Thirty Six
Malia
THEHOTWATERRUNSover my body, relaxing my tense muscles. I have never apologized to anyone in my life except for my dad. Laying on Liam’s chest after I took from him like he took from me and verbally said that I was sorry. The feeling of regret is unfamiliar to me and tasted bitter on my tongue as the words passed my lips.
There’s so much Liam doesn’t know about me and who I am, what I’ve done. Our connection so viscerally strong that that’s essentially what sums up our… relationship? Beyond that he still has only seen and heard pieces of me.
And for the first time I know fear.
When the veil falls and he sees all of me and what he thinks he knows will he find regret? I don’t want to hide myself from him. Not again. To Liam Brenner I’m all or nothing, willing to try to open myself up for the first time in so long. Let him see every scar and broken piece of me.
The shower door opens and Liam steps in. Tension building back up as he steps into my back and wraps his arms around my waist. It’s odd to feel like a monster and still be cherished beyond the darkness. But I guess that’s what love is:
Acceptance despite the good, the bad, and the ugly.
Liam’s lips drop to the crook of my neck as I stand stiff in his hold. I shut down when I released the binds on his legs and came straight upstairs to get in the shower. He’s always been persistent, and I should’ve known he’d follow, even if he did give me a little bit to process everything and I appreciate the thought.
His arms tighten around me while we stand in silence. I can feel his need to speak and he’s probably expecting me to shut down again and push him away. I deserve that reaction; I just did twenty minutes ago.
“Tell me what’s going on in that beautifully chaotic mind of yours,” Liam finally says. He doesn’t push, just waits as I remain silent for a few moments longer.
“Exactly that, chaos,” I respond with a sigh.
He hums and spins me to face him, reaching up to hold my face between his large hands. His thumbs massage my cheeks while he searches my face. I stare into his icy pools, relishing in the peace in them. I’ve missed the way he would look at me like this. There’s no more regret and confusion. The man staring back at me knows exactly what he wants.
Me.
“I don’t know how to do this,” I admit.
A smile tugs at the corner of his full lips. He’s trimmed his beard again since the ball, back to the way I’ve always seen it before. My hands fall to his chiseled chest and I sigh.
“We don’t have to talk right now but wedoneed to, Little Warrior.” My chest squeezes at the nickname he originally gave me. After he found out who I was he called meCupcakejust to fuck me off. “Just don’t push me away.”
I shake my head; his hands fall from my face and rest on my hips. “You were supposed to be a job.” My gaze drops at his intense stare penetrating the most vulnerable parts of me. “Lying to you wasn’t a choice, Liam. I had to get close to you, I didn’t expect…”
The words get lost as my throat tightens not being able to say them. I’m not ready until I know he’s not a temporary fixture in my life.
Liam lifts my chin, forcing me to look at him, green bleeding into blue as it should be. “You didn’t expect what?” He knows what I can’t say and he gives me a tight smile. “You don’t have to say it.”
His heart rate had picked up in anticipation in hope I would mutter those words to him. I need him to understand how just apologizing to him alone was a lot for me to do.
“I know you had no choice but to lie about who you are. I forgive you, baby,” he adds.
The tension bleeds from me as his forgiveness settles, my body melts into him. The pad of Liam’s thumb sweeps back and forth on my skin while he leans down and claims my lips.
It’s a soft kiss, nothing desperate like he has always kissed me before. Our lips move together, tangling our tongues, savoring each other for the first time since we met. My arms wrap around his neck, allowing him to deepen the kiss, only he pulls back and smiles.
“I always knew you were going to be mine, Malia,” he says through light pecks. “And I guess I should apologize as well.”
I lean away, searching his face for whatever he thinks he needs to apologize for. He’s never lied to me, I’m the one who hurt him.
He chuckles softly and it’s the sexiest thing I’ve ever heard—a deep rumble in his chest. “I need to apologize because if I hadn’t let something like that come between us we wouldn’t have lost anymore time together. I should’ve spent that time proving to you everything I promised before Mila became Malia. For that I’m sorry.”
Liam pulls me into an embrace, ducking his head into my neck and bites down onto my ear. “I still love you, Malia, and I don’t think I could ever stop,” he whispers. “Let me fade away into the gray with you and stand by your side.”
He pulls back and claims my lips again this time in a bruising kiss. His hand glides across my stitches, letting his thumb rub against the incision.
“Do you have any idea how worried I was when that building blew?” he asks through peppered kisses down my jaw and neck.