself I didn’t care what happened to you. I’d got what I wanted. You’d gotten what you wanted. We were through. But that fucking night three years ago.”
He squeezed my fingers. “I can’t explain it. Maybe I was so lonely I would’ve fallen for anyone who treated me with kindness. Perhaps, I would’ve handed over my soul to the first girl who saw past my rags and lack of riches and kissed me. But I don’t think that’s true. It was you, Elle.” His eyes shone with dark passion. “I fell for you the second I met you. I don’t care if that’s idiotic or improbable; it’s true. The one piece of truth I could never hide with the countless lies I told. I just—”
His head hung. His fingers spasmed. “I’m sorry.”
All my fight trickled away.
I walked into his embrace, slotting myself neatly into him as he rested his chin on my scalp. “I’m sorry, too. I’m sorry I didn’t find you. I’m sorry I left you.”
“You have nothing to apologize for.”
“I do.” I kissed his t-shirt over his heart, doing my best not to inhale the scent of imprisonment and cheap detergent. “And I might as well apologize for this, too.”
He pulled away, searching my eyes. “For what?”
“For this.” Standing on my tiptoes, I pulled his head down to mine.
My lips slotted over his, and I held on, linking my fingers tight around his nape as he tried to yank away. “Kiss me.” I fed into his mouth. “Trust me.” I poured down his throat.
We needed this now more than ever.
We’d ripped off scabs over old wounds. We needed to heal them rather than let them scar.
“Elle—” His hands landed on my hips, holding me firm. “Stop...” His voice said one thing, but his mouth said another. Slowly, he turned from stiff to pliant, unyielding to full participant.
His head tilted, angling me closer, kissing me deeper.
My anxiety quickened then lessened. My need thickened then loosened.
This was our night.
I wouldn’t let him steal it.
“If we do this, there’s no turning back...you understand?” He broke the kiss, whispering so soft my ears strained to catch it. “You let me have you, then you accept that I might never get out of here. That you’ll forever be restricted to a lover who can’t touch you, hug you, hang out and watch movies with you. If you stay, that’s it...the sum future I can offer you.”
He brushed his lips over mine. “I’m giving you a way out, Elle. Say the word, and I’ll let you go. It will fucking kill me. You’ll rip my heart out, and I’ll die in here, but at least I’ll be happy knowing you were free. Leave me, Elle. Don’t let me get away with stealing yet more from you.”
He was so open, so ardent.
He didn’t have a clue he just glued me to him for the rest of my life.
My lips twitched. I hid my smile for as long as I could before it crept over me. “Tell me one thing. Then I’ll make my choice.”
He swallowed hard as if bracing himself for me to walk out of this room and take him up on his offer. But even in his terror, he nodded with shoulders braced. There stood Nameless, not Penn. The man in the hoodie who drove off two men to protect me. He’d drive himself off, too, if it meant protecting me from him.
That’s what he’s trying to do by refusing to sleep with me tonight.
Well, it wouldn’t work.
He was mine. Simple.
“Tell me you don’t love me.” I placed both palms on his chest. His muscles beneath my fingertips rose and fell with rapid breath. “Look me in the eyes and tell me you don’t love me and I’ll go. I’ll leave you alone.”
He crumpled. The answer blared so loud and bright it filled the entire room. It didn’t matter he’d said it already with admitting he’d fallen for me three years ago. I let him verbalize, so we both knew he could never take it back. That he willingly admitted that despite wanting to live in an ideal world with picnics and vacations and lazy Sundays in bed, we might never have that. This might be our world with precious conjugal visits and achingly hard visitation.
But love would overcome that.
It had to.
Because I didn’t want, couldn’t stomach the thought of loving anyone else.
Finally, his shoulders realigned into confident, not angry. His spine unlocked. His face shed its mask, and his voice said what his eyes had all along.
“I can’t tell you that.” His hand cupped my cheek, his thumb running along my bottom lip. “I can’t tell you I don’t love you because that’s not true. It’s never been true.” He tipped forward, kissing me so, so soft. “I love you, Elle. I’m obsessed with you, consumed by you. You make me crazy and not necessarily in good ways. But I can’t lie to you anymore. I love you. So fucking much it kills me.”
My smile was sunshine and hot days as I kissed him back. “Then trust that. Trust that I love you, too. Trust that whatever happens, we’ll fight it together. Turn off that voice inside you that’s trying to screw everything up. Just trust like you’ve told me to do so many times before.”
He nuzzled into my neck. “You’re bossy as well as nosy.”
I laughed softly. “You bring out the worst in me.”
His eyes filled with intensity. “Yet you bring out the best in me.”
“Guess that means we’re perfect for each other.” My lip trembled, happiness overflowing.
Penn frowned, kissing me gently. �
�Suddenly, you don’t look convinced.”
“I am convinced. Completely. I’m just—” More truth bubbled, and I blurted, “I’m so afraid of losing you. That I’m the reason why you’re in here, and I don’t know if I have the power to get you out.”
“Hey...” He captured my cheeks with both hands, holding me tight. “You have power over me. That’s all you ever need.”
“Does that mean I can command you to spend the night with me, and you have to obey?”
A sly grin transformed him from serious to player. “Are you asking me to fuck you, Ms. Charlston?”
I nodded. “Again and again, Mr. Everett. Multiple times. Will you?”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Penn
I’D TRIED TO do the right thing.
I really fucking had.
The thought of having Elle in this place turned me right off, but kissing her blueberry-glossed lips and knowing she had nothing on underneath her skirt scrambled with my right and wrong.
My brain had had its chance at ending this.
Our fight had had its opportunity to push her away.
Our connection hadn’t ended, and she hadn’t gone.
That left only one thing to do.
“When it comes to you, Elle, I’ll do whatever you damn well want.” I kissed her softly, keeping my desires in check this time.
I couldn’t believe how quickly I’d pounced on her before. I’d been a fucking animal. She’d arranged this for us. The least I could do was make it good for her rather than a three-second humping against the wall.
“How long do we have?” I murmured as her hands slid around my waist, gripping me close.
My tongue massaged hers. My heart thundered as she moaned. “Twelve hours.”
“Really?” I could do so much to her in that amount of time. It would be the longest we’d ever spent together consecutively. Which, in the scheme of how many months we’d been ‘dating,’ was an embarrassment.
She pulled away, looking up. Eyes shining, lips bruised, skin flushed. The tank she wore showed the lacy indentations of her bra, revealing the pinpricks of her nipples, encasing her tiny waist in cotton just begging me to rip it off her.
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