“Why are you angry?” The hollow sensation in the base of her throat was spreading into her chest cavity, growing too big to suppress or ignore.
“Because you didn’t tell me yourself. Why didn’t you?”
Something broke inside her, sending a flood of anguished emotion through her. Not at the knowledge her mother was dead, but at the other knowledge that had struck like a blow when she had considered telling Gabriel.
“I didn’t think you’d care.”
He closed his eyes in a way that suggested she had run him through.
“I’m not trying to make you feel guilty,” she muttered, biting her lip. “I’m not trying to make you feel anything.”
“And yet I feel like hell,” he bit out. “She doesn’t deserve your grief, Luli.”
“I know that.” She realized she was convulsively opening and shutting the clasp on her purse. She threw it into a chair.
“And yet you still grieve.”
“That’s why you’re angry? I can’t help how I feel, Gabriel!”
“Neither can I! That’s why I’m angry. At myself. I knew immediately that you’d be hurting and I wasn’t here for you.”
“You hurt me,” she reminded wildly, instantly plunged back into the despair of their last conversation.
“I know that,” he thundered. “I stood there and saw that I was turning a knife in you exactly as you are turning one in me right now. I hate that we can do this to each other.”
Her eyes grew wet. She turned away, thinking that she had known this was coming, but she couldn’t bear it. “Please don’t say it,” she begged, agonized.
“Say what? That I love you? I do. I love you, Luli.”
Her heart swerved. “What?”
She came around cautiously, dizzy, certain she had misheard. “I thought you were going to say it’s over.”
“Like hell. This will never be over.” He dragged in a tormented breath, face contorting with pained acceptance. “I have never wanted to say those words to anyone. I knew it would be pure torture to feel it.”
She inhaled at that gut punch.
He closed the distance in a few strides and picked up her hands, holding on to them when she tried to pull away.
“Love forces you to feel that other person’s heartbeat. When they cry, you cry. When you hurt them, that pain comes back on you tenfold.” He drew her closer, so he cupped her hand against his heart and cradled the side of her face with his other palm.
“But when they’re happy, you’re so happy you can’t contain it. When they give you their heart, there isn’t enough room in your own body for both. You have to give up yours or the imbalance will break both of you.”
“You have my heart.”
“I know. It’s better than the one I had.” His thumb grazed her cheek in a tender caress. “Lighter, softer. God knows it’s prettier. Take mine. Fix it. Make it shine.”
She had to bite her lips to steady them. Her eyes were so wet, she could hardly see the light gleaming in his gaze, but she felt it beaming through her, filling her until she glowed. “It’s just rusty,” she choked. “But it works.”
“You make me happy, Luli. Too happy. If I ever lose you, I’ll become the emotional cripple my father became. That terrifies me.” His expression spasmed with deep emotion. “But pushing you away is killing me. I cannot bear the pain of hurting you.”
It didn’t escape her that he was giving her the one thing he had never wanted to give up. She was awed by the gift of his love and could only return it with the embrace of her arms, the press of her lips to his, the promise of forever that pulsed in her heart.
“Say it,” he whispered against her cheek.
“I love you, Gabriel. I love you with every breath in my body. I always will.”
“I love you, too. Infinitely.”
Their words seemed to infuse the air around them, gaining strength from the whispers and friction of their two bodies embracing. From the meeting of their soft gazes across the narrow space, and the unspoken desire that had them moving to the bedroom in perfect accord to celebrate their union in the most ancient and exalted of forms.