Yes, he was obviously having a weird fucking therapy session with himself. “No.”
“Then why are you pulling away from her?”
“She lied to me.” Stubborn. Even the words were stubborn.
“She didn’t want to cause a scene,” Jessie shot back. “If she’d told you what that prick had said to her in the alley, what would you have done?”
He wanted to lie, but it would be stupid since he wouldn’t be lying to Jessie. She wasn’t really here. He would be lying to himself, and maybe he’d done enough of that. “I would have confronted him.”
“And she was trying to avoid that. She thought she’d taken care of the situation. She told his ass off and then walked away because she truly believed he wasn’t going to physically attack her again. She handled the situation, and bringing you into it would have made everything worse.”
“Because I would have lost my temper. Because I’m always looking for an excuse to lose my temper these days.”
“But she helps you be calm. He does, too.” Jessie’s eyes lit with mirth. “I was surprised by that. I wouldn’t have put you on that end of the Kinsey scale.”
“Yeah, I kind of held back on the kink with you. You weren’t interested in anything but pretty straightforward sex.”
“Was I? Or did we just never talk about it? Were we in our comfortable corners? Unwilling to do anything to screw up our status quo?”
“I think betraying your oath was going to screw up the status quo.”
She nodded. “And we’re right back to where we need to be. We’re right back to why I would have done anything to keep things the way they were. Anything but tell you the truth. Why? I need to hear you say it.”
He went stubbornly silent.
“You need to say it, Michael. You need to say it so you can forgive me.”
“I don’t want to forgive you.”
It was strange to see tears in her eyes. She never cried. Except she had that night. When she’d helped him to bed, there had been the glossy sheen of tears in her eyes.
Was he making that up? Was he misremembering? Trying to make the moment softer than it had truly been?
Did it fucking matter?
“No, baby, you don’t forgive yourself for not seeing who I was,” she said, quietly. “But it’s more complicated than the one-sided evil I appeared to be at the end. A human being is complex, and so is a relationship. You’ve spent two years punishing yourself for not seeing how I used you. Two years of telling yourself our relationship was predicated on a lie, and therefore you can’t trust any other relationship that came after because I never loved you. So why would I put everything at risk for the tiniest shot at you not finding out what I’d done?”
“I don’t know,” he insisted quietly, fighting the truth.
“Because I loved you. Because I wanted a life with you, a life that wouldn’t have worked because I was lying to you about who I was. I loved you. It might not have been the best love, but it was what I was capable of giving you. It was love. It just wasn’t enough. That doesn’t mean you can’t find a woman who can give you what you need, who needs what you can give.”
“How can I trust myself to know?” He asked the question without a shred of the anger he’d felt mere hours before. He’d said his rage had kept him warm, but that had been bullshit. His rage had kept him locked in ice. His rage had squashed any warmth he’d had in his soul, and only Lucy had been able to find a tiny ember.
Then Ty had helped her nurse the tiny bit of warmth.
“Because I did love you,” she said with certainty. “Because deep down you know I loved you. I made a mistake and it cost us. Are you going to let it wreck the rest of your life? That’s not the man you want to be.”
“How would you know the man I want to be?”
“Because I’m not me.” She chuckled softly. “You’re arguing with yourself. I’m a ghost. I don’t exist anymore. Not here. Not with you. I’m that piece of Jessie you’re holding on to. Maybe I’m the part of you who wants so badly to forgive.”
“Why should I forgive you?”
She stared at him for a second, a deep sympathy in her eyes.
He took a long breath. “Why should I forgive me?”
“That’s the right question. And you know the answer. You’re not all knowing. You are arrogant, and it’s costing you.”
“I don’t feel arrogant.” He felt weary.
“If a friend came to you in similar circumstances, how would you react? Would you tell your friend that he was responsible for someone else’s actions? Would you tell your friend that he obviously shouldn’t allow himself an ounce of happiness because he hadn’t seen what his girlfriend was doing?”